| There are more and more individuals opting to | | | | network card. From time to time change the WEP |
| work from home than ever before. The | | | | key entries. If your hardware does not support a |
| advantages to this are many including avoiding the | | | | minimal of 128 bit WEP encryption, then it may be |
| morning and evening rush hours, being able to | | | | time to replace this dinosaur. WEP is only a |
| spend time with your kids and significant other, | | | | minimal security precaution, which is better than |
| and doing everything on your own time. Though | | | | none at all. |
| the pitfalls are many, the one that I will be | | | | 4. Alter the factory default SSID on the access |
| focusing on in this article is that of setting up a | | | | router point to a convoluted difficult to guess |
| secure wireless network for your home based | | | | string. Initiate your computer to connect to this |
| business. Right now somewhere out there, there | | | | configured SSID by default. |
| is someone with a receiver waiting to pick up on | | | | 5. Setup your access point not to broadcast the |
| an unsuspecting person's wireless local area | | | | SSID if available. |
| network. Their hope is to garner some sensitive | | | | 6. Block off anonymous internet requests and |
| information that may lead to identity theft, and | | | | pings. |
| stolen proprietary business information. | | | | 7. P2P Connections should be disabled. |
| Most businesses owners are not technically | | | | 8. Enable MAC filtering. |
| inclined, though they may be power users, in | | | | 9. Enable firewall on the network router/access |
| general security settings is not one of the first | | | | point with demilitarized zone function disabled. |
| things they want to mess around with in their day | | | | Enable client firewalls for each computer in the |
| to day operations. This makes most wireless | | | | network. |
| LANs a great target for information predators. | | | | 10. Update router and access point firmware as |
| Here are some general guidelines to follow in | | | | updates become available. |
| setting up your wireless network. Though it may | | | | 11. Make sure the physical router is hidden so that |
| vary from vendor to vendor, the gist is more or | | | | a random person can't reset the settings. |
| less the same: | | | | 12. Position the physical router near the middle of |
| 1. Setup the wireless access/router point via a | | | | the establishment as opposed to near windows to |
| wired client. | | | | prevent others outside from receiving the signals. |
| 2. Always change the factory setting password to | | | | These and other settings will collectively help |
| something difficult for someone to guess. | | | | prevent any unwanted intrusions on your private |
| 3. Enable 128-bit Wired Equivalency Privacy (WEP) | | | | data. |
| encryption on both your access point and | | | | |