How Safe Is Wireless?

Kwasi K · (#1 (**permalink**))

I'm toying with the idea of getting wireless as well! I have a WIFI-capable laptop and I currently have a broadband (Telewest) connection linked to my desktop.

I'm not too sure about the overall security when it comes to wireless, I can get onto my neighbour's network,niceone.gif and I'm sure if I did get wireless he could get onto mine!

Are most wireless networks encrypted, because I've heard there's 'key-gen' programs on the Net which can hack into most wireless networks.

I hear you can get a good wireless hub for about £45, but are they difficult to set up?

Can anyone give me some re-assurance (and advice) on what I should do? Also, what's the best Anti-Virus package out there? Do they all run out after one year and then pester you to send more money and upgrade when it expires?confused3confused3confused3

One last question - what's the best way of using Norton Ghost to back up your PC? Last time I tried,it wipedmy drive and didnt imageblkangry!

Is there a fail-safe way to do this?

Answers pls!

Kwasi K

ghanflag

TheDogon · (#2 (**permalink**))

Kwasi K wrote:

Quote:

I'm toying with the idea of getting wireless as well! I have a WIFI-capable laptop and I currently have a broadband (Telewest) connection linked to my desktop.

I'm not too sure about the overall security when it comes to wireless, I can get onto my neighbour's network,niceone.gif and I'm sure if I did get wireless he could get onto mine!

Are most wireless networks encrypted, because I've heard there's 'key-gen' programs on the Net which can hack into most wireless networks.

I hear you can get a good wireless hub for about £45, but are they difficult to set up?

Can anyone give me some re-assurance (and advice) on what I should do? Also, what's the best Anti-Virus package out there? Do they all run out after one year and then pester you to send more money and upgrade when it expires?confused3confused3confused3

One last question - what's the best way of using Norton Ghost to back up your PC? Last time I tried,it wipedmy drive and didnt imageblkangry!

Is there a fail-safe way to do this?

Answers pls!

Kwasi K

ghanflag

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I will take a stab at this one. Unfortunately, there is no "fullproof" solution for security. It's just like stealing a car. If a car thief wants to, he can still almost any car given the time. With wireless security, you can only add more "layers". You change the broadcast name (SSID) for your wireless network. Change the SSID to something less obvious. You should have an option not to broadcast that name. You can disable broadcasting the wireless network name. That waya personmust manually input it. Also, you can enable mac filtering. That's kind of complicated. But you can type in the mac addresses you will allow to connect to your wireless network. The mac address is the "physical" address for your wireless card. You can find it in the network properties for your wireless connection.

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As for antivirus, I use McAfee. And yes, they require a year subscription for automatic updates. Every decent virus package does that. They couldn't make any money without that revenue stream. But McAfee does allow for you to download the dat updates from their website without incurring any additional cost after your license expires.

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Ghost should be pretty much straight forward. But what you want to do is an image dump. Make sure that you are reading from your PC and dumping the image elsewhere. I take it that you are saving the image to a file someplace else?

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I would need some more info. But suffice to say, we use Ghost all the time at my shop. We couldn't survive without it.

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Well, that is about as good as I can do, perhaps one of these other bright brothas and/or sistas can provide more insight.

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LadyDay · (#3 (**permalink**))

i have a free norton trial on my laptop it has firewall and anti virus.

avg anti virus is good.

good advoce given here

also ask safetyblitz and between him and the dogon you should be ok

Blackthought · (#4 (**permalink**))

I am on the same broadband aswell kwasi.. I bought the NETGEAR wirelessrouter which cost about £35..

You have two type of security setting for your wireless configuration.. WEP or WPA-SPK foradded security.. but some machine may not have WPA-PSKsupport.

I use WEP.. you can give the security encryption key for WEPmorelike apass name, the router then generatessome numbers for you..this number is what you or anybody will need to access the wireless router..

Hope that helps you.

P.S

WEP - Wired Equivalent Privacy

WPA-SPK - Wi-Fi Protected Access Pre-Shared Key