Review: "Take Control of Your Wi-Fi Security" (E-book)

Look, let's face it: Wi-Fi (wireless Internet) security is a godawful mess.

It's incredibly confusing, and yet at the same time it's terribly important. You've got a little radio transmitter and receiver in your laptop (that's what wireless is, after all) and unless you secure it, every time you make a wireless connection you are broadcasting all of your private data in the clear to anyone within range.

(And, psst! Anyone who can use Google can find freely available programs that will help them eavesdrop on you.)

Don't believe me? Here, just go read the official security statement from the Wi-Fi Alliance, an industry group.

And consider that WEP, the kind of security that most of the people with "secured" home networks are currently using has become such a complete joke that the Wi-Fi Alliance is too sheepish to even mention it on their site. In fact, their attorneys have probably advised them against it.

Like a lot of you, I guess, I am the designated System Administrator for my network of friends and my extended family. I'm the guy they call when the computer eats their homework, or they get infected with spyware from surfing porn sites ("I have no idea how this happened!") or iTunes suddenly stops working on them.

I achieved this honor by having worked in the computer industry for the last 20 years and being a general propellerhead, but I have never made my living in the realm of PC security technology.

I have managed to secure my home wireless network pretty well, using the much stronger WPA standard; when I take my corporate laptop on the road with me, the IT staff of the big multinational consulting firm that sends me regular paychecks has thoughtfully provided me with Virtual Private Network (VPN) software and a SafeWord card that allows me to log in securely from almost anywhere, whether it's a wired connection in a hotel room or a wireless connection in a random airport somewhere.

So until recently, I haven't spent too much time worrying about wireless security. I've either been able to handle it on my own, or I've had some very smart and well-educated security folks handling it for me.

Then my wife and I bought a new "family" laptop with built-in wireless.

And we started using it occasionally from public access points, like coffee shops, or branches of the New York City Public Library.

I've been realizing, in the back of my mind, that I ought to do something about securing our new wireless laptop. I can't use the corporate VPN, for obvious reasons.

What I really needed, I figured, was some kind of *personal* VPN service that we could subscribe to... a service that, for a few bucks a month, would let us create a secure connection (that couldn't be eavesdropped on) from anywhere we happened to be.

In the course of searching out information on such a service, I stumbled upon something simply wonderful.

It's a $10 electronic book (e-book) called "Take Control of Your Wi-Fi Security." And if you're at all concerned with the issue, it'll be the best $10 you've spent in a long long time.

The authors, two guys with enormous geek credibility (one is the editor of the consensus-best Wi-Fi news and info website, the other has been writing and editing the Macintosh tech newsletter TidBITS since 1990), take the confusing tangle of Wi-Fi security issues and break it down for you in plain language.

The book is a marvel of excellent technical writing for a general audience, and I say this as a technical writer of some 20 years experience. It is completely current and up-to-date as of this writing (published exactly one month ago today: September 15, 2005) and packs a ton of information into a brief (115-page PDF) package; it's full of links to resources on the Web, too, and every link I've tried works: click it in Adobe Reader, and your browser goes right to the site.

(The links alone are worth $10; compared to what you'd have to pay at the local bookstore for an already outdated print copy of Teach Yourself To Be A Wireless Dummy in 15 Days, the e-book is an incredible bargain.)

Look, there are plenty of good, free Wi-Fi information sites on the Web. I'm going to list some of them at the bottom of this post, in case you're too cheap to shell out $10 to a couple of guys who have done all the skull-sweat for you.

And you can Google around and discover that there are, indeed, private VPN services like the ones I was describing above. Your choices include:

• PublicVPN - Works on Windows (Windows 95, 98, ME, 2000, XP), Mac OS X (10.2 or later) $5.95 per month, $59.95 per year
  
  
• HotSpotVPN - Ranges from $8.88/mo. to $13.88/mo, depending on encryption strength; multiply by 10 to get annual cost. (Has a day or week-priced option for infrequent travellers.)
  
