AIS300 - Scheme of Work - Scholarly Commons Home

Abstract
Security is a critical issue in wireless local area networks (WLANs) for many
individuals and organizations worldwide, and is one of the main barriers to its adoption
in organizations. A good understanding of both the WLAN technology and the security
issues is required to assist optimum planning and implementation of such systems. In
this dissertation, an experimental investigation of the current status of WLAN security
practices in Auckland CBD is reported. In the investigation, a warwalking (field trials)
approach is considered.
It is observed that the use of WLANs in Auckland city has increased by 114.41%
since 2004. It is also observed that about 74.31% of all WLANs detected on 26 th June
2007 utilized encryption technology while the remaining 25.69% did not use encryption
at all. This shows that overall 86.56% increase in the use of encryption compared to the
data collected in 2004.
Another finding is that 25% of all access points detected are D-Links. There are
various security measures that businesses can adopt to ensure the security of their
wireless networks. The techniques that will be discussed further in this dissertation are
the enabling WEP or WPA, MAC address filtering, virtual private network, intrusion
detection system, running network simulation, and performing security risk assessment.
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