Freeware and instructions to increase wi-fi security?

Tek7 (Legacy)

Tek7 (Legacy)

CGA & ToJ President
Time for all those wi-fi gurus to step up and help out the community.

I'm looking for a list of free software and instructions to help increase wi-fi security. I already have my wireless router set up using a Shared Key and 128-bit WEP encryption.

What software and additional instruction do you experts out there recommend for securing my wireless network?
 
I enable encription and use a randomly generated key.

Also I change the SSID to something non default, and after all my computers are connected, I tell my router to not broadcast the SSID (show your network's name publicly.)

Also, most if not all routers have the capability of allowing only certain MAC addresses. This will restrict access to machines that have MAC addresses you've approved previously which when combined with everything else, makes it darn near impossible to obtain access.

I don't use any software, just the web interface that comes with the router. I'm also far from a guru, but I think I have most of it covered.

Tek7 said:
Time for all those wi-fi gurus to step up and help out the community.

I'm looking for a list of free software and instructions to help increase wi-fi security. I already have my wireless router set up using a Shared Key and 128-bit WEP encryption.

What software and additional instruction do you experts out there recommend for securing my wireless network?
Click to expand...
 
Yeah, go WPA if you can...

Also, shut off DHCP on your router, set your network to static, set the default gateway and netmask to non default. Then manually configure the network adapters on your network, and turn off PNP and SSID.

That way, if someone finds the network, they have to know the network name, then crack the code, then know 6 ip numbers to get onto the network and use it.

You can even go further, and deny access to a range of IPs, such as you use 192.168.1.100 to 192.168.1.103, you can deny access to network from 192.168.1.104 to 192.168.1.255.

Leave off remote access via 8008 port, and change the default router password.
 
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I don't use any encryption at all. It'll slow things down and can still be hacked by intercepting packets.

Instead, I've renamed the SSID and turned off it from broadcasting, like techwhosaysnee said. Then I only allow computers to connect based upon their MAC address. Completely impossible to break in. Don't need anything extra.

If, however, you want to boost your wireless signal, there are generally firmware hacks or upgrades you can install that let you control that depending on your router.
 
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Boosting wireless signal will usually fry a router.

Default of 50%, set any higher without the proper cooling will fry it and it usually takes custom firmware flashes to access that setting. Or if you know how to telnet into router.
 
From what I understand, yes, it does affect the speed. It just isn't as much an issue with modern routers. http://www.speedguide.net/faq_in_q.php?category=91&qid=156

It also depends on which setting you put it on. Many people have had problems with WPA-TKIP, but not WPA-AES.

For the firmware, it depends on your router. Linksys usually has great support in the community and the firmware is pretty good. My router came at the default Xmit power of 28, which is pretty weak and wouldn't broadcast to the other side of the house (house is large, but yeah). Anything 80 and below is considered safe. Right now I have it at 50 and it's doing great.

About the mac address security, it is possible to spoof a mac address and get in, but they'll have to guess one of the 12 digit number/letter combinations allowed. Extra WPA is always an option, but I don't know that it is necessary unless you are paranoid someone is trying to get in.
 
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well 1st chane the router name from defalt, it is hard to keep stuff safe me and my frend do some wardriving (we dont do aneything ilegal) andand sometimes we can crack wifi in a day to a week so now days it is very hard to keep things safe
 
hescominsoon said:
come try to hack any wireless network i have setup. i'll give you the addresses to sit in front of..:)
Click to expand...


haha that would be fun, id love to but its kinda hard wifi hacking from atlest 1000 miles away let alone 1000 ft
 
Pfft, I could write a java program to randomly generate a key that large and keep going till it makes a match... it would take a lot of programming, but its just a bunch of if else statements and true falses.
 
Talon said:
Pfft, I could write a java program to randomly generate a key that large and keep going till it makes a match... it would take a lot of programming, but its just a bunch of if else statements and true falses.
Click to expand...
Well, sure, anyone that knows a programming language can do that. But there are just so many possible combinations. I'm not up on my statistics studies, but I think it'd look like this:

(95 * 63)!

where:

95 = number of printable ASCII characters
63 = length of password

Even (63!) returns (1.98260832 × 10^87), or (198,260,832) followed by about seventy-nine zeroes. Imagine how long it'd take your computer to go through that many possible password combinations.

But that number may be small, if my stats are correct. The real number would be (5985!), which Google won't show me. THAT, my friends, would be an extremely large number.

128-bit WPA is secure.
 
even at 3.2 billion clock cycles per second, it would take a loop program a longgg time to crack.

WPA is obviously more secure than WEP
 
hescominsoon said:
Just to give you an idea..
63 character full randomized passphrases(number letters and special characters of upper and lower case) and of course that's for 128-bit wpa..<G> I'm sure if you were able to get a DC project going it would be cracked..eventually..<G>
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haha *turn on computer and start airsnort* wow ya that would take some time
 
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