stuff to bring - the "shit... wish i'd thought of that!" list

[hackajar]

So tell us all about WiFi, buddy. This is just the start of the discussion. Soon you will be my bitch. Or Maybe Thorn and Roamers bitch.. but they like me so they'll lend you out.

muhahahaha

/rubs hands togeather

let's hear what the o' chap has to say about WiFi!

[Siviak]

I do know what I'm talking about as far as WIFI goes, maybe not DC but WIFI I know, end of discussion.

you mean I can get on that Interweb from DefCon? well how do... I'll be there

[yourwar]

/me sighs

end (n.) - The point in time when an action, an event, or a phenomenon ceases or is completed; the conclusion: the end of the day.

dis·cus·sion (n.) - A formal discourse on a topic; an exposition.

Therefor "end of discussion", in this particular case means, I have ceased to talk about this topic.

If your not quite sure what the word "talk" means here is the definition for that as well:

talk (v. tr.) - To articulate (words): The baby is talking sentences now.

Yes, I could get frusterated and write a huge essay on Wi-Fi, but unless I'm getting paid or really want to help, I'm not going to take the time or effort to write something just so a bunch of authors can look it over, point out what is wrong, and what I didn't say. I never said I was the Wi-Fi master. I said I knew Wi-Fi.

Further more, I can use any symbol I want as my avatar, and how it relates to me is my own business. I never said "Hey look, I have a glider symbol, that means I'm a hacker." And no, I never said you said that but I know thats what your assuming.

Anyways, I have bigger fish to fry. Bubye now!

[TheCotMan]

Anyways, I have bigger fish to frie. Bubye now!

Does this mean you won't be posting on the forums anymore? [Or just in this thread?] Could you explain this? (I'm not being a smartass here.)

I am not a little fish. I'm from the domain of archea. (Not even a little fish.)

[yourwar]

No, I will be, wether people like it or not.

[alklloyd]

Really? Please enlighten us.

Damn, of all the times to be out of microwave popcorn...

Al

[Xodia]

No, I will be, wether people like it or not.

Two sage pieces of advice:
1. If the people don't like you, you won't be here long.
2. Being arrogant around people who know infinitely more about a subject than you is not a good way to be liked.

With that said, lets kick back and watch him not listen to a word I just said.

[alklloyd]

On the "bring your computer on not" topic, does anyone remember if the AP television sets have video outputs and what kind? I'd like to cap a few of the talks that I'd otherwise miss.

Al

[highwizard]

No, I will be, wether people like it or not.

Until you get banned or dead.

[yourwar]

Okay, I admit defeat! You want me to tell you about Wi-Fi? Here, I'll tell you about Wi-Fi. If I miss something tell me, and I'll tell you about that to.

WiFi is the wireless way to handle networking. It is also known as 802.11 networking and wireless networking. The big advantage of WiFi is its simplicity. You can connect computers anywhere in your home or office without the need for wires. The computers connect to the network using radio signals, and computers can be up to 100 feet or so apart.

If you want to understand wireless networking at its simplest level, think of a cheap pair of walki-talkies. Walkie-talkies are small radios that can transmit and recieve radio signals via the antenna. When you talk into a Walkie-Talkie, your voice is picked up by a microphone, encoded onto a radio frequency and transmitted with the antenna. Another walkie-talkie can receive the transmission with its antenna, decode your voice from the radio signal and drive a speaker.Simple walkie-talkies like this transmit at a signal strength of about 0.25 watts, and they can transmit about 500 to 1,000 feet.

The radios used in WiFi are not so different from the radios used in $5 walkie-talkies. They have the ability to transmit and receive. They have the ability to convert 1s and 0s into radio waves and then back into 1s and 0s. There are three big differences between WiFi radios and Walkie-talkies:

1. WiFi radios that work with the 802.11b and 802.11g standards transmit at 2.4 GHz, while those that comply with the 802.11a standard transmit at 5 GHz. Normal walkie-talkies normally operate at 49 MHz. The higher frequency allows higher data rates.

2. WiFi radios use much more efficient coding techniques that also contribute to the much higher data rates. For 802.11a and 802.11g, the technique is known as orthogonal frequency-division multiplexing (OFDM). For 802.11b, it is called Complementary Code Keying (CCK).

3. The radios used for WiFi have the ability to change frequencies. 802.11b cards can transmit directly on any of three bands, or they can split the available radio bandwidth into dozens of channels and frequency hop rapidly between them. The advantage of frequency hopping is that it is much more immune to interference and can allow dozens of WiFi cards to talk simultaneously without interfering with each other.

Because they are transmitting at much higher frequencies than a Walkie-Talkie, and because of the encoding techniques, WiFi radios can handle a lot more data per second. 802.11b can handle up to 11 megabits per second (although 7 megabits per second is more typical, and 802.11b may fall back as low as 1 or 2 megabits per second if there is a lot of interference). 802.11a and 802.11g can handle up to 54 megabits per second (although 30 megabits per second is more typical).

