Wardriving

[HaRuMaN]

All you wardriving people out there, beware:

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20050707/ap_on_hi_te/techbits_wi_fi_theft

My wireless router is secure...  is yours?   

[tristan]

Leaving your wireless network unsecured is like running a network jack out to the sidewalk. If someone uses it, you have no one to blame but yourself.

When I was wardriving, I never used anyone's connection, just logged them with GPS and mapped it all. It was pretty cool to see how many new hotspots popped up when it all started getting popular.

[SOAPboy]

Leaving your wireless network unsecured is like running a network jack out to the sidewalk. If someone uses it, you have no one to blame but yourself.

When I was wardriving, I never used anyone's connection, just logged them with GPS and mapped it all. It was pretty cool to see how many new hotspots popped up when it all started getting popular.

Been looking for a cheapo laptop to go out wardriving.. tho, been thinking about just a PDA..

[DYNAGOD]

well the real problem is what people are doing with your unsecure network.
its muchmore dangerous than people seem to think,
your ultimatley responsible for what comes thru your IP from your provider. if some sicko is sitting outside your house in a van downloading mountains of kiddie porn on your unsecure connection, the authorities are going to come for YOU, and you have no legal recourse..
screw wireless...i like wires

[SOAPboy]

well the real problem is what people are doing with your unsecure network.
its muchmore dangerous than people seem to think,
your ultimatley responsible for what comes thru your IP from your provider. if some sicko is sitting outside your house in a van downloading mountains of kiddie porn on your unsecure connection, the authorities are going to come for YOU, and you have no legal recourse..
screw wireless...i like wires

Yep, fully wired for me until i die.. i HATE wireless networks with a passion..


Tho, it IS fun to find peoples unsecure shared documents and throw a little txt file on one of their shares that says "HEY YOUR NETWORK ISNT SECURE FIX IT"

>_<

[Crazy Cooter]

IMO, the biggest problem is the "default" settings on the router that come from the factory.  Instead of being totally open, it *should* be totally closed.  That way comsumers are forced to learn how to open a single connection just to do what they need.  Of course that would raise the price due to product support, so it would never happen...

So what constitutes a "secure" network?  I have it locked down according to mac addresses, from what I know (not much), that's supposedly the best way to do it.  Anyone else do something different/better?

[tristan]

Bottom line, if you don't know what you are doing, and can't be bothered to research it, have someone that knows what they are doing set it up. I've located nearly 30 unsecured networks in my building alone (landlord pays for the cable modems, so everyone has one).

Turn off the SSID beacon, enable WEP (or WPA if yours supports it) and change the key on a regular basis. Don't use DHCP, and definately use the MAC address filters.

Also, I would suggest using the subnet on the wireless router as more of a DMZ area than your main network area. The best would be to use a server on one of the regular network ports to autenticate getting past the router and onto your wired network or Internet access (there's a few open source ones out there), and not using the "Internet" port at all.

WIRELESS_ROUTER<------------>AUTH_SERVER<----------------->MAIN_ROUTER<------------->INTERNET

Use strong passwords on all network equipment.

[ChadTower]

Eh, I unplug mine when I'm not using it.  That's 90% of the time.

[SirPoonga]

Been looking for a cheapo laptop to go out wardriving.. tho, been thinking about just a PDA.. 

Heh, I picked up free 486 laptop.  It's running windows 95, it can't run 98   But I do have an orinoco wireless card with win95 drivers    The battery doesn;t hold a charge anymore, even after freezing it.  So I picked up a power invertor for the car when one went on clearance.

However, I'd love to get a pentium so i can run 98 or 2000 with a triple band card

It's funny, for most people all you need ot do is change your router password and enable enryption.  Make the key something easy for you to remember, like all 5s.  It's still enough to make the casual wardriver not bother with you.
Actually, today's routers can be configured via usb drive.  I noticed that when I went to xp' wireless setup.  You cna create a key to upload to a router and it will configure any computer you put the usb stick in.  Then it is a no brainer to get encryption going, don't have to come up with a key, M$ does that for you

[ChadTower]

YAY, I don't have my key, but Microsoft does.

[SOAPboy]

Been looking for a cheapo laptop to go out wardriving.. tho, been thinking about just a PDA..

[RayB]

Anyone here a webmaster? Seems to me that if they can arrest someone for this, then it should be possible to arrest people who leech files (ie: bandwidth theft). It's pretty much the same thing.

[ChadTower]

It's not even close to the same thing.

[Hoagie_one]

id share my bandwidth with my neighbors if they paid me

[TOK]

Wardriving sounds so cool! I though the thread was going to be about going out and running over peoples garbage cans, mailboxes and turfing up their yards, not riding around with a bunch of geeks and a big antenna. 

