Most of the phones these days come with wi-fi and people are using it more than ever. Though Wi-Fi is very comfortable and easy way to share information and access internet, it is also highly vulnerable to attacks if not encrypted properly. While setting up your Wi-Fi connections you may come across terms like WEP, WPA, WPA2 etc that may be confusing for some. Today, I'll try to explain these terms as simply and exactly as possible, so that you don't loose your valuable information.
WEP
WEP stands for Wired Equivalent Privacy and is the oldest & least secure way to encrypt your Wi-Fi. Now a days it is very easy to crack WEP protected Wi-Fi and anyone interested in your information can crack the password. WEP will only stop your neighbours from accessing your Wi-Fi (if they are not hackers).
Therefore, there's no reason to use WEP. If you have an ancient router or device that supports only WEP, it's high time that you upgrade your devices unless you don't care about your security.
WPA
WPA - Wi-Fi Protected Access comes in two version WPA and WPA2. WPA was designed for devices that support only WEP as an security enhancement.
WPA2 is the newer version and all devices these days support WPA2 straight out of the box. You should always opt for WPA2 over WEP or WPA for obvious reasons. WPA2 also comes in two versions they are : WPA2 personal and enterprise.
WPA2 Personal or WPA2 PSK
PSK stands for Pre-Shared Key. This is also known as Personal mode. It's intended mainly for homes and small office networks. The wireless router encrypts network traffic with a key. With WPA-Personal, this key is calculated from the Wi-Fi passphrase you set up on your router. Before a device can connect to the network and understand the encryption, you must enter your passphrase on it. This option is most suitable if you're going to set up your Wi-Fi in your home. There are potential vulnerability but keeping a strong password can help to increase the protection. (Click Here :- how to choose a strong password.)
WPA2 Enterprise or WPA2-802.1X
WPA2-802.1X is intended for enterprises, it requires more hardware and it is difficult to set up and maintain. To use WPA2-Enterprise, you'll need a RADIUS authentication server. RADIUS stands for Remote Authentication Dial In User Service. To authenticate with such a server, a variety of EAP — Extensible Authentication Protocols — can be used. After connecting to the Wi-Fi network, each client would have to log in with a username and password. Traffic to each client would be encrypted with a unique encryption key which isn't derived from a pre-shared key. This is more secure than simply deriving a key from the same pre-shared key on each device. This also allows network administrators to monitor who's connecting to the network and revoke access to specific users at any time without affecting other users.
What should you opt for?
WPA2-Enterprise is the most secured option and if you want it for your big enterprise than you should go for this.
If you use Wi-Fi for ordinary purposes inside your house or small business office, WPA2-Personal is perfect for you.
In no case you should go with WEP.
Remember one thing, nothing is fully secured on the net, even the most secured system can be hacked, the important point is to remain active while using the net and clicking links from recognised sources only.
Stay safe.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Hello, I am Piyush Ranjan, a computer engineering student from India. I love coding and talking on technology. Most of the time I am glued to my laptop watching movies, listening songs, blogging or coding.
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