User Guide - SMC

Understanding Wireless Security
8
Understanding
Wireless Security
Anyone within range of your wireless network is a potential
security risk. Without wireless security options configured on your
network, a person outside of your physical location, but within
your wireless range may be able to access the network and any
data that is being transmitted over it. SMC Networks’ wireless
devices support the wireless security standard called Wired
Equivalent Privacy (WEP) to prevent unauthorized users from
accessing your network over a wireless connection. This security
feature uses a secure network key, called a WEP key. The WEP
key encrypts wireless data so that it is only readable by other
computers that have the matching WEP key. The WEP key is
stored on each wireless device, so that data can be encrypted
and decrypted as it is transmitted over the network.
While the Institute of Electrical & Electronics Engineers (IEEE)
802.11i standard is being finalized, an interim solution called
Wi-Fi Protected Access (WPA) has been introduced. The EZ
Connect g Wireless Ethernet Bridge is the first device of its
kind to support this new wireless security specification. WPA
defines a set of interoperable security enhancements that greatly
improve upon the level of data encryption and authentication or
access control for existing and future wireless LAN systems. WPA
includes Extensible Authentication Protocol (EAP), Temporal Key
Integrity Protocol (TKIP) and 802.1X for authentication and
dynamic key exchange. In the WPA-enabled network, the client
first associates with the Access Point. The Access Point does not
allow network access until the user can be successfully
authenticated. If the client shows the correct credentials to the