When
you buy a wireless AP or Router
and put it on your network it
starts to broadcast its default
SSID. Yes that’s how you
find your Router to build your
LAN. But why do you need to change
the default SSID? The answer is
that the default SSID often clearly
announces the manufacturer of
your router by broadcasting the
name and model for example DL-624
+ etc. Now imagine that anybody
having the least knowledge of
WLAN will notice in one second
that the network is using a D-Link
router and also its model. Now
being a cracker the person will
most probably know most of the
default settings used by D-Link,
but even if he don’t, all
he need to do is to check out
the D-Link web site and will get
more then enough info for free.
Having evil ideas in his mind
the cracker he can now do anything
to you, for example he can just
type the D-Link (Also most of
other brands) default IP address
192.168.0.1 into the web browser’s
address bar. You did it too, didn’t
you? So you are not worried about
it, because after you type the
IP address and press Enter button,
you are prompted for the user
name and password. Of course the
crackers can not know that much.
Wrong, yes he knows it now, because
he was on D-Link’s web site.
He knows that the default user
name is “admin” and
the default password is blank.
Bingo! He is in, what can you
do now? I guess you are too late
then. So before this kind of thing
happens to you too, change the
default SSID as soon as you get
connected to the device. It is
also recommended to turn of the
broadcast of the SSID as it will
make your Router normally invisible
to anybody who is not on your
network, |
Now
that we are through with the SSID
and Password, we theoretically
blocked the intruder from messing
up our Router or Access Point’s
setting. But our Wireless Local
Area Network is still open and
if we have any File and Printer
Sharing enables at the network
or if we are connected to the
Internet, we actually gave way
to the cracker to use the great
services available at our network.
He can either get into the network
and access the shared resources
or start using our internet account
for his illegal or evil tasks.
What to do now? Yes, we have to
lock our network but how? Encryption
is the answer. Generally today
you can use two kinds of encryption
for your WLAN. Wired Equivalent
Privacy (WEP) or Wi-Fi Access
Protected Access (WPA). |
