Setting up Wireless Access Points: You and your AUP

If you use an ISP that does not allow you to share your access, then do not allow anyone but the members of your family to access your AP. There are some simple steps to accomplish this:

• Most APs have the option to turn on WEP which, while not very good for protecting confidential information, will stop the casual wardriver from jumping on your AP.

• If your AP supports it, enter the MAC address of every machine you want to allow to access your LAN via the AP. This "guest list" causes your AP to ignore packets from anyone not on the list. This makes it difficult for anyone but a fairly sophisticated cracker to gain access to your network.

• Deactivate DHCP and assign all your machines hard IP addresses. You may also want to use IP addresses that are "uncommon". You might choose 172.16.0.x. This address range is valid (like 192.168.x.x and 10.x.x.x) for private LAN traffic, but much less common and therefore much less likely to be "guessed".

• Try limiting the signal coverage to just the area of your house. Place your AP in the center of the building if possible and do not add any external antennas or amplifiers. If you have the ability to adjust your transmitters output power, lower to the minimum signal necessary to reach all your workstations. (If the signal doesn't reach the street, the cracker would have to sit on your doorstep while he was trying to break in. They might be a bit obvious there... hmmm?Lowering your output power also helps to limit the amount of "noise" you contribute to your environment. This is considered to be "polite" usage of the spectrum by limiting the amount of interference you might induce to other 2.4GHz devices (cordless phones, wireless cameras etc).

ISP Name	Service	Setup Fee	Price	Comments
Birch Telecom	Business T1	$600.00	$399.95/mo	They provide unlimited bandwidth (no xfer limits), 28 static IP addresses & the router, 2 year contract
Onramp Access	Business T1	$?	$399.95/mo	Limited to 5g of transfer/month. Requires one year contract minimum
Core NAP	Business T1	$400	$295 & $395/mo	No bandwidth limits, Static IP's, One year contract.
Speakeasy	Residential and Business		$49.95/mo	Best AUP I've seen for residential service. Tell them I sent you --NathanWalther

• ISP -- Internet Service Provider, the people you pay each month to allow you to connect to the Internet.
• Internet -- C'mon now.... Do we really need to get this detailed?!?
• AP -- Access Point. A "wireless ethernet hub" that disatributes networking traffic via radio waves.
• NAT -- Network Address Translation. Usually refers to the process of converting public IP addresses to private private IP addresses. Mostly employed by broadband "routers" to allow multiple computers to access the Internet via a single Internet connection.
• AUP -- Acceptable Use Policy. This is a big, long, boring legal document that you probably didn't read but agreed to anyway when you signed up with your Internet Service Provider. Usually contains surprising restrictions on how you can use the Internet when you are connecting through that ISP.