Well I'm back! I've taken off a good month from the blogosphere.

I've actually been really interested lately in Internet/Network security. I never really got into listening to podcasts until recently when I stumbled accross a "Security Now!" podcast. The show is hosted by Leo Laporte of TWIT.tv (This Week In Tech) and Steve Gibson of grc.com which is the acronym for Gibson Research Corporation.

Steve Gibson knows his stuff. I am highly impressed by these shows. In fact I was so impressed by his show on WI-FI access point security that I went out and purchased a WPA2 enabled wireless broadband router which I've included a picture of at the left.

The overview from www.Dell.com:

" The Linksys^® WRT54GX4 Wireless-G Broadband Router with SRX400 combines the functionalities of three devices into a single device — a wireless access point, a four-port full-duplex 10/100 Mbps switch and a router. The wireless access point lets you connect Wireless-G, Wireless-B devices and other performance-enhanced SRX devices to the network, while the switch connects your wired-Ethernet devices together. Finally, the router function ties it all together by letting your whole network share a high-speed cable or DSL Internet connection. The Router combines antenna technology with standards-based Wireless-G (802.11g) networking. The router serves as a DHCP server, has a powerful SPI firewall to protect your PCs against intruders and most known Internet attacks, and supports VPN pass-through. 'Multiple In, Multiple Out' (MIMO) uses signal reflections to increase the range and reduce 'dead spots' in the wireless coverage area. To help protect your data and privacy, the Router encodes all wireless transmissions with WPA2 encryption to thwart unauthorized access. With the Wireless-G Broadband Router with SRX400 (Speed and Range Expansion) at the center of your home or office network, you can share a high-speed Internet connection, files, printers, and multi-player games with flexibility, speed, and security! "

Needless to say now I'm a little concerned that my hardware (NIC's specifically) will NOT support this router! (lol). Well I guess I'll find out when I connect everything. My wait will be a little while though since this piece of hardware is on backorder :-(

You might be asking "Why are you are upgrading your existing router?" ... Well as it turns out as part of my learning experience from the podcasts, WEP encryption (which is what my current wireless router uses) has been "badly broken" according to Steve and Leo. SSID hiding and MAC Address Filtering isn't even "real" security it simply "prevents" your lovely neighbor from using your wireless connection "without realizing it".

So as soon as my router arrives in the mail I'm going to try and set it up.

I'll report back with my results.

-warren