Neighbours Wireless networks

ice27

Hi All,

I am going to rattle your brains here! Do neighbours wireless networks actually interfere or detract from the performance of your own wireless network. Also, how secure is a wireless network with Security(WPA). Can people still hack into your system! I know most people couldnt be bothered, me included, but in in one part of my house I can pick up five wireless networks (some may be in fact access points from these same networks I guess). I mean it only takes one tech expert with a bit of spare time on their hands to become curious, and with all these networks knocking around how stable can my own one be. Surely there must be some intereference.

Cheers!:)

layke

Interferance, unlikely. Especially during encryption.
WPA is actually quite good. I can crunch WEP in an hour and a half and be using your bandwidth in no time

KTRIC

It really depends on what channel they are using. My neighbour thought it was a great laugh to change his to channel 1, the same as mine. It caused no end of greif for me until I changed to a different channel.

Try downloading "Net Stumbler" , that will show you what channels are being used. Then just select a free one.

irlrobins

What Ktric said ^.

You're best off using non overlapping channels (1,6 and 11).

ice27

layke wrote:

Interferance, unlikely. Especially during encryption.
WPA is actually quite good. I can crunch WEP in an hour and a half and be using your bandwidth in no time

What about WPA! is it possible to crunch that aswell? also, if you do crunch it, you can only use the bandwidth right? its not possible to actaully hack into someones computer is it!:)

irlrobins

Afaik WPA is very secure. It could be bruteforce hacked by trying to guess the passphrase. But I read somewhere that this would take years to do.

But let's assume that the WPA was hacked. Then it would be possible to join the network it protected. Whether your PC could be hacked then depends on the security of the PC (firewall, AV, patches installed etc).

TBH, for a home network WEP is going to prevent 90%+ of people hacking into your wireless. WPA prob increases that to 99%.

ice27

irlrobins wrote:

Afaik WPA is very secure. It could be bruteforce hacked by trying to guess the passphrase. But I read somewhere that this would take years to do.

But let's assume that the WPA was hacked. Then it would be possible to join the network it protected. Whether your PC could be hacked then depends on the security of the PC (firewall, AV, patches installed etc).

TBH, for a home network WEP is going to prevent 90%+ of people hacking into your wireless. WPA prob increases that to 99%.

Cheers again!!
I actually forgot to say that I have a digi sender to transmit sky from one room to another. I found it plays havoc with the wireless on the laptop. If anyone has these things in their house it may prevent them from getting a good connection!!! Soemtimes you get good speeds if its on but its best to turn these bloody things off. You probably alll know this anyway!!!!just in case theres a few novices like me reading ,these things caus:) e havoc!!!!

JohnnieM

Wpa psk can be brute forced but only if your key length is short..I read about a demo where it was carcked in seven minutes (because the password was something short.. If you use a long random key you will be totally secure... log on to www.grc.com/pass and down load a maximum enthropy password ..You'll have to cut and paste it (because they are so random.).
believe me ..It will only be cracked the day after the end of the universe...

azzeretti

There is very little difference between WEP and WPA(1). The only real difference is the key changes. Both are based on pretty crappy encryption algorithms.
But I think you are being a little paranoid. I can't see many people bother trying to crack WPA - WEP is much easier is you sniff for long enough.

Is your router 802.11i (WPA2) compliant? This is MUCH more secure, and if you could use it then you would have little to worry about.

Overall though, I would be overly concerned unless you are running a confidental business etc.

NutJob

The big difference between wep and wpa is WPA as far as we know this far is implemented correctly. At the moment it is infesable to brutefource wpa with cowpatty due to the time taken per key is just too slow.

A strong passphrase and an origonal ap SSID is plenty.

As a tip use WPA with TKIP as AES makes routers belch steam

As for wpa2 cowpatty does wpa2 also.

Foxwood

The other advantage of WPA is that interoperability between different brands of hardware just seems to be better. You occassionally hear of interoperability problems with WEP clients, but WPA setup seems to have benefitted from the extra year or twos development that it got.