Neighbours don't have WEP enabled....?!

tk123

My Esat BB was crawling along last night so I reconnect only to find one of the neighbors have gotten Eircom BB but don't have their WEP on..I don't know which one it is thou! How can I tell them - maybe change their SSID to 'enable WEP!!' or something like that?

zAbbo

I don't have WEP enabled, what exactly are you asking?

lololol1111 change their ssid to enable wep lollozomgrolzlfmao

aidan_walsh

You can change the SSID to what you like, chances are if they just bought a package off Eircom they wouldn't know what to look for or what you mean by such a message.

tk123

Aww but the poor noobs - anybody could just muscle in on their connection!

dub45

A neighbour has just got a wireless router and I was telling her that I could access her network and to put a password on it etc,

She aske me if someone could access her pc via an unprotected wireless network - I dont think I have ever seen this mentioned on boards so anyone able to shed any light on this?

MrPinK

tk123 wrote:

Aww but the poor noobs

Some might say a noob is someone who thinks their connection is secure with WEP.

kippy

She aske me if someone could access her pc via an unprotected wireless network - I dont think I have ever seen this mentioned on boards so anyone able to shed any light on this?

Its the same principle as asking if someone could access your PC over a LAN.
IE-yes someone can access your PC over a wireless network but they would need to know a username and password with the relevant privilages on the PC....although there are otherways of doing it. To be honest the unsecured WEP is only facilitating the access-if the network was secured then anyone on the LAN who had entered the correct WEP key would be able to access it too so long as they had the correct credentials.
Back to the original topic. Tough one-there are way to many unsecured network out there and most people dont know enough about the technology to do anything about it. Best thing to do maybe a house to house .....even then they may not know what to do or care enough to do anything about it. Thats were you can offer your services for a fee.....

dub45

kippy wrote:

Its the same principle as asking if someone could access your .........................Thats were you can offer your services for a fee.....

A wifi gigolo?

Karoma

Do you have a laptop or PDA? You could walk around and gauge where the signal is stronger...

I would personally love to see every wireless network 'unsecured' - onegiganticroamingaccess . People should share more.

Krusty_Clown

Chances are that if their wireless network is unprotected, then the security of their PC is probably questionable...

As kippy mentioned, once someone join's their wireless network, it is not dissimilar to plugging directly into a wired network or LAN... After that it's relatively straightforward to gain access to an unprotected or semi-protected PC....

People will plug in a wireless router, without realising that they are making their network available outside the confines of their house. It's akin to taking your local area network, plugging in some very long cables, and leaving the other ends stretched our randomly around your neighbourhood...

WEP has been crackable for quite some time (in many cases, takes less than half an hour). I run WEP at home (hardware limitation - no WPA), but try to keep an eye out for visiting friends (a-la Kismet)...

RangeR

Agreed that WEP isn't the best security out there but little security can be better than no security.

I have wireless in my house and have noticed that once I leave my house, I get about 8% signal strength. I would assume that your "open" neighbour is within 4 or 5 houses from you. A quick knock on each door will sort that out.

AthAnRi

I'm fairly new to this whole wireless network thing but I am correct in saying that the fact that you can see your neighbours wirless network is more an issue with the fact that their router is set to broadcast. there is a setting on routers to switch this off and that will prevent the network being automatically picked up by wireless network cards?? Or is that just on some routers or am I talking throught my anus?

kippy

AthanRi,
Kinda off topic.
But basicilly what you are talking about is SSID broadcast-where the router "advertises" its network. Meaning that it will be automatically found and connected to in some cases by a client. You can swithch the SID broadcast off on many wireless access devices however the network can still be found with the correct software.
Tonnes of stuff on the web about this-just pump in SSID broadcast in google.
Kippy

philologos

tk123 wrote:

Aww but the poor noobs - anybody could just muscle in on their connection!

lol logon and write a text file on their desktop

Laguna

The problem is, most people can barely navigate windows, let alone set security permissions on their Wireless network. I mean come on, not everyone is tech savvy, if you go knocking on their door saying "Alright mate, you're wireless network isn't WEP enabled, I suggest using a shared key and having a MAC address pool so only your computers can access it.". They'd probably throw holy water at you whilst compelling the power of christ upon you..

tk123

i'm just going to leave it - i'm all stressed out from work lately and don't want whoever it is bugging me everytime they have a prob when i'm home!

