[X4U] airport wifi security questions

[Allan Hise]

On Thu, 2 Jun 2005, Kevin Mantooth wrote:

> Is there any utility or method to display which computers are
> currently on your network?  Ideally, I'd like to have some sort of
> notification if a computer other than my expected 3 hacked into my
> wireless network.

I don't know of anything, but it isn't something I have researched.

> Also, in the interest of keeping things simple for a flaky old
> Windows laptop and for the sake of bandwidth, I never turned on
> encryption or security on my airport.  Instead, I added a list of MAC
> addresses for my known computers to the Access Control list.  So my
> network appears open, but another laptop cannot hop on.
>
> How secure is this?
> Can someone still snoop without actually connecting?

It really provides little security. I think it is enough to keep people
looking for an easy free ride out, becasue they can just drive down the
street a few blocks until they find a network that is truly open. Somebody
that really wants to get into your network will, at least to use your
bandwidth. (Spoofing your MAC address is not difficult).

Since you are not encrypting anything, and you are broadcasting data, it
can be seen by anyone that wants to. It would be like using a speakerphone
in a cube farm (like someone nearby is doing). If I want to listen, I can.