15 Network

15 ‐ Wireless Networking
Thursday, May 4, 2017 1:47 PM
1. Introduction to Wi-Fi and Wireless Access Points

In this episode, Mike explains the concepts behind wireless networking.
From <https://hub.totalsem.com/content/2257#path=2257,2483,2484>
Wi‐Fi = Short range radio to be used instead of cabling for distribution for Local Area Networks. We're
getting rid of wires and replacing it with radio waves.
Wi‐Fi that we use is based on 802.11 standard.
Wireless network card that Mike pulled out of his desktop computer (acts as an interface to a wireless
network):
Wireless NIC that you plug in to a USB port and it handles all your wireless needs:
Everybody's got a wireless NIC these days but if you want to connect to a wireless netowkr you need a
Network+ Page 1
Wireless Access Point (WAP):
A WAP is a bridging device that bridges between a wireless network and an Ethernet network (if you
look in the back of a WAP there is an RJ‐45 jack for this).
You have wireless clients and a wireless access point.
You can use infrastructure mode (most common) or ad hoc mode (less common).
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In infrastructure mode you've got a WAP and individual clients who are designed to connect to the
WAP.
In ad hoc mode there is no wireless access point! All of these guys can talk to each other but there is no
interconnection to an ethernet network.
When you configure a WAP the first thing you do is set up an SSID. You go into the web interface of the
WAP and name it.
Network+ Page 3
One WAP with one SSID is a BSSID.
You can take multiple WAPs and connect them all to the same switch and if you give them the same
SSID they will automatically start talking to each other. So if you walk around and drop the connection
from one WAP but you are in range of the other WAP it will continue your connection. This is called
ESSID.
The SSID is simply the name of the network being offered up to the individual clients.
802.11 is designed to run on 2 ISM bands:
2.4 GHz and 5 GHz bands
Each of these bands have sets of channels
2.4 GHz band's channels are 1‐14
North America can only uses channels 1‐11
Rest of the World can use channels 1‐13
Japan can use channels 1‐14
The problem is that these channels overlap pretty heavily. In the U.S. there are really only 3 channels:
1, 6 (or 7), and 11
We usually only set our WAPs to use one of these 3 channels to make sure we're not overlapping and to
keep us away from other WAPs that are broadcasting on the exact same channel
This WAP has 1 RJ‐45 connection coming out of it
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This is also a WAP …and a home router. There are more than 1 port. It is a WAP, Switch, and Router. It is
3 totally different devices and each needs separate configuration.
2. 802.11 Standards
This episode covers the various wireless networking standards and examines their relative merits.
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802.11 has been around for over 20 years
802.11 is actually the one standard. There are extensions to this standard: a, b, g, n, ac
802.11b
…is the first standard.
Speed: 11 Mbps
(ISM) Band: 2.4 GHz (a range of frequencies)
‐‐> defines 14 different channels…the U.S. has 11. These channels overlapped and that wasn't good. 1, 6
or 7, and 11 are the only channels you can have without overlapping though.
802.11a
(i.e. WAP called Cisco Aeronet 1200)
Speed: 54 Mbps
(ISM) Band: 5 GHz
Range: slightly shorter than 802.11b
‐‐> you don't really worry about channels in the 5 GHz band. Less chance of interference from different
types of devices.
Network+ Page 6
This standard really put wireless on the map. This is the infamous WAP/router (57 Chevy of WAPs)
Linksys WRT 54g.
802.11g
Speed: 54 Mbps
(ISM) Band: 2.4 GHz (backward compatible with 802.11b)
‐‐> changed the game!
Mike personally dislikes the next one…
802.11n
Speed: 108 Mbps ‐ 300 Mbps (introduced channels…you can increase throughput by adding antennas)
ISM Band: 2.4 GHz and 5 GHz
‐‐> came out as a way to increase the speed beyond 54 Mbps and to start moving into the 5 MHz range.
Usually has more than 2 antennas even if they aren't externally exposed. Introduced MIMO: allowed you
to use multiple channels to talk to different devices. With enough send and receive antennas you can
almost make personal conversations with individual devices at a higher speed.
Things that make it challenging:
- Invented a different kind of packet that it would send out, so in order for it to be backward
compatible with different devices it would need to go into different kind of legacy modes. It would
be difficult to configure access points the right way, in particular if you didn't have the right kind of
network card. i.e. if you upgrade to an 802.11n network and you thought you had 802.11n
network cards in your devices but all of a sudden you couldn't get real high speeds. The reason for
this is either the WAP didn't have the right type of configuration (i.e. Greenfield mode…you'd have
to do firmware updates on all your network cards so they know what is taking place).
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- There's a lot of tweaking with 802.11n
It's going to take the next version of 802.11 to get this right….
Mike's favorite version of 802.11 is AC
802.11ac
Speed: 1 Gbps (the more channels you add the more speed you get…only limited by the network cards
in your client)
(ISM) Band: 5 GHz (can also run in the 2.4 GHz band…this has 3 antennas for 2.4 GHz band and 5 GHz
band. It has the ability to run in the 2.4 GHz band just by making a better access point, not because ac
runs in that band)
‐‐> has a lot of power to it! Builds on the 802.11n MIMO concept and has MUMIMO. You can provide
MIMO to multiple users at a time and it increases throughput dramatically.
Network+ Page 8
Mike LOVES 802.11ac!
Exam will ask things like:
- Their network is running slow. What standard should they move up to?
- They're having problems with channels. What should they do about that?
3. Power Over Ethernet (PoE)

