Slashdot Mirror
Home WiFi Network Security Failings Exposed
An anonymous reader writes "The shocking state of home wireless (Wi-Fi) network security in the UK has been revealed by a life assistance company study. CPP used an 'ethical hacker,' Jason Hart, to test thousands of Wi-Fi networks across six UK cities, including London. He found that many didn't even have a password and roughly half of home UK Wi-Fi networks could be hacked in less than 5 seconds."
My wifi router required me to change the root name and password. Don't they have that technology over in the UK?
If you were in any doubt as to why they were sponsoring a study which discovered something scary about the intertrons.
No kidding!!! What do you say at this point?
My Wi-Fi has no password, and that's a purposeful choice. While evaluating the passwords on WiFi that does have a password is a reasonable analysis, it's not reasonable to call any WiFi without a password as unsecured.
Need a Python, C++, Unix, Linux develop
um seconds... no... it takes a few minutes max to crack wep ...
If you were trying a dictionary attack against a network that may work faster :)
There is no way to know if the open wifi networks are open intentionally or not. Just ask Bruce Schneier. Saying they're "open to criminals" is biased, maybe "open to visitors" would be more appropriate. How come coffee shops and other businesses with open wifi aren't called out for letting criminals access the network?
The men in their scary black vans will totally park outside my house and steal my wifi!
Oh wait, that's not scary at all because people don't do that. And in real life, I type all my passwords only into sites secured with ssl, which is way better than crappy wifi encryption anyways. So I guess that the neighbor kids might get some free wifi (don't care, not a big deal to block them, mac whitelist, upside-down-ternet etc). If there are people parked outside my house gathering my non-secret data (since my secret data is encrypted regardless of wifi), I either
a) Don't care (google, engineering students, etc
b) Have bigger things to worry about (the FBI, and since I don't have brown skin or read a Koran, I probably won't ever fall into their highly sophisticated detection network)
See also: http://xkcd.com/341/
and furthermore: http://www.wired.com/politics/security/commentary/securitymatters/2008/01/securitymatters_0110
Ze Atomic Device! It iz Ztolen!
You seem to be confusing "unsecured" with "insecure". They do not mean the same thing.
Unsecured WIFI means you have no password..
Just because it's intentionally unsecured doesn't mean it's not unsecured.
Why is it so hard for industry (default configurations) to move from open or WEP to WPA? Sure, WPA isn't perfect, but it does represent a significant increase in difficulty for hackers.
Honest question here. Say I wanted to setup and open a WiFi AP for neighbors to check email, etc, when their connection is down. How can I do that and not get screwed if they download kiddie porn or send a threatening letter to the white house? Yes, I'm in the US. I know I can use the TOR network, but frankly, I'd rather not. Is there any legal way I can share my network connection to those that need it without setting myself up for a world of hurt?
Again, I realize this is OT, but it's an honest question.
...a large quantity of general users don't know how to properly configure a wireless network. Shock and awe!
My Wi-Fi has no password, and that's a purposeful choice.
Which doesn't mean it's not unsecured. It just means that it's unsecured on purpose.
Supposed you have a bicycle. You chain it to a lamppost. It is now secured.
Supposed you take the same bicycle and decide purposely to not chain it to anything. Just because you decided not to chain it doesn't make it magically secured. It's still unsecured, you just made the decision not to secure it.
...but on the other hand I'm all for securing access points which aren't meant to be publicly accessible. It is good that these people do what's necessary to gain actual security. The alternative is that some of them get burnt and complain, which will lead to the criminalization of accessing public wireless networks. That in turn will lead to a false sense of security as people still broadcast their data in the clear. So, yes, please encrypt your wireless network if it's not meant to be provide public internet access.
Lets face it, yeah, wi-fi routers can be hacked, yeah, a lot of people don't have secure wi-fi, but in all honesty does it matter to most people? Credit card information already should be encrypted with HTTPS so that wouldn't be sniffed, most sites let you use security to log in, etc.
Taxation is legalized theft, no more, no less.
Hello, Day Old News? Slashdot would like to cancel their subscription. They're taking all their business to Behind the Times.
He found that many didn't even have a password and roughly half of home UK Wi-Fi networks could be hacked in less than 5 seconds."
I'm impressed. I can't connect to my own wireless network in less than 5 seconds.
And yet, the world keeps on turning.
Hopping onto somebody's wifi doesn't mean anything. It doesn't mean you can get their personal documents, or banking info, or anything else.
Does that qualify every 12yr old- capable of cracking a WEP key, to then do security assessments in the name of CPP? If so, they should promptly upgrade their lolcats and share those with us, so at least their contribution to the information security community will have some usefulness and originality.
"* We found that nearly a quarter of private wireless networks has no password whatsoever attached, making them immediately accessible to criminals."
