[Roger]

First, a thanks to those who replied to my previous post with recommendations for a wireless router. I wound up getting a Netgear MR814, and it was installed and running in under 10 minutes. Not bad for a no-brainer tech guy like me. Thanks for the help!

Now, just a couple questions now that I have this wireless service running:

a) Do I need to be concerned with security between the router and the laptop? Can email or web pages be read or intercepted any more readily by an outside party? Should I try enabling the WEP (?) encryption? I'll have to read the manual to figure that one out (what the heck is a hexadecimal number?)

b) Can anyone, with or without my permission, use my internet connection now? As long as they are within the router's range, can they connect and surf or email?

Thanks!

 

[MrVermin]

In answer to your questions:

a) yes

b) yes

A wireless network is inhierently less secure than a wired network. You should at least enable the built in WEP security that comes with your access point. You may also wish to restrict access to your wireless network by enabling the MAC address filtering. This will only allow the computer with that unique MAC address to access your network.

Oh, and if you do not configure these, then don't be surprised to see a van parked outside your house late at night with the lights on using your network as a free ISP..

MrVermin

 

[Ohenri]

No doubt!

I recall not having any WEP enabled or MAC filtering, only to go to re-admin the router configs @ work and finding a list of MAC addresses that have been riding my waves....

Also went to re-admin the home router - and found the same thing. But none were able to get in as the filtering had been on from jump... I would suggest that you do that. Will save you some headaches, unless you want to share. I have a few friends who are surfing courtesy of some unknown neighbours.

H!

 

[Rob]

You definitely want to set up MAC filtering so that only those computers you want can access your wireless network.

Every ethernet card has it's own MAC address. This is a 12 digit number that has a mix of numbers and letters. (00 B5 4C C8 88 67 is an example.)

You can find out the MAC address of your computer by using Apple System Profiler. You will see the Mac address in the Network information.

 

[Moscool]

Hey guys where is your kind heart?

I'm delighted to share my connection with the world as long as (i) it doesn't slow me down too much and (ii) now one gets into my system.

I got a standard router + DHCP configuration; I trust the built-in firewall but haven't done any configuration to it. Should I? What kind? Thanks...