Book Image

BackTrack - Testing Wireless Network Security

By : Kevin Cardwell
Book Image

BackTrack - Testing Wireless Network Security

By: Kevin Cardwell

Overview of this book

Wireless networks are everywhere. You have probably set one up yourself, but have you ever wondered just how safe you are while browsing online? In the majority of cases, the default settings for your networks are not enough to protect you. With your data being transferred over the air, it can be easily plucked and used by anyone who knows how. Don't let it happen to you.BackTrack - Testing Wireless Network Security will help you secure your wireless networks and keep your personal data safe. With this book, you will learn how to configure your hardware for optimum security, find network security holes, and fix them.BackTrack - Testing Wireless Network Security looks at what tools hackers use and shows you how to defend yourself against them. Taking you from no prior knowledge all the way to a fully secure environment, this guide provides useful tips every step of the way. Learn how to select a wireless card to work with the Backtrack tools, run spectrum analysis scans using kismet, set up test networks, and perform attacks against wireless networks. Use the tools aircrack-ng and airodump-ng to crack the wireless encryption used on the network. You will learn everything you need to know to set up your wireless network for use within Backtrack and also how to defend yourself against the included attack tools.
Table of Contents (13 chapters)

Defending from surveillance


The second step of the attacking methodology that we discussed in Chapter 4, Breaching Wireless Security, is the surveillance step. In this step, the attacker surveys and looks for a weak network to attack. In the example shown in the next screenshot, what kind of network do you think the attacker would attempt to attack?

While many of you would probably be tempted to go after the access points that use the WEP protocol, an attacker would usually go for the open access points that are not protected by any form of encryption. This is because if the access point is not protected, it is just a matter of connecting to it and then carrying out the rest of the process. This should provide you with the first step for defending your network once you have made the power modifications that are allowed by your device. The next step is to configure encryption on the access point. Since we are several chapters into the book at this time and have discussed the flaws of WEP,...