Is Your Wireless Network Secure?

The use of wireless technology has become increasingly popular due to its flexibility and recent affordability over traditional methods to access hard-wired LANs. This convenience, however, may not be worth the potential for losses incurred by its use. The 802.11b standard has been coming under increased scrutiny in light of a recently published paper outlining a significant vulnerability found with the Wired Equivalent Privacy (WEP) used to secure traffic between wireless devices. Unfortunately, this recent discovery is the latest in an increasingly long list of security issues surrounding 802.11b. This paper will present the issues surrounding newly discovered vulnerabilities with WEP, as well as current access control problems that exist with the wireless architecture currently in use. It will also propose methods that can be used to help secure wireless LANs.