How can I tell if my system compromised?

Yes, absolutely; they could passively intercept the traffic on your network, pick one of the MAC addresses in it, and write it their network interface. As a guy who's more familiar with the wired world, I'm realizing that wireless MAC filtering isn't the show stopper I expected it to be.

Getting back to the subject of the post, if you're back to the factory defaults then your router isn't compromised, but the systems behind it may still be. Logs are the name of the game: hopefully your personal firewall logs, system logs, etc. will provide some answers.

Thanks for the info. What should I look for in my logs? I am using Zonealarm and in my area where I use my laptop and desktop there is only one highspeed ISP. I would not know how to differentiate the ISP pinging me and an intruder since the intruder would have a similar IP address as myself or my ISP.

After you reset your router your mac addresses were reset too. If someone figured out your router password use a more difficult one. Use 128 but wep encription with a long passphrase.

Always make an attempt to secure your wireless network. MAC address

filtering alone is insufficient being that MAC addresses can be

spoofed. If you enable encryption with a long nonsense passphrase,

then you really wouldn't need MAC filtering enabled. Example of

nonsense passphrase:

'QD3$fj/057rdTyZP>>?/gG107392alcytBQPZ'

(QD3$fj/057rdTyZP!@>>?/107392alcytBQPZ)-qsh55601

By the way, check your router's log. Depending on how detailed your

router's log is, it might show the IP address of each computer who

logged onto your network, the websites they visited and the times as

well as break-in attempts, etc. Don't expect decent logs from all

routers / APs. An old Netgear router maintained an excellent log, but

my Belkin and Dlink does not. If an alleged hacker did break into your

APs menu, he or she would likely be smart enough to clear your log.

They know there's a problem with the WEP implementation in V. 1.05 of the DI-524 firmware? Or just that there are lots of problems with it? I ask because that's what I have - DI-524 V. 1.05 - and the major issue I'm having is with MAC filtering; the shared 128 bit WEP key seems to be working fine (with no noticeable reduction in speed, FYI).

Ok, I need help on this one. Where would I insert a passphrase? Also, I WAS reluctant to use WEP or other security measures for a couple of reasons:

1. internet speed slows down
2. Dlink-524 firmware is buggy and only works reliably under an unencrypted OPEN system firmware 1.03. The updated firmware from July still is poor and drops the connection every 30 minutes or so. DLink has been a bunch of lazy SOB's and they haven't provided an update even though they are aware of the problem.

"doug Jamal" wrote in message news:doug.Jamal.1hpzpm@WiFi-Forum_dot_com... : : Always make an attempt to secure your wireless network. MAC address : filtering alone is insufficient being that MAC addresses can be : spoofed. If you enable encryption with a long nonsense passphrase, : then you really wouldn't need MAC filtering enabled. Example of : nonsense passphrase: : : 'QD3$fj/057rdTyZP>>?/gG107392alcytBQPZ' : (QD3$fj/057rdTyZP!@>>?/107392alcytBQPZ)-qsh55601

The tech told me they "know there are issues with the 1.05 firmware and they have no ETA on the new revision". I had to flash back to 1.03 because connections are being dropped every 30 minutes or so. There is a lot of info available that shows this problem and the fix was go to back to 1.03.

As far as speed tests go, there has been a lot of [separate] issues with our ISP and speed tests show a considerable drop in speed using encryption, which Dlink tech support confirmed. I was told that one can expect a 10-30% drop in speed! The other day, I set up the WEP 64 bit encryption and I had difficulty in loading pages. The connection would just pause. I also have broadband. It's very frustrating.

Hey, Jean. I started to use the 64 bit WEP and the connection goes up and down like a hooker's panty (using 1.03).