[SirPoonga]

For any noobs reading this thread..

If you want a pretty secure wireless network so that most passerbys won't do anything (even the ones that want to dig a little) Just do the following:

1) Change SSID and admin password on the router.
2) Use WPA if possible, if not then WEP.
3) Enable MAC filtering.

Number 1 protects you from someone logging into your router and changing the settings.  If this ever happens you will need to do a factory reset on the router and start over from scratch.

Number 2 protects you from people sniffing your wireless traffic to get passwords and other personal info.  It also keeps people from being able to use your wireless router unless that person has the key.

Number 3 makes it do only your network card can connect to the router.  In theory each network card has it's own  MAC address.  Something 1 in a billion or trillian will have the same MAC as you.  The only time that is a problem is if for some reason the card with the same mac happens to be on your same network.  So chances of that happening are very slim.  Now, a MAC address can be spoofed, so if someone figures it out they can connect to your router with that MAC.  But with a combination of all three situations this should not happen as any data sent to the router that may contain your mac address will be encrypted.

If you don't understand any of this your manual for the router will probably have a good step by step guide.  And do a search on the net for securing wireless, such as
http://www.pcstats.com/articleview.cfm?articleID=1489



TOK, never heard of wardriving before?  Then I wonder if you heard of a cantenna...

Oh yeah, I so have my GPS hooked up to that laptop too when I drive around
Around here it is easy though, this is a college town.

I alos got that little wifi detector form tigerdirect when it was free after rebate.  Bah, what a piece of crap.  It is not suppose to pick up phones, but it does. 

[tristan]

MMMM, cantenna....



It cost about $13.21 and the cookies were the most expensive($5.29) and tastiest part.

[SOAPboy]

MMMM, cantenna....



It cost about $13.21 and the cookies were the most expensive($5.29) and tastiest part.

Pringles cantenna > *




and the first one ever made

http://www.seattlewireless.net/index.cgi/PringlesCantenna

http://www.netscum.com/~clapp/wireless.html

Which you can NOW BUY for 50 bucks.. lmfao
http://www.cantenna.com/

[TOK]

SirPoonga, I heard of driving around and looking for open networks, just never heard it given the name Wardriving. Mad Max is a Wardriver.
Ernie Finklefarb riding around in his dads Hyundai with an antenna made from a Pringles can and a stove pipe is Nerddriving. 

[thetered]

I got a fricken cantenna and an orinco card..... but my internal card on my toshiba laptop works a billion times better in all directions than the cantenna.  I think the antennas in some newer laptops are far superior to older cards.

Before I got internet I would wardrive around my neighborhood/shopping centers for a usuable signal.  But I never did anything malicious, only stuff like download their email, sniff out credit card numbers, etc... pretty basic stuff you know.  Nah, but seriously I just did did stuff like email and what not. 

Apartment complexes can be bad, I got a friend who lives in one and can pick up 3 usuable signals from his living room.

[clanggedin]

Warviewing is much more fun than wardriving. Especially when you find a house that has a nannycam. On the few outings I have been out we have seen some pretty interesting things.

All you need is an X10 cam receiver modded to a cantenna and conneced to either a video camera that has a video in or a portable dvd player. We used a portable dvd player.

You may not find as many locations to warview, but there is virtually no security for the 2.5ghz wireless video signal.

[paigeoliver]

What is the point of wardriving anymore, when darn near every mid-price hotel in america has an open wireless network that can be accessed from the parking lot.

Not to mention all the Panera's, etc that all have free wireless as well. You don't even have to BUY anything, just go in and sit down.

[SirPeale]

Paige: because it's fun?

It's like Geocaching.  You know something's there.  They've even given you exact directions on where to find it.  It's actually doing it that brings the excitement.

[Setabs]

id share my bandwidth with my neighbors if they paid me

You terms of service from your ISP probably don't allow you to do this.  I have cox and its in there terms of service.

Warviewing is much more fun than wardriving. Especially when you find a house that has a nannycam. On the few outings I have been out we have seen some pretty interesting things.

All you need is an X10 cam receiver modded to a cantenna and conneced to either a video camera that has a video in or a portable dvd player. We used a portable dvd player.

You may not find as many locations to warview, but there is virtually no security for the 2.5ghz wireless video signal.

Check out From the Shadows

http://stashbox.fromtheshadows.tv/box3.0.php

This episode they go by banks that have wireless video, they explain how stupid this is in the episode .  they also get in an airplane and actually pick up a cam over LA.

Systm.org also does the same thing.  But they show you how to build a small war driving box.

[MnMCaputo]

At hot spots, you'd be surprised when you change your workgroup back to "workgroup" and hit view computers connected to this network, the stuff people have shared on thier harddrives.  They make Paris Hilton look like a prude  LMFAO!!!!!