You might be wondering where the funny 802.11 nomenclature comes from. The Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE) creates standards, and they number these standards in unique ways. The 802.11 standard covers wireless networks. The a, b and g notations identify different flavors of the 802.11 standard:

a. 802.11b was the first version to reach the marketplace. It is the slowest and least expensive of the three. As mentioned above, 802.11b transmits at 2.4 GHz and can handle up to 11 megabits per second.
b. 802.11a was next. It operates at 5 GHz and can handle up to 54 megabits per second.
c. 802.11g is a mix of both worlds. It operates at 2.4Ghz (giving it the cost advantage of 802.11b) but it has the 54 megabits per second speed of 802.11a.

Fortunately, all of this radio technology is hidden in a WiFi card and is completely invisible. WiFi, in fact, is one of the easiest technologies that you will ever use.

One of the best things about WiFi is how simple it is. Many new laptops already come with a WiFi card built in -- in many cases you don't have to do anything to start using WiFi. It is also easy to add a WiFi card to an older laptop or a desktop PC. Here's what you do:

* Buy a 802.11a, 802.11b or 802.11g network card. 802.11g has the advantage of higher speeds and good interoperability on 802.11b equipment.
o For a laptop, this card will normally be a PCMCIA card that you slide into a PCMCIA slot on your laptop. Or you can buy a small external adapter and plug it into a USB port.
o For a desktop machine, you can buy a PCI card that you install inside the machine, or a small external adapter that you connect to the computer with a USB cable.
* Install the card
* Install the drivers for the card
* Find an 802.11 hotspot
* Access the hotspot.

A hotspot is a connection point for a WiFi network. It is a small box that is hardwired into the Internet. The box contains an 802.11 radio that can simultaneously talk to up to 100 or so 802.11 cards. There are many WiFi hotspots now available in public places like restaurants, hotels, libraries and airports. You can also create your own hotspot in your home, as we will see in a later section.

On the newest machines, an 802.11 card will automatically connect with an 802.11 hotspot and a network connection will be established. As soon as you turn on your machine, it will connect and you will be able to browse the Web, send email, etc. using WiFi. On older machines you often have to go through this simple 3-step process to connect to a hotspot:

* Access the software for the 802.11 card -- normally there is an icon for the card down in the system tray at the bottom right of the screen.
* Click the "Search button" in the software. The card will search for all of the available hotspots in the area and show you a list.
* Double-click on one of the hotspots to connect to it.

On ancient 802.11 equipment, there is no automatic search feature. You have to find what is known as the SSID of the hotspot (usually a short word of 10 characters or less) as well as the channel number (an integer between 1 and 11) and type these two pieces of information in manually. All the search feature is doing is grabbing these two pieces of information from the radio signals generated by the hotspot and displaying them for you.

WiFi hotspots can be open or secure. If a hotspot is open, then anyone with a WiFi card can access the hotspot. If it is secure, then the user needs to know a WEP key to connect.

WEP stands for Wired Equivalent Privacy, and it is an encryption system for the data that 802.11 sends through the air. WEP has two variations: 64-bit encryption (really 40-bit) and 128-bit encryption (really 104-bit). 40-bit encryption was the original standard but was found to be easily broken. 128-bit encryption is more secure and is what most people use if they enable WEP.

For a casual user, any hotspot that is using WEP is inaccessible unless you know the WEP key.

If you are setting up a hotspot in your home, you may want to create and use a 128-bit WEP key to prevent the neighbors from casually eavesdropping on your network.

Whether at home or on the road, you need to know the WEP key, and then enter it into the WiFi card's software, to gain access to the network.

It is very easy to set up a WiFi hotspot in your own home. You can do it in one of two ways:

* If you already have several computers hooked together on an Ethernet network and want to add a wireless hotspot to the mix, you can purchase a Wireless Access Point and plug it into the Ethernet network.

* If you are setting up a network in your home for the first time, or if you are upgrading, you can buy a Wireless Access Point Router. This is a single box that contains: 1) a port to connect to your cable modem or DSL modem, 2) a router, 3) an Ethernet hub, 4) a firewall and 5) a wireless access point. You can connect the computers in your home to this box either with traditional Ethernet cables or with wireless cards.

Either way, once you turn your Wireless Access Point on, you will have a WiFi hotspot in your house. In a typical home, your new hotspot will provide coverage for about 100 feet (30.5 meters) in all directions, although walls and floors do cut down on the range. Even so, you should get good coverage throughout a typical home. For a large home, you can buy inexpensive signal boosters to increase the range of the Hotspot.

If you are setting up your 802.11 network from scratch, you will have to choose between 802.11a, 802.11b and 802.11g. 802.11b is slightly less expensive, but it is the slowest of the three options. For home use, 802.11g costs just a little more, but is up to 5 times faster. If you will be doing a lot of file transfers between computers in your home, 802.11g is definitely the way to go.

