Re: wireless router password security

"Sebastian G." <seppi@xxxxxxxxx> wrote in
news:68jrooF2t4jo8U1@xxxxxxxxxxxxx:

bz wrote:

"Kyle T. Jones" <Email@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote in
news:fvvj3k$a5m$1@xxxxxxxx:

Sebastian G. wrote:
Kyle T. Jones wrote:


http://www.howtodothings.com/computers-internet/how-to-protect-a-link
sy s-wrt54g-router-using-wap-and-wep


But please omit the step where disabling SSID broadcast. It doesn't
change anything about the security, doesn't make your network
invisible at all, but
surely creates a lot of trouble with your client accidentially trying
to connect to someone else's network.

Good point.

I don't follow the logic. Disabling SSID makes it more difficult for
someone to connect to my wireless router (WEP turned on also).


Actually it makes them easier to accidentally to connect to your network
instead of another SSID-disabled network.

HOW? They need to know my router's SSID. It has an SSID, it just doesn't
broadcast it.

It DOES respond when my WiFi card says 'hey, (MyRouterSSID), I want to
connect to you, doesn't it?

If I understand stuff correctly, this stuff is loosely based on packet radio
technology.
In packet radio, I would send a transmission something like
Node#1 this is Node#2 k
then Node#1 would answer Node#2 this is Node#1 k
Node#2 would then go ahead and establish a link or send a command to node#1.

If Node#1 isn't busy but is available, it would periodically say something
like
CQ de Node#1 K

If Node#1 isn't broadcasting anything, I need to know its name to contact it,
(and the channel/frequency it listens on).


They will have to wait until I have a connection in progress and sniff
that to find the router's SSID.


This would require cracking the encryption.

Agreed.


During the times when there is nothing

connected, the SSID is not broadcast, so they can't WAR DRIVE by my
house when I am not there and try to bust in.


Bulls***.

Please keep the language clean.

They can simply send packet to the router

HOW do they send a packet to the router? They don't even know it is there.

It isn't broadcasting. It is sitting there listening for broadcasts addressed
to it. It does NOT respond to a transmission unless it is addressed to it.

I don't think there is a 'all routers please broadcast' command for IEEE
802.11, but I could be wrong. I know that such a command exists on wired
ethernet but would not expect it on wireless.

, which then replies
with packets. So they can create their own traffic required for the
encryption cracking attempt.

How? I thought their best bet was to monitor for a day or so and then crack
the WEP key from accumulated traffic.


Also, my laptop, doesn't try to 'accidental' connect to other networks.
It needs to know the SSID for my wireless router in order to establish
connection.


Argh, it seems like you really don't have a clue how things works.

That is why I asked. Because, from what you said not matching with what I
thought I knew, I want to find out where my misunderstands are.

I asked. Do you have a problem with helping people that ask you questions?

Hint:
Your laptop tries to connect to the other router on the MAC layer, tries
to establish an association, with the SSID, and fails.

My laptop knows the SSID because I configured it to talk to (MyRouterSSID),
doesn't it?

Now it connects
to a third router, tries the same, fails.

Why would it try to connect to (YourRouterSSID)? It keeps sending
(MyRouterSSID) this is MyLaptopSSID please answer!
Doesn't it????

Now it connects to the second
router... long story short, it can very easily happen that you'll never
connect to the right router at all, since you're intentionally
suppressing the required information for locating the right one.

I am sorry to be so dense but it still doesn't make sense to me.

The router can run its beacon, saying 'This is MyRouterSSID' every 100 ms(or
other time interval, as configured) or it can sit there and just listen for
calls such as
(MyRouterSSID) this is (MyLaptopSSID), do you copy?
and respond to the calls.

One way [in my opinion] makes it easier for someone unauthorized to connect
to MyRouterSSID. But, I could be wrong [and you clearly think it makes it
HARDER for me to keep my computer from connecting to the wrong router, but I
don't understand why.]

I don't tell my laptop wireless card to connect to any available access
point, so it isn't going to connect to anything unless I tell it to do
so.


OK, you can connect to (NAMELESS NETWORK), (NAMELESS NETWORK) or
(NAMELESS NETWORK). Now which one is it?

I don't try to connect to (nameless network), I try to connect to
(MYROUTERSSID) and if I can't find (MYROUTERSSID) then I don't get a
connection unless there is a network with an SSID that I have previously
configured for connection.

I just tried an experiment. I turned off the SSID broadcast on my wireless
router (It was on).
I turned off my network card.
I started netstumbler and turned on my card. I could not see my wireless
router. (net stumbler prevents connection).
There were no broadcasts from the Wireless MAC address.

I shut down stumbler and cycled my WiFi card off and back on.
It established contact with my wireless router. It DID see a neighbors OPEN
router that broadcasts its SSID the first time I powered it on and would have
connected, if I allowed it to do so, however I doubt it would connect to
anything that does NOT broadcast an SSID.
Unfortunately, I am not seeing any other wireless routers that are not
broadcasting SSID at this time so I can't be sure who is right.
My Dell network card manager sees only one (nonbroadcasting) in its
monitoring window.

When I run NetCrumbler (a patched version of Stumbler that does NOT interfer
with connections) I see my router just fine, along with 5 other named
routers.
But I don't see anyone else running with broadcast off (and am unlikely to do
so with these tools).

So, what is it that I am failing to understand about how these things work?

Are you assuming OPEN routers running with default SSIDs but with broadcast
turned off? I guess that if my router was named Linksys but had broadcast
turned off and there was another router named Linksys that also had broadcast
turned off, it would be easy to connect to the wrong one but operating with a
default router SSID or ANY as an SSID _would_ be kind of clueless.

Surely that is NOT what you are talking about, is it?

Thank you for your patience and for NOT using bad language.

--
bz

please pardon my infinite ignorance, the set-of-things-I-do-not-know is an
infinite set.

bz+nanae@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
.

Relevant Pages

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