I am setting up a wireless access point using the WRT54G so I can connect with only my laptop
Will my network be secure if I use a MAC address filter that allows only the MAC address of my laptop, and use the WEP feature? Also, is it advisable not to broadcast the SSID? Should the SSID be set to the Windows Workgroup name or something else, or doesn't it matter?
I plan to have shared folders available to the wireless laptop and want to be sure the neighbors can't get in.
"paul" hath wroth:
No and no respectively. MAC addresses are easily spoofed and WEP is fairly easily cracked. You should be using WPA or WPA2 encryption. Never mind the MAC address filter.
Yes, it not adviseable to not broadcast the SSID? SSID hiding does little for security as the SSID can easily be extracted by various common Linux utilities. If you set your router to not broadcast the SSID, you run a good chance that your neighbors will not know you're there and land on your channel.
Doesn't matter. There are limitations as to what ASCII gibberish can be used. Stay with letters and numbers and don't use control characters and funny symbols. All that is important is that it is unique. I use my street address.
WPA or WPA2 should be sufficient security. However, setting a password on shared folders would not be a bad idea.
The FAQ wireless security section: |
Hi Jeff,
Thanks for the advice. I don't see WPA as a feature in my WRT54G. Do I need to upgrade the firmware?
"paul" hath wroth:
It's there. Which hardware version of the WRT54G do you have? v1.0, 1.1, 2.0, 2.2, 3.0, 3.1, 4.0, 4.1, 5.0, 6.0, or 7.0? All these have firmware that supports WPA-PSK or WPA-Personal.
My guess(tm) is you have a V5 or V6. See: |
It is version 1.1. Apparently the owners manual I downloaded was a bit out of date. Thanks again for taking the time to reply.
look at dd-wrt
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