Most wireless access points come with default values built-in. Once you plug them in, they start working with these default values in 90 percent of the cases. However, you may want to change things. You normally get to set three things on your access point:

* The SSID -- it will normally default to the manufacturer's name (e.g. "Linksys" or "Netgear"). You can set it to any word or phrase you like.

* The channel -- normally it will default to channel 6. However, if a nearby neighbor is also using an access point and it is set to channel 6, there can be interference. Choose any other channel between 1 and 11. An easy way to see if your neighbors have access points is to use the search feature that comes with your wireless card.

* The WEP key -- The default is to disable WEP. If you want to turn it on, you have to enter a WEP key and turn on 128-bit encryption.

Access points come with simple instructions for changing these three values. Normally you do it with a Web browser. Once it is configured properly, you can use your new hotspot to access the Internet from anywhere in your home.

For more information on wireless networking and related topics, check out the links on the following page.

Phew... jesus people, anyways, there ya go thats all I know...

-----------Information Thanks to: Marshall Brain-----------

[highwizard]

Okay, I admit defeat! You want me to tell you about Wi-Fi? Here, I'll tell you about Wi-Fi. If I miss something tell me, and I'll tell you about that to.

<snip>

-----------Information Thanks to: Marchel Brane-----------

It's Marshall Brain http://ibs.howstuffworks.com/ibs/sea...ss-network.htm

Couldn't you have done it if the top of your head or did you really need to copy and paste from "How Stuff Works"?

[alklloyd]

It's Marshall Brain http://ibs.howstuffworks.com/ibs/sea...ss-network.htm

Couldn't you have done it if the top of your head or did you really need to copy and paste from "How Stuff Works"?

Heh, Highwiz, Google is your friend. That brings some nostalgia for the old text file days, people typing stuff out of manuals to each other...well, not really.

Al

[Thorn]

Okay, I admit defeat! You want me to tell you about Wi-Fi? Here, I'll tell you about Wi-Fi. If I miss something tell me, and I'll tell you about that to.
...

Phew... jesus people, anyways, there ya go thats all I know...

-----------Information Thanks to: Marchel Brane-----------

Not bad, for using someone else's work, but that's rather beside the point. If that is in fact all you know, it's probably slightly more than the average wireless consumer.

All in all though, the real point is that you walked in here and made some statements about which you have no knowledge, specifically WiFi AT DefCon and in Las Vegas during DefCon. So that you don't make a complete fool out of yourself, I would suggest you perform several searches on these forums and on Google.
1) Wall of Sheep/Shame
2) airpwn

After doing a bit of reading, you may understand why bringing a Wireless setup to DC is the hardly best idea in the world, at least if you intend to use it in a normal manner for activities such as email or web browsing.

Also, the line about "Bum F**k Egypt" was rather ignorant. One of the best known pages of Do-It-Yourself moderate distance links is about the Internet cafe in Hurghada, Red Sea, Egypt. Mr. Hassan Adly's link hjas been operational since 2001, and he founded the Red Sea Technologies WISP.
http://www.d128.com/wireless/
http://www.d128.com/wireless/index_old

[TheCotMan]

...

The computers connect to the network using radio signals, and computers can be up to 100 feet or so apart.

What about 35.2196 miles Or 55.1 miles?

WiFi, in fact, is one of the easiest technologies that you will ever use.

(The Dog from Conan: "Easy to poop on!" :-)
Ease of use often includes other risks that people might not consider.

WiFi hotspots can be open or secure.

I've never liked this name applied to use of encryption. Others like "SSL" and "HTTPS" have great selling points by including the "S" in their names, but it is misleading.
An access point can be open, or not.
An access point can be configured to include encryption to enhance security, or not.

WEP stands for Wired Equivalent Privacy...

I thought there were talks at BlackHat on how the first generation of WEP was fundamentally broken as a protocol. Then there are tools that have been discussed elsewhere (not going to google them for this post) that worked to gather data on a WEP network to break the key.

If you are setting up a hotspot in your home, you may want to create and use a 128-bit WEP key to prevent the neighbors from casually eavesdropping on your network.

I think this is a bit old in the security space for wireless. Later it was suggested people also use MAC filtering, and for businesses, also use a proxy that required SSL authentication or a VPN connection from the wireless access network.

Some of the information is a bit old, and not specific to computer security or hacking. It seems to be targetted toward the home user-- not hackers.

As for:

-----------Information Thanks to: Marchel Brane-----------

I won't criticize the original source. I expect their target audience was the home user. Other aspect of using that source have been addressed and will be skipped by me. But you had the opportunity to alter the content to fit this target audience.

[hackajar]

I wonder if "Mr. NiceGuy" will be replaced by "banned" in the near future.

/hackajar looks into his crystal ball