  
• WiTopia personal VPN (Windows XP) - Regularly:$79.00; currently priced at $39.50

All well and good.

But it took me over an hour to sort all of that out, my friends. (I signed up for a couple months of PublicVPN service and am currently testing it out; if it works out, I will point all the users in my "support community" to it.)

And then when I stumbled on the book, I saw... grrrrrr!... that the authors had already figured this out for me!

Oh, the time I could have saved myself.
Dammit.

Okay, here are the free resources I mentioned. But go buy that book, really.

• WiFi Networking News
• Daily Wireless
• Unstrung
• MuniWireless - About municipal wireless efforts worldwide
• TechDirt Wireless
• Reiter's Wireless Data Weblog
• Om Malik's Broadband Blog - "Unwired" topic

DISCLAIMER: Although I must sound like the worst corporate shill ever, I discovered "Take Control of Your Wi-Fi Security" on my own, bought it with my own money, have never met either of the authors and have no business relationship (or any relationship whatsoever) with them.

Westell Versalink 327W problems

So, it turns out that the Westell Versalink 327W, the modem/wireless router combo that I use to connect to the Internet(s) via Verizon aDSL, is a known piece-of-shit.

I've been having occasional problems with dropped wireless connections since I got the thing, but in the last few weeks it's become really, really bad. Previously, I could power-cycle the Versalink, or switch wireless networking on and off via the Versalink's web interface, and get signal back, but now even that's not working.

So I call Verizon's help line - 1 800 567 6789, for those of you playing along at home.

(Parenthetically, I should explain that I've been a Verizon DSL customer since the week after it became available in my Manhattan neighborhood, and I have generally been quite pleased with the quality of service and the technical support that I have received the few times that I've needed to call.)

I get a very nice technician on the phone. I explain to him the problems that I've been having, and to forestall the ritual first-level tech support script run-through, explain that I have already power-cycled the Westell Versalink 327W as well as all connected PCs, be they wired or wireless, have run internal troubleshooting, and for good measure also sacrificed a chicken and waved it vaguely over the box.

We run through a little additional question-and-answer, and there is a strained silence on the other end of the line.

Uh-oh, I thinks to myself. Here it comes.

"Well," the tech begins tentatively, "you're having hardware problems, all right. Frankly, this is a known problem with the 327W, and in fact we haven't been shipping these units to customers for the last several weeks..."

Fine, I say. Ship me whatever you've got that's decent as a replacement. I hear that Linksys makes a pretty good wireless router these days.

(In the background, on the computer with the working, hardwired connection, I am Googling "Westell 327W problem," which I should have already done, in retrospect. Ah, hell... 4,000 hits.)

It turns out that he can't do that. Doesn't have the authority. If he orders a replacement for me, and they have any of these defective beasts in stock, guess what I'm gonna get?

"But I don't WANT another 327W," I whine.

"Neither would I," he agreed.

He tells me that my best bet is to call Verizon Billing, open Monday-Friday from 8am to 8pm, and tell them that my modem is defective and insist on a non-Westell replacement device.

Because, you know, everybody in Verizon Support knows that the device I have is a piece of shit, but nobody has the authority, not even his supervisor, to authorize the shipment of a non-piece-of-shit replacement.

Here's a hint, guys: When your Customer Support is bright, polite, knowledgeable, and UTTERLY INEFFECTUAL, it's not very good Customer Support, is it? You've got a known problem and a system that isn't set up to deal with it -- in fact, is reinforcing the problem by shipping known-bad equipment as a replacement for known-bad equipment.

So I'll talk to the Billing Weasels on Monday. I wonder how they're set up to deal with disgruntled, technically knowledgeable customers?

In the meantime, the laptop (which I'm typing on now) is tethered to the router by a length of Cat 5 cable that, mercifully, I still had lying around the house. I, my wife, and both dogs have already tripped over the damn thing... only the cat, so far, is successfully avoiding the Cat 5.

Is anybody using Road Runner cable modem service in Manhattan who likes it? (shudder)