Wireless connectivity (Wi-Fi) is really useful. You can be sitting in a hotel lobby that’s a wireless “hot spot” and use your laptop without having to find a place to plug in a cable or telephone connection. That’s the good part, but from the security point of view Wi-Fi can be as dangerous as it is beneficial.
As the number of metropolitan area hot spots increase you can now go through any capital city with a wireless-enabled laptop and be amazed by how many connections you can make. You might even get a big surprise if you’re not wireless enabled at home to find that you can connect there as well. And if you do have a wireless connection at home someone else could be tapping into it right now without your knowledge.
Every time you log on to a public Wi-Fi access point you are also transmitting your login name and password over open airwaves. Whenever you send a credit card number over a wireless connection it’s out there as well. This doesn’t necessarily mean that any data is being stolen, although for a medium-grade computer hacker it wouldn’t present much of a challenge. Far too many wireless network owners and operators have inadequate security that’s open to abuse and worse.
Whenever you make your data available in an unprotected form it may well be picked up and read by somebody. Not only will they have your communications, with a little more effort they’ll also probably have enough information to work out just who and where you are. Most of them probably won’t use it against you, but why take the chance?
Switched off Security
The fact is that most networks do have some kind of built-in security, but this is often turned off to facilitate access by users, particularly in public hot spots. Public hotspots like the T-Mobile service in most Starbucks lack encryption and don’t bother with address filtering to avoid negating the “public” aspect of Wi-Fi hot spots.
Unfortunately, this can expose your own communications to being read by others, and can even open up your own network to hackers and others that can do real and expensive damage.
In one famous, but unfortunately not isolated case, U.S. home improvement firm Lowe’s were using a Wi-Fi network to transmit credit card and other data from cashiers to a central network. Three men sitting in a parked car at a Lowe’s store in Southfield, Michigan were able to access all this credit card information and then gained access to computers in six other of the company’s stores.
This access also enabled them to alter the software code used by Lowe’s to process credit cards. Fortunately the men were caught and arrested by the FBI, but not all such intrusions are even noticed, and even less frequently is the stolen data recovered.
The Answer could be VPN
If you value your security the best way to protect it when you are connecting back to your office is to use a Virtual Private Network (or “VPN” as it’s more commonly known). VPNs are used by many larger firms to protect communications to and from remote-access employees. They create a secure link between the remote computer and the user’s access point through the Internet, then on to the firm’s server.
The VPN technology is proven and is in use throughout most developed countries. It requires a VPN server at the firm’s central location, encrypting data that is sent to computers at locations outside the firm. The remote computer has VPN software loaded that decrypts the signal received and encrypts the signal sent, thus enabling secure transmission of data between the two parties.
With a little extra work the VPN can also protect mobile users sending from public locations like airports, hotels and conference centers, as well as people working from home that need to access the firm’s server.
VPN doesn’t lock out other functions that can be performed using computers at the firm’s central location such as accessing the Internet and the use of email. It does make sure that only those authorized for access to the firm’s network, whether inside or outside the central location, can have it.
Choose your Level of Protection
Whenever you communicate over the Internet, whether using a wired or wireless connection, it’s just good business to ensure that your communications and files are secure. Particularly if your data is confidential or if you want to be sure that hackers can’t use your connection to raid your office server, there are several different types of VPN technology, and a wide range of applications you can use depending on the level of security required.
In a home wireless network you can use simple security procedures to protect your connection that include enabling Wi-Fi Protected Access, changing your password or network name and closing your network.
There are so many threats to computers that security is an increasingly important concern for any network – especially for a wireless network where information is sent and received through the open air and is subject to interception by anyone within range. If you use wireless access but don’t have a VPN for security it may be wise to restrict your use of the wireless network to non-critical communications.
Copyright 2005, RAN ONE Inc. All rights reserved. Reprinted with permission from www.ranone.com.
Chris’ combination of academic credentials, career experience and temperament ideally suit his calling as a business development advisor. Clients say he has a mind for business and a heart for service.