In this episode, Mike demonstrates the power of PoE, which provides electricity to network devices
through their Ethernet ports.
Old Cisco WAP in Mike's office:
Network+ Page 9
There's a blue RJ‐45 cable but no power cable. This is done by Power Over Ethernet (POE)
POE provides power over an ethernet cable. Especially great for WAPs that are nowhere near
convenient electricity.
To make POE work:
1. Get a WAP that is POE capable.
2. In order to get power to WAPs that are POE capable, you also need a switch that is POE capable.
He has a switch where every port is a POE switch. So the WAP can be plugged into any port on that
switch and it should provide enough juice ‐ in theory. Problem is that particular WAP needs a lot of
electricity ‐ more than his POE switch is capable of providing.
In cases like this, you need to provide a POE injector.
Network+ Page 10
The box Mike has his hand on is a POE injector. The ethernet cable from the WAP goes to the switch and
then to the POE injector.
Is designed to supply power to a WAP.
Has 2 RJ45 connections:
1 plugs into the switch
1 plugs into the WAP
The back has an AC adapter
Network+ Page 11
Plug the POE injector in to provide power to a WAP. Can also use these when you don't have a POE
capable switch.
4. Wireless Security Standards

This episode is an overview of the various encryption standards that exist to protect your wireless
network.
Need to go through a fairly strong configuration process for security for WAPs:
By default, anybody can connect to a WAP. There's nothing you can do about that.
The real power with 802.11 comes with encryption. Just because you can talk to a WAP doesn't mean
you can get much past that. So we use encryption to protect our systems.
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Different types of encryption standards:
Default address for this WAP is 192.168.1.245
This older WAP can only be set to Mixed, G, or B
SSID: linksys
Wireless security options:
Network+ Page 13
WEP: the original form of encryption that came with wireless devices.
Encryption options are 64‐bit or 128‐bit.
They are actually using a streaming encryption protocol. The initialization vector (a starter) eats up 24‐
bits of the entire key. So you really only have 40‐bit keys and 104‐bit keys. So you already use a lot of the
power of the key with WEP.
• 40 / 64‐bit (10 hex digits)
• 104 / 128‐bit (26 hex digits)
Can setup 4 keys, so if you want to loan out keys from time to time you can use key 2, 3, or 4 for
temporary users.
The downside to WEP is the way it uses its keys made it mathematically trivial to crack it. YOU SHOULD
NOT USE WEP because it is trivially cracked.
To get around this problem we have an improvement on WEP called Wi‐Fi Protected Access (WPA).
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WPA is still WEP but it includes TKIP which makes it a little more challenging.
Instead of incrementing the secret decoder ring one time at a time, what if we spun it randomly and had
some special way to tell the other people what the special spin is.
WPA is a marketing term which was designed because the real standard hadn't come out yet. Everyone
was waiting and needing something in the meantime a little stronger than WEP…
WPA is crackable, especially if you use a short 8 letter kind of password.
There is also a WPA Enterprise
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This boils down to authentication. How do you authenticate a system so you know who they are?
The easy way to do WPA is with a Personal Shared Key (PSK) or Personal.
When you put in WPA Enterprise you have to type in the RADIUS server and such:
Not too many people did this.
Should type in a complicated passphrase (especially long).
The only thing WPA lacked was the more aggressive AES Encryption…it used RC4.
AES Encryption required extra hardware.
Over time we got to the point where devices could use AES. They called it WPA2.
There is WPA2‐Personal and WPA2‐Enterprise
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The encryption has to be AES.
The only thing you have to worry about is all the devices have to support AES, which most do nowadays.
There is also WPA2‐Mixed which supports WPA and WPA2.
RADIUS is another option.
Network+ Page 17
Really what they're saying here is RADIUS and WEP. Which is weird and rare and almost never used.
WEP and WPA are crackable.
It's the long passwords that really stop people cold!!!!!!!
5. Implementing Wireless Security

