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WiFi got flu – viral router attack could hit entire city!




Posted by ketyung
on Jan/03/2008
at 6:00 am

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WiFi got flu - viral router attack could hit entire city!
The wider the coverage of wireless network or WiFi, the more vulnerable it is subject to attack. And the attack could be wide spread over a city. Yeah, it’s no joke, the statement here doesn’t come out from the mouths of those paranoids. It’s from a paper written by a team of researchers at Indiana University.

I absolutely agree with it. Wireless routers are not as secure as the wired counterparts, although the development of WPA encryption has increased (theoretical) wireless security significantly. As the density and scale of wireless coverage has expanded, however, the chance that a router-focused viral attack could cause significant damage has increased. How many of those out there leave their wireless routers’ default passwords unchanged. And how many of the wireless routers are easily to crack with their short passwords. All these are simply vulnerable to the attack of malware.

The research team has carried out simulation on how quickly an infection would spread across the various wireless networks and what general steps shall be taken to prevent or reduce the attack. The result of the simulation shows that non-encrypted wireless routers are the fastest to be conquered by malware, followed by the second is WEP-encrypted routers – although comparatively slower but not immune to malware attack. Only WPA-enabled wireless routers configured with strong password are considered impregnable.

The two straightforward solutions to it are to change the default password to strong password. And use WPA-compliant hardware whenever possible. WEP-enabled routers are simply not safe at all, having too many flaws to be considered as effective solution. Last but not least, having encryption on, even though it’s only WEP is much better than having no encryption!

via [ArsTechica]

WiFi,wireless network,WiFi Flu,viral router attack

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One Response to “WiFi got flu – viral router attack could hit entire city!”

  1. Security alert: Malicious JavaScript-loaded website can take over your router! - by Gadget, shop online blog of TechChee.com Says:

    [...] in charge of your office Internet router, you’ve gotta be aware of that you router could be easily hackable if it’s simply protected by weak password. Researcher Dan Kaminsky will prepare a [...]

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