I was wondering if anyone could give me any tips on increasing the security level on Airport and reduce my fears of anyone logging into the signal. IE Anyone next door for example.
There are several things you can do. First, on your wireless router, turn SSID broadcast off. That way, anyone scanning the airwaves won't even see your wireless router putting a signal out. You'll have to tell your PB the name of the SSID so it can find it and connect. .
Next, on your wireless router, you can specify that only certain machines can use your wireless router. This is controlled by the MAC (media access control) address. You can find your MAC address on your PB by clicking on the blue apple, about this mac, more information, network, and it's listed under ethernet, in 6 pairs of hex characters.
You want to encrypt your transmissions too. Don't use WEP encryption, as it can be broken in the time it took me to type this up. Use WPA or WPA2, with a complex (upper/lower case alpha, numbers, and special characters) pass phrase. Write down the pass phrase, as you'll need it now, and sometime in the future you'll have to key it in again, and if it's a good, complex pass phrase, you will have forgotten what it is.
On the wireless router, if you have the option to disable wireless updates, choose that. That means that the wireless router options can only be changed by a computer hooked up via an ethernet cable. That way, someone can't hack your router wirelessly and change options or passwords on you.
There are several things you can do. First, on your wireless router, turn SSID broadcast off. That way, anyone scanning the airwaves won't even see your wireless router putting a signal out. You'll have to tell your PB the name of the SSID so it can find it and connect. .
Next, on your wireless router, you can specify that only certain machines can use your wireless router. This is controlled by the MAC (media access control) address. You can find your MAC address on your PB by clicking on the blue apple, about this mac, more information, network, and it's listed under ethernet, in 6 pairs of hex characters.
You want to encrypt your transmissions too. Don't use WEP encryption, as it can be broken in the time it took me to type this up. Use WPA or WPA2, with a complex (upper/lower case alpha, numbers, and special characters) pass phrase. Write down the pass phrase, as you'll need it now, and sometime in the future you'll have to key it in again, and if it's a good, complex pass phrase, you will have forgotten what it is.
On the wireless router, if you have the option to disable wireless updates, choose that. That means that the wireless router options can only be changed by a computer hooked up via an ethernet cable. That way, someone can't hack your router wirelessly and change options or passwords on you.
The best way to secure a wireless network is to use WPA encryption (not WEP) and a very good password. If you have an Apple airport or airport extreme/express base station, you can follow the instructions in this discussion thread -
http://discussions.apple.com/thread.jspa?threadID=722106&tstart=75
If you have a non-Apple wireless basestation, you would need to consult the manual it came with for how to set up WPA, then follow the instructions in the discussion thread for how to connect.
