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Wireless Networks
1. Protect your home wireless network with an encryption key
What is an encryption key, and why do I need one?
A wireless encryption key is like a password that allows you to access a particular wireless network. If you don’t have the necessary encryption key, you won’t be able to connect to that wireless network.
If you connect to the Internet via a wireless connection in your home, the wireless signal for your network will almost certainly extend well beyond the bounds of your house and garden (unless you have a mansion rather than a house, and grounds rather than a garden). This means that any of your neighbours, or indeed anyone sitting outside your house with a wireless laptop, could connect to your wireless network. As well as being connected to the Internet, they would also be able to access your own computer via the network, meaning that they could steal or delete your data, plant viruses, or whatever. Even if you have nice neighbours you trust, you still need to consider the hacker sitting in a car parked outside your house. Using a wireless encryption key means that only people who know the key can access your network, thus keeping hackers out.
How do I know if my wireless network is protected?
Essentially, if an encryption key has been set up on your network, you will need to enter the key the first time a particular computer connects to it wirelessly. If you have never had to put a key in to connect to your wireless network, or if friends and family can bring their laptops to your home and connect without a key, it means you are not protected.
What should I do if my network doesn’t have an encryption key?
It would be too complicated to explain here how to set up an encryption key for your home network. The best thing to do is to ask a technically adept friend or family member, or employ a local home computer support service. You should ask whoever does this to use a high level of encryption (we suggest WPA2), as lower levels such as WEP are easy to crack.
2. Be careful when connecting to public wireless networks with your laptop
What are the risks of connecting to a public network in a café or hotel?
When you are out and about with your laptop, and use the wireless network in a public place to connect to the Internet, you are joining your laptop to a network shared with a lot of people you don’t know. There is a risk of hackers accessing your laptop through this network. This applies even if you have to put in an encryption key supplied by the hotel etc, because all the other guests will be using the same key and be on the same network.
What should I do to keep secure when using a public network?
If you have Windows Vista on your laptop, when you connect to a new network, it will ask you what sort of network it is: Home, Work, or Public. Make sure that you always select Public. If you do this, Windows automatically configures its firewall etc so that nobody can access your computer over the network.
If you have Windows XP, it’s not so simple. The safest solution is not to connect to public networks. However, if you decide that you really need to connect, configure your firewall to block all incoming traffic. For Windows XP’s own firewall, go to Control Panel, Windows Firewall, tick the box marked “Don’t allow exceptions”, and click OK.