What good is unimplemented security? In this episode, Mike demonstrates how to secure your wireless
network so that your neighbors will stop hogging all your bandwidth.
There's a lot more to security than turning on WPA2. These are things you should do on your WAP to
make sure your system truly is secure.
D‐Link WAP settings:
Network+ Page 18
You can disable SSID visibility. This turns off SSID Broadcast. The downside to doing that is that it
requires you to manually configure your clients. It stops the most basic bad guys, but not much else. Like
putting a screen door on a submarine: pretty limited in terms of use.
More powerful security things to do:
1. Wireless MAC ACL: Access Control List based on MAC addresses.
Have everyone connect who you want to be on your Wireless network, then turn this on and select Add
for the devices you want to allow.
Network+ Page 19
Now it will only accept these MAC addresses:
Downside is that if your Aunt Bernice comes to visit you have to go through some rigamaroll to get her
configured.
2. Multiple SSIDs. Advanced WAPs can create multiple SSIDs. One can be a visitor SSID for instance.
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Once the multiple SSIDs are setup you can give them different types of encryption, set them to separate
VLANs, etc. to help protect your network.
3. DHCP Issue Limiting:
DHCP is another way you can increase security.
Pretty much all WAPs are going to be DHCP servers.
You can set the range of your DHCP pool to a smaller number (i.e. 5 if you have 5 computers in
your network). Same downside/issue you run into, i.e. if your aunt is visiting and needs an IP
address to get onto your Wifi. You have to go in and increase the range of the DHCP pool.
4. Change the default user name and password!
Network+ Page 21
Duh!
5. Remote Management: can you access this configuration screen from a wireless client? By default
it is almost always turned off. In general this is a bad idea because bad guys will try to poke in on
it. If you want to do it for convenience to get into your WAP to make changes, you need to make a
strong username/password, change the default port (away from port 80).
6. Client Isolation: usually there is a single WAP with a bunch of people connecting to it. When this
happens people are in essence in a broadcast domain. So if everything else is setup correctly on
their individual computers, they can see each other. However, on a cool WAP (i.e. with the DD‐
WRT firmware upgrade) is that it adds the option of client isolation. So everyone can connect to
the same SSID but they cannot see each other. This is really important especially on a public
wireless network!
Network+ Page 22
6. Threats to Your Wireless Network
In this episode, Mike covers war driving, war chalking, rogue WAPs, evil twins, and how to protect
against them.
There are some other issues with wireless networks that need to be discussed:
1. War Driving
I'm in my car driving around, I've got a laptop with an antenna, and I'm looking for unsecure wireless
networks (or WEP and WPA based wireless networks).
It is unclear whether this is illegal or not.
What is illegal is using someone's network in an unauthorized way.
2. War Chalking
Back in the old days, people would pullup to a place, find a wireless network. Use nomenclature to
decide what type of network it was.
Example: this picture shows the following…
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SSID
Open network
G network
Speed is 11 Mbps
Was used so other people could get onto the network.
When people were doing this it was to steal bandwidth or hack into your network.
All kinds of bad things happen on open networks.
It is a good idea to lock down your networks as much as possible.
Use a password.
Use WPA2.
WIDS: most WAPs have this nowadays.
First go through a make a list of all the WAPs that your WAP can see.
Check them and say they are Valid
Now you have a list of WAPs you know are good. So if another WAP appears in my network you can do
something about it.
Network+ Page 24
Rogue Wireless Access Point (WAP)s are out there. Are often innocent problems. Need to let people
know what they can and cannot do.
There is another kind of Rogue WAP out there called an Evil Twin.
A lot of people have webs where you get a homepage type of thing and you do some type of login. It is
so easy to copy that webpage, get a wireless jammer (completely illegal in the US), put the jammer on
channel 6 and jam this channel. Your wireless devices are designed by default to find that SSID on
another channel if the channel they were on is jammed. In the meantime, Mike has setup his laptop as
a WAP and made a copy of that login page for the wireless network he is copying. Instead of jumping
onto the correct WAP, they jump onto Mike's laptop and enter their usernames and passwords. Then he
has collected tons and tons of logins that often people use the same login info for other sites (i.e.
Paypal)!
