Security with Wireless - Protect your wireless network
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SSID (Service Set Identifier) Broadcast
SSID is a name to identify your wireless network. This is the name you will see when you’re scanning for a wireless network from your laptop or computer.
Your router is broadcasting your SSID and so anyone with a wireless laptop or PDA can see your wireless network. Although your wireless network by now is encrypted and only accepting a connection from your laptop, you can disable the SSID broadcast as an extra layer of protection. When disabling the SSID broadcast no one will be able to see that your wireless network exists as it is not advertising itself.
If hackers do not know the wireless network is there, then they wont certainly be attempting to hack it. So if I had disabled my SSID "Guest", and then did a "Refresh Network List" from Windows, which is a wireless scan for wireless access points, my "Guest" router will not appear in this list anymore. However really it is within the range and is available to communicate via wireless, but know one else but I know this and only I can connect to it, since my laptop is already set to connect to "Guest".
If for example I had a friend who wanted to connect to it, they can connect manually via the wireless properties, where they specify the SSID name, "Guest", the encryption type "WPA Personal" and finally the by specifying the pre-shared key and hitting apply.
Mac Address Control
MAC address control is another feature which you should configure on your router. With Mac address control you can tell your router that it will only accept a connection from your laptop or computer. You would need to give the router your laptop’s network card address. This is a physical address hard coded into your wireless network card on your laptop.
To locate the MAC address of your laptop;
Go to Start, then Run.
In the run dialogue type: cmd and hit Enter.
Now type: ipconfig /all
You will now be able to view your mac address. Scroll down to Ethernet Adaptor Wireless Network connection and under this note down on a piece of paper the 12 character address next to Physical address. Take a look at the figure below.
As you can see from the figure below I have enabled Wireless MAC filter and chose to Permit only PC’s listed to access the wireless network. I can now hit the Edit MAC Filter list button to specify my 12 character laptop address.
Don't forget to save changes when your done.
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