5.1.14

WiFi Encryption

Test yourself

WiFi Encryption

It's easier to intercept WiFi signals than signals in a wire. This is because they are just radio waves that anyone can pick up.

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Security measures

  • Because WiFi is so open, it's important to protect against eavesdroppers.
  • There are three common security measures to protect against this:
    • Wired Equivalent Privacy (WEP).
    • Wi-Fi Protected Access (WPA).
    • Wi-Fi Protected Access version 2 (WPA2).
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Wired Equivalent Privacy (WEP)

  • WEP is the weakest protection of all.
  • WEP simply needs a password to join the network.
  • No data is encrypted, so it can be easily intercepted.
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Wi-Fi Protected Access (WPA)

  • WPA also uses a password to join the network.
  • WPA also uses encryption to scramble the data being sent:
    • This means that only devices with the correct key can decode the data.
  • WPA is much stronger than WEP.
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Wi-Fi Protected Access v2 (WPA2)

  • WPA2 is the successor of WPA.
  • WPA2 uses a stronger encryption algorithm to prevent unauthorised parties from accessing the encrypted data.

Jump to other topics

1Problem Solving

2Programming

3Data

4Computers

5Communication & The Internet

6The Bigger Picture

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