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Wireless Networking and Security

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Wireless Networking offers many benefits that are undeniable, but there are some downsides to it. There are many security concerns, such as Electromagnetic interferences, slower data transfer speeds than wired networks and other drawbacks. This paper will concentrate on Wireless Networks and the security concerns that should be considered when implementing such technology.

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There are two types wireless computer networks.

  • 1) An ad hoc network is one that allows wireless communication to be established from one computer to another.
  • 2) Access points are what distinguish Infrastructure Networks. Each communication within an Infrastructure Network is sent over an access point.

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  • Wireless Access Points are equipped with a security feature called WEP. It uses the encryption algorithm RC4. This is a symmetric stream encryption cipher.�Use two types of encryption keys. 64 Bit and 128 bit. Two main purposes of WEP encryption are authentication and data encryption. Without data encryption, everything sent from a computer would be encrypted and all received information would be in plain text. It means that data can be easily intercepted by unknown third parties and viewed while it travels over radio waves. WEP is not used to authenticate who logs onto the wireless computer or network. Anyone within a reasonable distance can also use the wireless signal for their own purposes.

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