Nearly every internet-connected home or office has wifi or a wireless network connection. Wifi or wireless networks are modern standards of mobility and accessibility for every home, small office, and enterprise network. Recent news and blog posts about wifi security suggests to use the latest wifi security method - WPA2.
Wifi security through WPA2 is the recommended standard over the old WEP. In brief, the WEP security method is obsolete and easily “hackable”. For the occasionally cautious internet subscriber, to the adamant Network Administrator, finding out who exactly is connected to your wifi network is a big concern of security. While WPA2 wifi passwords are not easily hacked, leakage of the actual password is still possible through simple word of mouth, wrong email or im message of the password.
Use
Wireless Network Watcher to quickly view the devices that are connected on your wireless network. Occasionally using Wireless Network Watcher to check on wireless devices adds a second layer of security. It ensures that your wifi password is permitted only to authorized computers.
Download
Wireless Network Watcher from
http://www.nirsoft.net/utils/wireles...rk_watcher.html Wireless Network Watcher is a free and portable program. Simply extract the zip file, and run it. It detects your active wireless adapter, and quickly searches the wireless network for connected devices.
The simplicity of this software is its major strength. It quickly scans the wireless network, shows connected devices, and lists details. There are no other options to configure!
- IP Address – a unique temporary address that your computer gains whenever it is connected to a network
- Computer name – a name or alias that you can use to identify your computer from others in the network
- MAC Address – a fixed address that is unique to your computer’s wireless or Ethernet card. This is your computer’s most unique identifying fingerprint.
- Brand and provider of the wireless device’s MAC address
You can export the list of detected devices into an HTML file. You can run the tool occasionally and compare daily for any new devices that may have gotten into your network.
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Of course, the first and strongest layer of wifi security is a combination of
- WPA or WPA2 security
- A long and complex password
WPA or WPA2 is the recommended wifi security method. Or course, a longer password for either WPA or WPA2 is the main security lock. Do not be fazed with the task of inventing and remembering a long password. Choose simple word phrases or even song lyrics will do.
Passwords can be as long as the wireless router allows, and should be as easy to remember and to type:
P@sswordToDomsHomeWifi42011
never-gonna-give-you-UP-never-gonna-let-you-DOWN!!!1
For suggestions on good passwords:
http://www.syschat.com/how-to-choose...word-6837.html
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In addition, for those of you who have access to the wireless router, you can also check the DHCP client list.
Check the DHCP client list. Use
Wireless Network Watcher to gain more information and match the detected devices. If you suspect that some devices might have gained unauthorized access, you can proceed to enforce tighter security with MAC address permissions.
You can choose to allow or deny the list of MAC addresses.
With the information of MAC addresses and matching computer names gathered from Wireless Network Watcher, list the MAC addresses that you would like to permit on your wireless network.
