Hacking wifi the easy way

Wireless networking makes life easy for those that use it, but unless properly configured, it is also remarkably easy to attack. Security firm SecPoint has released a portable version of its penetration testing appliance, Penetrator, designed specifically for pen testing wireless networks. The convenience of a technology is often inversely proportional to its security. This rule works for most things, including password management, physical building access, online payments, and – unfortunately – wireless networking. So let's look at one system for testing wireless networking and, along the way, we'll examine the state of wifi security. Danny Bradbury tries out the system and along the way examines the state of wireless networking security. He discovers that successive encryption protocols – such as WEP and WPA – have proven to be insecure. But administrators can deploy various techniques to make their networks more secure. While you can test this security using common tools available for all Linux distributions, the SecPoint product conveniently brings them all together in a single package.