Page 16 - Cyber Warnings

Best Practices to keep your Home WiFi Secured

by Lisa Barrie, Sub-editor at List Enthusiast

Wi-Fi internet or traditional wired internet?

Ask any person and he/she’ll go for the former. The ease-of-use, easier installation, and
maintenance means Wi-Fi network has fewer problems than a wired network.

But if there’s one area where wired networks are way ahead, it’s security. Wi-Fi networks are far
easier to break-in than wired networks. Because of their wireless nature, any person in your
signal range can attempt to connect to your Wi-Fi network.

An intruder can create many problems for you. Apart from increasing your internet bills, an
unknown person can try to access your personal information. That’s why it’s important to secure
your Wi-Fi network. Here are some of the best practices regarding Wi-Fi security.

Change your Router’s Admin Username

Although changing your default router's admin username won’t make it stronger, not changing it
may land you in trouble. If you don’t change it, a person can try to access your router's admin
panel.

Activate Encryption and Create a strong Password

A weak or predictive password will only make it easier for others to connect to your network.
This is the reason you need a hard-to-guess and long password. But according to this report,
“123456” is still one the most commonly used passwords in our world. You need a much better
password than this.

For this purpose, you can use many online password generators to make sure your password is
full of capital and small case letters, and special characters.

A password alone is not sufficient. You must set an encryption standard for your network. It’s
because all Wi-Fi encryption standards are not equal. First, there was WEP (Wired Equivalent
Privacy), it’s used on older routers, but very easy to crack and no one uses it nowadays.

WPA2-AES is widely used and most recommended encryption method nowadays but it’s not
available on older routers. That’s why you may need to upgrade your router.

16 Cyber Warnings E-Magazine – May 2017 Edition
Copyright © Cyber Defense Magazine, All rights reserved worldwide