Wireless Network Security

Introduction

The wireless technology has been under threat in terms of security because of hacking aspect, the wireless technology has been under threat as the same as the wired network, but on the other hand they are vulnerable to additional risk( Silva, Santos & Nogueira,2015). The wireless network usually transmits data via the radio frequencies that enhance the possibility of tapping the information by threaten invaders if it is not properly protected. The threaten invaders have founded a way to get the access to the wireless system to steal or destroy the original information, the attackers launch strikes which are related to network bandwidth and prevent the authorized users to use their desired services, and they also keep an eye on the conversations that are taking place. For instance, the hackers or threaten invaders successfully get into wireless systems to have access to important information. The project mainly focuses on the IEEE802.11 and IEEE802.16 which are group of standards for wireless local area networks (WLANs) and metropolitan area networks (WMANs) respectively.

Overview of Wireless Technologies

The wireless technologies make the gadgets to have communication without any connection physically, implying that they do not need peripheral or network cabling. The wireless range from the complicated environments, for instance mobile networks that includes 3G mobile phones and local area networks, to less complicated gadgets such as microphones without wire, earphones and other gadgets which will not save or process data and usually used for small range procedures like infrared or communications via Bluetooth (BT) (Egners, Herrmann & Meyer,2015).

Typical IP network wireless devices or infrastructure

Access points or base stations

· Station wireless

· Router wireless

Retransmission devices (Sun, Yan, Zhang & Rong, 2015).

· Repeater wireless

· Network bridge wireless

End points

· Cards or adapters wireless

· Laptops

· PDAs

· Mobile telephones

Infrared devices, such as cordless computer keyboards, remote controls and mice all needs a direct line of sight between the receiver and transmitter to complete the link. Even though the infrared communication replaced by BT technology in most of the gadgets, some legacy standard gadgets still use IR for short range communication (Illiano, & Lupu, 2015).

Network classification of wireless networks

Wireless networks act as date transmitter mechanism between other wireless communications and the traditional wired networks. Wireless network can be structured in different ways but they are frequently categorized into 4 main categories based on their coverage range.

· Wireless wide area network (WWAN)

Which involves wide are technologies for instance 2G which includes general packet radio service and 3G cellular that includes high speeds packet access.

· Wireless metropolitan area network (WMAN)

That represents wireless internet connection at broadband speed in cities and is usually referred as wireless broadband. It haves the technologies such as IEEE802.16 and the upcoming standards such as mobile broadband wireless access.

· Wireless local area network (WLAN)

It involves Wi-Fi (802.111) and Hipper LAN and is a kind of local area network in which information is carried through radio waves which has high frequency instead of wires or cables.

Standards of Wireless Specification:

· The IEEE 802.15 standard is usually termed as Bluetooth. This standard prompt low intricacy and small power connection, perfect for close devices.

· IEEE 802.15 is a sub-standard that refer the requirements of low sum wireless individual area nets or ZigBee. The ZigBee has been developing the robotics of dynamism supervision, building and home structure administration that comprises heating, lighting, and refrigeration method and efficacy observing.

· IEEE802.1x is a certain standard that defines a framework for authentication and controlling user traffic to secure network, handling and managing the different devices of the framework. The 802.1X enhance many authentication methods.

Security Features

Security characteristics of WiMAX and Wi-Fi have been created with secured measures measure to meet the standards for secured transaction of wireless data. WiMAX technologies incorporated the some of the features that are mentioned below (Tepšić, Veinović & Uljarević, 2014).

Security features of IEEE802.11

The IEEE802.11 WLAN standard has established many services to provide a secure operating environment. The recent ones are WEP6, WPA7 andWPA28

· Wi-Fi protected access (WPA) it is a development on WEP is WAP which was established in 2003. The WPA averts most WEP’s susceptibilities and increases the ability of confirmation and encryption (Chenoweth, Minch & Tabor, 2010). The Wi-Fi security access 2 is an advancement one WPA, this further increase the power of encryption with a space to utilize the advanced encryption normal and improve key supervision controls and authentication. The security features of IEEE802.16

· It is has undergone tremendous review by information security researcher to minimize any loophole in the security procedures and implementation stipulated in the specification. The modern 802.16 security architecture involves the following protection measures (Illiano, & Lupu, 2015).

· Privacy and key management

That gives a view on how the keys are managed securely in a WiMAX gadget or at the time of interaction between key and data. It offers security to keys which is important feature of WiMAX network and its