Civilian_Target

I don't get it? I've lived in 3 different houses in the last year, and have always used an open (unsecured) wireless access point. I don't object to people using my internet connection for odds and ends - and I'll notice if someone is leeching properly.

My own computer is properly firewalled, and network sharing is passworded so you won't be hacking me, but good luck to anyone who wants to use my internet.

WEP is a waste of time, with a wireless network sniffer and a WEP cracker you can be inside most wireless networks within 5 mins I believe, and you lose a lot of speed by enabling WEP so whats the point?

Laguna

Yeah you're right TK, it's not your problem.. lol, your sig is mildly amusing btw

Krusty_Clown

Civilian_Target wrote:

I don't get it? I've lived in 3 different houses in the last year, and have always used an open (unsecured) wireless access point. I don't object to people using my internet connection for odds and ends - and I'll notice if someone is leeching properly.

My own computer is properly firewalled, and network sharing is passworded so you won't be hacking me, but good luck to anyone who wants to use my internet.

WEP is a waste of time, with a wireless network sniffer and a WEP cracker you can be inside most wireless networks within 5 mins I believe, and you lose a lot of speed by enabling WEP so whats the point?

So you don't mind people watching while you transmit your un-encrypted online banking credentials from your remote computer to your router? Credit card details? personal details? Fair play to ya...

WEP will put off 90% of the curious population as it takes a working knowledge of Linux, specific hardware (wireless cards that can be put into monitor mode) and time (up to an hour and a half)... I'd rather have weak protection, than no protection...

But fair dues to you on sharing your internet connection..

RangeR

Krusty_Clown wrote:

So you don't mind people watching while you transmit your un-encrypted online banking credentials from your remote computer to your router? Credit card details? personal details? Fair play to ya...

Ah come on, now. That's just blatent scare mongering. I appriciate where you're coming from and what you mean, but the examples you have given would be done through https on all financial sites and all reputible etailers. Https is encrypted at source, meaning from YOUR computer. Even on a wired lan, another computer couldn't sniff them properly.

But other than https, yes, you are wide open to your surfing habits and possibly your computer files [if you have sharing turned on].

Krusty_Clown

Fair point... Stenographer, strike that last comment from the record...

damnyanks

Just curious. What would people view as one of the most secrue ways to set up a wireless lan then ?

biko

damnyanks wrote:

Just curious. What would people view as one of the most secrue ways to set up a wireless lan then ?

I use MAC Authorization

RangeR

Yeah, MAC Authorisation as above, also signal encryption.
Use WPA, if you don't have WPA, use WEP. It's better than nothing.

gandalf

Using MAC Address filtering and WEP to secure mine.

MrVestek

Yes but using a Linux system Mac Addresses can be faked. A neighbour (not sure which one) has a secured WiFi Eircom connection and I get pretty good signal strength (about 60%) no matter where I am in my own house. Pity it's WEP encrypted tho. I haven't been trying to crack it with Airsnort on Knoppix only to find out that my USB Drivers aren't compatible... no honestly I haven't :P

Krusty_Clown

As Achilles suggests, MAC address whitelisting only takes seconds to circumvent... You basically sniff for MAC addresses of clients that are currently connected to the AP, and change your MAC address to the same as one of the MAC addresses of a valid client.

You should at a minimum have WEP enabled, and bear in mind its limitations. I couldn't see WEP having a huge impact on the speed of your network, but if it was of concern, I'd switch to a wired connection..

I use WEP and Mac adressing, but would use WPA if my hardware suported it..

Like Civillian_Target, I wouldn't mind terribly if others connected to my wireless network. I just don't want to make it too easy for them..