WPA3 & Wi-Fi 6 (also known as 802.11ax)

[labbe5]

https://betanews.com/2018/01/09/wpa3-new-features/

The Wi-Fi Alliance has announced the introduction of WPA3, which will be available for both personal and enterprise Wi-Fi devices this year. The big additions over its predecessor, for which certifications began in late-2004, are improved security and privacy.

Further reading :
http://www.enterprisenetworkingplanet.c ... wi-fi.html

[belham2]

Anyone got an opinion on whether it is worth it (because of WPA3) to wait on buying a new router?

Remember all the wifi crack stuff we just went through a few months ago? I was thinking, instead of using these patched Kong and Tomato-routers of mine, to just get new ones where they come with newer & better firmware that is set to protect against most known exploits up till today.

But WPA3? Is that reason to wait? And what about all my home devices & hardware (some 6-9 years old), puppy OSes, and other Linux OSes---will they just easily recognize WPA3 if I wait and get a WPA3-enabled router???

Thanks for any thoughts/tips/advice/etc.



P.S. Between the latest computer chip Spectre & stuff going on, and the wifi vulnerabilities over the past 4-5 months coming to light, it seems hardware manufacturers have found their silver lining to keep us all emptying our wallets. I bet they secretly $$$$ back these hackers, lol, so as to force the public into panic to keep buying new stuff. Thought for the day: my $$$$ used for hardware purchases from hardware vendors are the very same $$$$ used to finance hackers who find lovely-endless-hardware vulnerabilities and thus force me to keep spending more $$$$ to said vendors to avoid....and the rat on the circus wheel keeps running eternal.

[s243a]

Anyone got an opinion on whether it is worth it (because of WPA3) to wait on buying a new router?

I think if you're not a person of interest then the chance of someone hacking your wi-fi is low. That said your router may have other security settings that you can use. For instance you could only allow certain mac addresses on your network to connect. I think there are other security settings that you can use on your router like only allowing certain mac addresses to connect and I think that you can also hide your wi-fi.

Also if someone does manage to get onto your wifi you could have another security layer like a local VPN.

Also if all else fails you could go to a 100% wired network. You could also use puppy as the wireless network access point if you wanted to do something custom like WPA3.

[belham2]

Anyone got an opinion on whether it is worth it (because of WPA3) to wait on buying a new router?

I think if you're not a person of interest then the chance of someone hacking your wi-fi is low. That said your router may have other security settings that you can use. For instance you could only allow certain mac addresses on your network to connect. I think there are other security settings that you can use on your router like only allowing certain mac addresses to connect and I think that you can also hide your wi-fi.

Also if someone does manage to get onto your wifi you could have another security layer like a local VPN.

Also if all else fails you could go to a 100% wired network. You could also use puppy as the wireless network access point if you wanted to do something custom like WPA3.

I am a long-time, over a decade, user of Kong, Tomato and DD-WRT router OSes. Have even done a few of my own thanks to DD-WRT & their great forums + developers. Long time ago, I used to run my routers with both mac addresses specifying and also hiding the SSID network.

But after I saw how easy it was to spoof a mac address & fool the router while doing so, I realized what a waste of time it is. For a dedicated hacker (or even a somewhat half-talented neighborhood kid) it is nothing more than an extra 5 mins nuisance.

Same goes for hiding your SSID of your network. Heck, with IP Penetration OSes I've tried over the years it takes the OSes less than 15 mins to find my hidden network & source every character out, and that is even using a SSID name of 64 letters, numbers and crazy symbols.

What I was looking for is if anyone here on murga had firsthand experience and/or knows someone working on WPA3, maybe even talk about comparisons to WPA2 other than the simplified versions the news media is putting out. WPA3, with access name login limited restrictions, is interesting, but not if it is going to turn out like the hoopla that surrounded mac addressing and hiding the SSID, both things which are urban folklore and add pretty milch zilch to a router/network's security profile.

[s243a]

Anyone got an opinion on whether it is worth it (because of WPA3) to wait on buying a new router?

I think if you're not a person of interest then the chance of someone hacking your wi-fi is low. That said your router may have other security settings that you can use. For instance you could only allow certain mac addresses on your network to connect. I think there are other security settings that you can use on your router like only allowing certain mac addresses to connect and I think that you can also hide your wi-fi.
ex
Also if someone does manage to get onto your wifi you could have another security layer like a local VPN.

Also if all else fails you could go to a 100% wired network. You could also use puppy as the wireless network access point if you wanted to do something custom like WPA3.

I am a long-time, over a decade, user of Kong, Tomato and DD-WRT router OSes. Have even done a few of my own thanks to DD-WRT & their great forums + developers. Long time ago, I used to run my routers with both mac addresses specifying and also hiding the SSID network.

But after I saw how easy it was to spoof a mac address & fool the router while doing so, I realized what a waste of time it is. For a dedicated hacker (or even a somewhat half-talented neighborhood kid) it is nothing more than an extra 5 mins nuisance.

Same goes for hiding your SSID of your network. Heck, with IP Penetration OSes I've tried over the years it takes the OSes less than 15 mins to find my hidden network & source every character out, and that is even using a SSID name of 64 letters, numbers and crazy symbols.

What I was looking for is if anyone here on murga had firsthand experience and/or knows someone working on WPA3, maybe even talk about comparisons to WPA2 other than the simplified versions the news media is putting out. WPA3, with access name login limited restrictions, is interesting, but not if it is going to turn out like the hoopla that surrounded mac addressing and hiding the SSID, both things which are urban folklore and add pretty milch zilch to a router/network's security profile.

Sorry that I lack the detailed knowledge that you were looking for. What do you think about adding a VPN as second layer of protection. Couldn't the router block all non VPN traffic? Tinc sounds interesting to me for small VPNs.

[labbe5]

https://news.softpedia.com/news/wi-fi-6 ... 7425.shtml

Unveiled last year in October, Wi-Fi 6 (also known as 802.11ax) launches officially today with up to 37 percent faster speeds than the previous Wi-Fi generation (802.11ac), increased bandwidth for greater performance with low latency, higher data rates for greater network capacity, as well as MU-MIMO (Multi-User Multiple Input Multiple Output) support for greater download performance on more devices at once.

Wi-Fi CERTIFIED 6 also supports the latest generation of Wi-Fi security, WPA3.

The recently announced Samsung Galaxy Note10 is the first Wi-Fi CERTIFIED 6 smartphone, and Apple's iPhone 11 also supports the Wi-Fi 6 technology. More and more new smartphones, routers, and other wireless devices that will be released in the coming weeks and months will be Wi-Fi 6 certified. Wi-Fi 6 is also backwards compatible, which means that you won't have to replace your current devices with new ones just to benefit of the faster Wi-Fi technology.

[8Geee]

I am a bit skeptical...
On the road, using wifi nodes, what chances are there that the smartphone and the host router are WPA3. How long will that take?

At home, I agree that its $$$ over software update on the home router. I hope that WRT-based routers get a software injection.