In article ,
(Martin Underwood) wrote:

Presumably if the wireless LAN has been configured sensibly, it will
reject any "casual" attempts to connect to it:

- don't broadcast SSID

Security by obscurity, pretty useless.

- only allow connections from PCs with specific MAC addresses (listed)

- WPA (or at the very least 128-bit WEP) security

That's more like it.

--
Colin Rosenstiel

"Colin Rosenstiel" wrote in message
...
In article ,
(Martin Underwood) wrote:

Presumably if the wireless LAN has been configured sensibly, it will
reject any "casual" attempts to connect to it:

- don't broadcast SSID

Security by obscurity, pretty useless.

Is the SSID readable by more subtle means, or is the only way to connect if
the SSID is not broadcast to try likely names in turn (brute force)?


- only allow connections from PCs with specific MAC addresses (listed)

- WPA (or at the very least 128-bit WEP) security

That's more like it.

Yes, remove temptation by hiding the SSID and setting MAC filtering; for the
determined hackers who penetrate this, rely on WPA. It's a shame that
(AFAIK) a wireless adaptor can't run WEP and WPA at the same time: WPA for
clients that support it and WEP (better than no encryption at all) for those
clients that don't support WEP. Is it still the case that WPA is only
supported on XP and not on Win9x or W2K, or is that restriction no longer
true?

On Mon, 11 Apr 2005 15:55:02 +0100, Martin Underwood wrote:

"Colin Rosenstiel" wrote in message
...
In article ,
(Martin Underwood) wrote:

Presumably if the wireless LAN has been configured sensibly, it will
reject any "casual" attempts to connect to it:

- don't broadcast SSID

Security by obscurity, pretty useless.

Is the SSID readable by more subtle means, or is the only way to connect if
the SSID is not broadcast to try likely names in turn (brute force)?

It's covered in something I was reading earlier
http://blogs.zdnet.com/Ou/index.php?p=43 "The six dumbest ways to secure a
wireless LAN "

Steve