Different Wifi Encryptions, help?

randruff

randruff

New Member
I am familiar with WEP and its pros/cons but not so much with WPA, etc. Recently, I coated my wifi network with WPA-PSK encryption and I am wondering what/how this is different than WEP or any other encryption. What is the benefits/risks to WPA-PSK, or any other encryption besides WEP? Thanks in advance for the help!
 
Without getting to technical WPA-Password Shared Key is simply a much stroger encryption than wep, which can be cracked in about 10 min on a busy network of a few days on a less busy one. All wireless-G hardware out there has some form of WPA on it, but a firmware or driver update can get WPA on your older wireless-b equipment as well.
It is not the sole defence in your wireless network. You should disable ssid, and enable mac filtering. Turning of DCHP would be a good step too.
 
Thanks apj....as for your suggestions, i already have changed my SSID, default pass to access router, mac addy filtering, as well as DHCP. I did notice an option for WPA or WPA-PSK....is there a difference?
 
Different Types
WPA Radius Authentication - Your typical home user wont use this, unless you want to setup a radius server. This server works with WPA to pass different keys to each user. I'm not going to go into how to set this up.

WPA PSK - PSK stands for Pre-Shared Key and is most commonly used by home users. The user must have a certain password to enter the network. PSK can be used with either AES or TKIP, depending on what your hardware can support. It is important that you choose a strong password to prevent against dictionary attacks.

AES - An algorithm that requires special hardware support to use. It is stronger, but a firmware/driver update won't get you AES.

TKIP - This system changes the key every specified amount of time to prevent cracking attempts. You can usually adjust how often it changes in the router/AP settings. This does not mean it changes your password, just the key.

WPA2 - The new WPA standard that uses a stronger algorithm, but is not backwards compatable with older hardware.
 
apj, youre the man. thats for that guide, thats exactly what i was looking for. I setup my LAN with WPA-PSK encyption with TKIP. One more question....you mentioned TKIP changes the key....when my AP does change the key, is there a loss of signal or any noticable difference in my connection? Would it be a good idea to set my AP to change keys every 5 min? 10 min? hour? etc
 
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