Evil Twins are dangerous! On serious wireless networks they have wireless intrusion detection systems
that know what WAPs are out there, and if another one shows up they will triangulate on it, jam it on
their own, deauthorize anyone trying to connect to it, and send off alarms.
7. Retro Threats
Mike and Logan time travel back to the days of war driving and war chalking.
1 millionth CompTIA A+ certified tech
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War Driving: in a car driving around looking for wireless networks.
They found a network and are going to do War Chalking!
Network+ Page 26
Symbols:
Open Node )(
‐‐> SSID and bandwidth
Closed Node ()
‐‐> SSID
WEP (W)
‐‐>SSID, Access Contact
= Open Node network with SSID of Belkin and Bandwidth of 2 Mbps
Network+ Page 27
8. Wi-Fi Protected Setup (WPS)
In this episode, Mike explains the technology behind WPS, a method for easily connecting to a secure
wireless network.
Taking devices other than computers and connecting them to wireless networks has always been a
challenge.
Wi‐Fi Alliance came up with WPS
Push button wireless configuration. You take your WAP or router and press a button on it. You have
about 60 seconds to walk over to whatever device you have and press a button there. They will
automatically configure themselves with WPA2.
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The problem is this:
(i.e. Cisco E2500)
He presses the button on the router first
Then he presses the button on the printer.
That's all you have to do!
Most network cards have a WPS button too:
The cornerstone of WPS is an 8 digit code that is being queried and passed between the devices.
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Any device accredited by the WiFi alliance has to have WPS.
The process you go through to get the 8 digit code accepted electronically can take years!
WPS is very easy to hack.
The answer is: turn off WPS. Unfortunately a lot of devices can't have WPS turned off.
Some people rip out the firmware from their devices and replace it with DD‐WRT if they are unable to
turn WPS off.
9. Wireless Problem Scenarios
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Mike looks at some of the issues that can arise to topple your wireless network, with a special focus on
wireless interference.
Once a wireless network is setup properly there shouldn't be a lot of issues with it.
Problems:
1. Interference
When you connect to a wireless network, you establish a certain speed that you are going to run
at. Because of interference, speeds can slow down a bit. Figure out what speed you have agreed
with your WAP to run. In Windows 8 he fired up the Resource Monitor and he is running at around
1 Mbps
802.11n network should be running faster than that.
In his Wi‐Fi status his speed is set to 65 Mbps
When this speed tends to dip down it is probably due to interference. Interference from things
like:
a. WAPs stomping on your channel. Would have to go out and do a site survey to see what's out
there.
b. Baby monitors, portable phones.
Network+ Page 31
The way you can tell there is a problem is if things seem slower. You need to find what the
Negotiation Speed is between your device and the WAP (finding this varies by OS). See what
your established link speed is and if it is dropping down to something very very low. i.e. if his
speed went from 65 Mbps to 11 Mbps he has an interference issue.
Two solutions: 1) kill the interference (i.e. get rid of the baby monitor and find one on a different
channel) or 2) get away from the interference (i.e. set the channel on your WAP a little further
away from everybody else).
2. Wrong WAP password.
If you can't get on the internet on a new network, check your IP address. If you have a
169.xxx.xxx.x (APIPA) address you probably typed in the wrong WAP password. The big clue for a
bad password is an APIPA address!!!
3. Changes made to WAP settings will no longer match client profiles
Once you make a connection to a particular SSID, everything is going to be remembered. So if you
are connected to an open network then someone makes a change to the WAP requiring a
password, you're not going to be able to get on the network.
To fix this: click Forget this network
It's still there, but he has deleted the profile:
When he reconnects, it will prompt for a password and the profile will be re‐established.
Network+ Page 32
10. Planning and Installing a Wireless Network
In this episode, Mike goes over the process of setting up a wireless network in a home or small office.
You want people to be able to access the wireless network wherever you think they should be able to.
First, get out a diagram of your home or office.
Look at the measurements so you know where the WAP should be placed. Preferably in a central
location.
Wireless is fantastic but it will always have latency issues. When in doubt, wired is always going to be
better than wireless. On serious stuff like servers, you want to run a cable to them.
Perform a site survey. Can do this with a free tool. See what wireless networks are in your
