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News that's changing the Wireless World!
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Sunday, May 30, 2004 |
Source: Wi-Fi Networking News
Vendors Don't Take
Simple Security Setup Seriously
Almost superb AP story on the lack of simple setup in Wi-Fi home gateways:
The reporter neatly details the difficulties in all of the current Wi-Fi
gateways in turning security on, especially in gateways and adapters
designed by different companies. The only point the writer misses is that
WPA (Wi-Fi Protected Access), which is required in all new Wi-Fi equipment,
allows the entry of a simple passphrase instead of a long sequence of
hexadecimal numbers. But there's so much pre-WPA equipment out there that
hexadecimal WEP keys are still the rule of the day--most adapters (but not
all wireless gateways) can be patched to handle WPA, but a user who can't
figure out hex keys won't be able to figure out where to find obscure
firmware upgrades. Windows XP requires patches and a rollup to support WPA,
while Apple users must installed Mac OS X 10.3 (Panther) for WPA support. As
WPA support permeates the home market through updates and upgrades to
hardware, and as new equipment fills homes, you might see security improve
through less obscurity....
Source Link
12:12:05 PM 
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Source: eWEEK Technology News
Many Wireless Networks Lack Security
With a laptop perched in the passenger seat of his Toyota 4Runner and a
special antenna on the roof, Mike Outmesguine ventured off to sniff out
wireless networks between Los Angeles and San Francisco. He got a big whiff
of insecurity.
Source Link
10:50:25 AM
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Source: Wi-Fi Networking News
Newsweek's Focus on
Wireless
Newsweek covers all forms of wireless networking and cellular telecom across
several stories this week: The package of articles opens with Steven Levy
musing about why people find wireless technology so compelling. You can
distill his interesting and accurate overview of the field into this
sentence: The ease of distribution becomes a force in itself, pushing
networks to handle more bandwidth. It's a restating of Metcalfe's Law, in
part: The power of the network increases exponentially by the number of
computers connected to it. Therefore, every computer added to the network
both uses it as a resource while adding resources in a spiral of increasing
value and choice. Wireless networks require substantial innovation and
expense in developing the basic technology, but then each additional node
has substantially less cost associated than with increasing a wireline
network, whether in an office or across a city. Wireless reduces the
friction in accelerating the density of network, and that rollercoaster ride
into exponential power is where speed freaks get their high. A bar at the
right top of the article links to the several other pieces in the package,
but I'll point out two notable pieces: The Wireless World offers a
city-by-city rundown of some of the more interesting uses of wireless data,
including entire towns blanketed with Wi-Fi and Austin, Texas's intense
density of free hotspots. The other article to note is A Few Who Got Us
Here, which puts NYCwireless co-founder Anthony Townsend in the first
position alongside the founder of BlackBerry's maker Research in Motion, and
a VP at Samsung....
Source Link
9:08:25 AM
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© 2004 [OCCalWUG]
Last Update: 6/1/2004; 2:48:42 AM
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