So that's not just home networks then, that includes businesses deliberatly running open wifi as a service to visitors, and all sorts of commercial access points that are "open" in that they get you to a login provider for the service, which you then have to log in to? How many these "private wireless networks" are adhoc wireless on one PC connected to nothing in particular?
The first link is just an advert selling snake-oil, the second contains no information to speak of. No link to any "report" at all.
I can just imagine the birth of WarPrinting -- folks driving around the neighborhood, looking for an open printer to spew out Tubgirl or Goatse. Somehow, WiFi-equipped printers don't seem like the perfect idea, after all.
You don't need to password protect your wifi to secure your network. If you have it properly firewalled after the AP there's no need to secure the connection at all. Since Wifi security is pretty much worthless anyway, why bother? If someone connects to my AP they will get a big fat nothing. No internet connection, no access to the internal lan, nothing.
Good.
Its so cute how kids today think 'hacking' is obtaining access to an unprotected WAP.
Comment removed based on user account deletion
... then it's not called 'hacking', it's called 'connecting to an open access point'. Next thing you know, sticking a DVD in your computer's drive and installing software will be called 'hacking'. Have we fallen so far?
'The Economy' is a giant Ponzi scheme whose most pitiable suckers are the youngest among us and the yet-unborn.
How is this shocking to anyone that uses the technology? Every person that uses WiFi knows that there's open AP's all over the place.
Where's the software suite that lets me set up P2P software, a giant list of usenet down- or uploads, or any task for later execution, then constantly searches for open wi-fi, connects, and does the task(s)? Surely someone has written something simple to set up that works automatically.
It sure would be nice if EvilMe (tm) had a VM on my laptop that was constantly doing all my EvilDeeds (tm) in the background.
I have an open wi-fi access point. The SSID is named "FBI Surveillance". I've waited a long, long time for someone else to actually connect to it. If they did, it's not as if they'd be able to access any of my hosts - my security doesn't rely on a closed network segment at all.
-fb Everything not expressly forbidden is now mandatory.
I wish that "ethical hacker" clown had kept his head down and his mouth shut. Given how far down the road the UK has already gone toward a society like Big Brother's wet dream, relatively easy access to Wi-Fi without some government snoop leaning over your shoulder might be one of the few remaining freedoms.
I've calculated my velocity with such exquisite precision that I have no idea where I am.
there's a subbtle diference :
- a burglar can only be physically in one home at a time
So your possesions are at risk only if he broke specifically in *your* house. If the burglar is in neigbours' - your possessions are safe (for now)
- whereas, a war-driver can usually see a smal city block while sitting comfortably in his/her car (even farther using special antenas)
So your local network (if WiFi isnt'correctly segregated) is at risk,as soon as an evil-hackerdrives in the neighbourhood. Both your local network and anyone else's on the same small block is at risk.
- a script kiddie can see the whole internet at the same time. The whole internet is just "one big village".
So if you don't have a correctly configured firewall an up-to-date antivirus and/or patched OS, your computer is pretty much toasted. It's only a matter of minute before it gets hosed, once a range scaning comes up with your IP. Luckily, most modern modem come with a firewall preconfigured. The bad thing is, some people are going to (badly) open it for applications which need incoming ports. Worst thing, people are going to connect laptops on networks that are somewhat big (work,university) and there's bound to be an infected machine on the local network.
and that's not counting that burglars will have to carry a physical loot and are thus weight limited, whereas evil hackers are more interested in data and are mostly band-width limited (and not even CPU limited. Thanks to CPU technology advancements, now there are enough cores to run all the crapware and still have free processing power for work).
"Sufficiently advanced satire is indistinguishable from reality." - [Tips: 1DrYakQDKCQ6y52z6QbnkxHXAocMZJE61o ]
Yes, but if we're going to parse the words that closely, I'll jump in on the side of the OP. Perhaps it's true to say, strictly speaking, that the WAP itself is "unsecured". But if the WAP is unsecured by design (i.e. the design of the *network*), than I'd say it's inaccurate to say that "the network is unsecured".
I leave my AP open to the public on purpose. I have no less fear of an attack on one of the machines hosted on that network through the wireless interface on the router than I do through the WAN interface. The only part of the network that would be "unsecured" due to the AP being open would be a box (ahem, windows) that was connected to it without my knowledge and is listening for connections.
Oh, what? MitM attacks? Puh-lease. Again, the network is no less secure through the open WAP than it is through the WAN interface.
----
Not to be confused with Col.
Vote in the November election.
For one Republicrat or the other Republicrat? As I understand it, child pornography and terrorism are not issues whose policies vary between the respective platforms of the two major U.S. parties.
Lobby your congresscritters
How do you propose to outlobby the "for the children" crowd and the Motion Picture Association of America?