neighborhood.
Network+ Page 33
Mike is using inSSIDer. A lot of laptops come with site survey tools in them.
There is nothing on the 5 GHz band.
On the 2 GHz band, channel 1, 6, and 11 are busy areas. Channel 1 has the least amount of noise. There
is only 1 network with greater amplitude (ATT3991 about ‐80).
The other network, HookEm, has less amplitude.
Would like to see his own network at an amplitude of ‐20 but it will probably be closer to ‐30 to ‐40.
He could probably put his wireless network on any of these channels and it would be stronger than the
others ‐ there is no one that is absolutely stomping him. They are all around ‐70 or worse amplitude.
That's the important thing.
Now he needs to mount this WAP on his wall:
It is POE capable.
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After it is mounted, certify connectivity and check for any dead spots.
802.11 signals go through non‐metallic walls.
Wherever you have metal you may get bounce and have dead spots.
Walk around with your laptop to look for dead spots.
These antennas are dipole (according to Network+) or omni (according to Mike) antennas. You have to
think of what shape of signal your antennas are giving. Dipole is a flat signal. Good for WAPs to cover
everybody on one floor (i.e. a flattened bagel). Omni antennas are like a big fuzzy ball which is good if
you have second and third floors. Run multiple omni antennas together to get a nice flat signal that will
cover everybody on this floor.
Alternative Antennas:
Patch antenna: creates a signal like half of a basketball. It radiates out in one direction and almost
nothing in the other direction.
Popular in office environments because you can place it against a wall and someone on the other side of
the wall won't get the signal.
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Yagi antennas: good for shooting signal from a specific point to another, i.e. down a hall.
With WAPs you can pretty easily remove and replace antennas nowadays. The FCC wasn't happy about
this because they didn't want people boosting signals beyond 1 watt, which is all that an ISM device is
allowed to radiate. The bigger the antenna, the more gain, or signal strength.
The downside to this is people get out of control. They get too big of a high gain antenna. And to get
more signal they will put it in the ceiling or on their roof. They won't move the WAP, which is a bad idea.
Because the wire that runs from the RF source to the antenna actually kills gain. So if you put in a 3rd
party antenna you want to screw it directly into the WAP itself! (don't use a long antenna cable to put
the antenna on your roof and keep the WAP in your house)
Process of setting up a WAP: Cisco E2500
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This is DD‐WRT… this is a firmware update that replaces the firmware that comes with the WAP.
He went to the dd‐wrt.com website and typed in his WAP model # and it gave him new firmware.
This is a little bit of an experimental tool.
First, configure the WAP as an access point (AP):
Wireless Network Mode: Mixed (is a bad idea…the more channels it supports the less throughput you're
going to get on the WAP). So you can draw a line in the sand and say you're not going to support A and
B. In Mike's house he has 2 WAPs: 1 for N and 1 for G. He can improve his throughput that way.
NG‐Mixed
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Put in a SSID
Virus Workshop ;‐)
Set the Wireless Channel… 14 is illegal in the U.S.. He set it to 1. Or you can set it to "Auto" ‐ Mike likes
this.
Channel Width: Auto
Wireless SSID Broadcast: Enable
When you have a place where you need wireless access but you don't have a WAP. You can use a Bridge.
i.e. if you have a boat house.
This is one of many different types of Wireless Bridges:
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It picks up an existing SSID and propagates it onto the network. It also acts as a repeater and will pick up
signals from the SSID and burst it out so computers in the area can be bridged.
Bridging is a very popular thing to do.
AP Isolation: is good for coffee shops. So other people can't see other people on the network. Just
allows people to get on the internet.
Transmit power: by default, most WAPs are not transmitting at their maximum power. If you need to
give it a quick shot, you can go in and type a bigger number.
Don't make it too high because you'll be broadcasting across the street, for example.
Wireless GUI Access: if I can do it, then anybody else can. Make sure you have a good username and
password on the WAP and then enable it.
Network+ Page 39
Network+ Page 40

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15 ‐ Wireless Networking

1. Introduction to Wi-Fi and Wireless Access Points

3. Power Over Ethernet (PoE)

4. Wireless Security Standards

5. Implementing Wireless Security

9. Wireless Problem Scenarios

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