Not quite. I have two WAPs, one with WPA2-PSK connected to my internal LAN with a ridiculously long key, another open and isolated in a DMZ with very limited access to my LAN. As such, while the WAP isn't locked down, I'd argue it is secured.
Which is just how all WAP's should come out of the box:
MyNetwork SSID w/ WPA2 for LAN connectivity - include a couple keychain tags with the default 'AOL-style' password on it
GuestAccess SSID w/ no 'wire' encryption or local access controls. But with the traffic QoS'ed down to never take any bandwidth from the secure side or any LAN traffic. No outbound port 25, probably. There should be a physical slide switch, clearly marked, to turn this on and off. Perhaps even a captive portal for a ToS valid in the local jurisdiction.
Secure mechanism for auto-update for security holes as they're discovered.
Hijack HTTP requests on the secure side with a non-chinglish setup wizard to tell people to add a bookmark for changing their configuration later (mDNS service discovery, where art thou?)
I imagine somebody has already made a DD-WRT or Tomato build like this but that I've just been unable to find it.
The manufacturers have already started to get the color-coded RJ45 ports right.
My God, it's Full of Source!
OUTSIDE_IP=$(dig +short my.ip @outsideip.net)
I thought the present state of the art was that WiFi "security" was impossible - any system, including WPA2, could be hacked in less than an hour. WEP goes down in seconds. WPA in minutes. MAC address filtering is just a DOS - when the hacker uses your MAC address you are blocked because of a duplicate MAC address on the same network.
So why is anyone concerned about security on a WiFi network? How could there possibly be any security at all?
You are confusing the network with the machines on the network. A unsecured network simply means you are able to send and receive packets on the network that other devices (if any) on the network can (if they chose to) accept, and/or respond to.
If the WAP in unsecured by design, the network is unsecured (assuming normal things like the WAP actually routes packets to and from the wired network OR to and from other wireless devices OR both).
Who dislikes open wifi? When you are travelling, do you curse when you find a connection? No. It is the ISP's (phone, wireless, cable) companies who don't like this. They are losing the potential moneys by allowing multiple customers to use a single connection rather then taxing every individual. So the solution is to scare the wifi owner into shutting off their wireless.
This is not the solution. Instead these owners should be encouraged to properly route the public traffic to the Internet and isolate it from any local network within the home/business.
The government supports business, as taxation is all the rave with them for pulling us out of this econo-slump. If you are worried about: "...risk of being wrongly disconnected from the Internet" because some external user of your network viewed questionable content... then support the tor network. We should all be using the tor/onion network (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tor_%28anonymity_network%29) in order to dissociate the potential consequences of our browsing from the network provider. It is a ridiculous law to reduce your network capabilities because someone MAY transmit questionable material over it.
You don't need to stand for this. Open your network to the world. Encourage your neighbors to do the same. Feel the love when you walk down the street and easily connect from house to house to apartment as they are all open.
We (society) should be looking for ways to efficiently improve the network and reduce barrier to access for all. Why aren't we reprogramming old cell phones to work as network repeaters instead of throwing out potential networking devices? I'm sure there is a good business reason for that too.
any system, including WPA2, could be hacked in less than an hour.
Have you got any evidence that WPA2/AES is 'broken'? My understanding is that *as long as you use a sufficiently long passphrase which is not vulnerable to dictionary attack*, WPA2 is literally uncrackable (by brute force or implementation/algorithm weakness) at present.
Wikileaks are good
Build your own energy sources from scratch. http://otherpower.com/
A new Finnish law protects those who tap into an unsecured WiFi network (as it could easily happen inadvertently). However, it is not clear if offering an unsecured WiFi network (even inadvertently) is legally safe.
Do you really think someone is going to sit outside his home with a laptop for an extended period of time just to post crap on some forums? Why would a spammer do that if he can just use the botnet from the comfort of his home?
You are paranoid.
I leave my wireless open. No, people who connect cannot access the rest of the machines on my network except through ssh. All my friends and visitors find it convenient, and probably some strangers too, just as I find other peoples' open networks convenient.
Turn the wireless off and plug in some Cat 5. Problem solved.
(((dB)))
http://www.ex-parrot.com/pete/upside-down-ternet.html
I've always wondered why they don't print temporary credentials on the receipt.
Sit-down restaurants don't present a receipt until after the meal is over. The person serving you would have to bring out the credentials with the drinks.
Putting aside the fact that MAC spoofing is childs play (check the man page for ifconfig) all manufacturers of networking equipment have their own blocks of MAC addresses.
So you can try MAC addresses similar to well knwon routers and I suppose you would be in in no time.
IANAL but write like a drunk one.
Is the leasst you should do ...
IANAL but write like a drunk one.
WiFi Security Checklist http://blog.jdpfu.com/pages/wifi-security has a checklist of 15+ items to secure your WiFi