Yeah. Both sides would need to support IPSEC. FreeS/WAN is a kernel patch so should be simple enough to add into the Empeg kernel. I've got it working with W2K and WXP as well so it's not just limited to Linux. It's not trivial to set up however.

- Trevor

Am I right in thinking that you need to see lots of WEP encrypted packets to do this ? I had been assuming that 128bit WEP on a very lightly loaded WLAN is hard to crack because of the lack of packets to work with.

Is my assumption correct, or is my lightly used WLAN wide open ;-)

lightly-loaded WLAN is hard to crack

I'm not actually that bothered about someone cracking my WLAN -- they'll only get access to the outside of my firewall, and any sensitive traffic going over it is either HTTPS, IPSec or SSH.

Andy, you are right, it depends on the traffic to crack your WEP.

Rolf

Ah good. I can put off moving my PCI WLAN card from my Windows to Linux box and/or getting IPSEC working on my Windows laptop for a while then...

I'm really not looking forward to making the PCI WLAN card (in effect a PCMCIA card with an adapter) work in Linux, whenever I go near the PCMCIA stuff it gets nasty. I'm hoping I can combine the task with rebuilding my Linux box and letting Redhat see if it can find it during the install...

So long as one doesn't mind having their broadband service disconnected (or worse..) due to abuse from roving spammers, porners, crackers, etc.. sure, just leave it wide open. It's not so much one's own data that's at risk, but rather one's connection and reputation.

Cheers

If you never change the WEP key, then they just have to listen in for 15 minutes of active traffic each day for a week..

Reading the paper on the attack it would seem you need about 4,000,000 packets (assuming you have selected a truely random key, which I have) to mount an attack. My WLAN is very, very lightly used. I average less than a packet a second, even my five minute averages rarely peak at more than 5 packets a second. So even collecting at my peak times it would take over 200 hours to collect 4,000,000 packets.

Is my math correct ?

When you click on a single simple web link, it could easily result in over a hundred packets being passed back and forth.. But yeah, it might take a few collections over several days for yours.

Cheers

For my setup, I'm not overly concerned about security... the only wireless client I plan to have is the empeg. That lets me put the AP on it's own interface to my firewall. I can then filter packets to allow only the traffic I want.

That would only leave my empeg exposed... anyone port a hacked sshd to the empeg to allow only authenticated logins?

Okay, so I have another update. The Linksys Wet11 arrived fairly quickly and was quite easy to setup. It works from the lounge to the study. But, oh joy of joys - 1 1/2 hours ago I picked up my docking stations from the Post Office courtesy of Mr Lord (I paid for it Tuesday and it was supposed to be delivered yesterday - Friday - at my home in the UK but no-one was in - a very professional service so many thanks to Mark). I am sitting at my PC now with music streaming to a browser from the empeg sitting near the TV in the lounge whilst my gf is listening to a playlist through the amp.

But, there are certain parts of the lounge, namely where I normally sit, where the CF card for my iPaq won't pick up the router. I was hoping it would wirelessly connect to the bridge but this isn't the case. I'm tempted to order the Netgear AP to see if this will do everything I need. Any comments?

And, in case anyone is interested and to stop any confusion here is my current set-up:

Linksys Wireless Wet11 Bridge in the lounge.
Empeg in docking station connected to the bridge.
Belkin wireless DSL/cable router connected to cable in the study
2 PCs hard-wired to the router.
Wireless CF ethernet card - Buffalo Airstation - for use in iPaq.

The bridge talks to the router allowing me to connect to the empeg in the lounge from my PC in the study.
Router connected to internet allowing me to share with 2 PCs.
iPaq goes via router to log onto messenger browse etc from (almost) anywhere in the house or to synch with outlook on my PC.

When I get the airnet card for my TiVo I shall be doing a fairly noddy diagram on my web pages to help anyone else who tries this kind of thing.

And for the curious, Steve purchased a pair of Docks at the same time, and asked for "air mail" delivery -- since two docks together are too heavy for airmail, they got sent Express Post, which takes 3-5 days to almost any major country on the planet. But very very expensive (around US$50).

Cheers

You've convinced me - im gonna get a Netgear Wireless Access Point ME102UK for my empeg, to (hopefully) talk to my Netgear FM114 router / firewall thingy.

I will report back with the results - may be a month or two though cause im waiting for my mlord docking station before I go ahead with this.


Update time ....

Didnt go the Netgear AP route in the end - ordered a Linksys WET11 on the recommendation of my supplier (www.nickknows.com)

Works like a charm - in conjunction with an mlord dock

How do you guys get the WET11 to work with the Empeg? The link light won't light on mine when I connect it and consequently, I can't get the Empeg to appear on the network. Are you connecting directly to the WET11 or using something in between? What version of firmware does your WET11 have? Thanks.

Stu

Hi.

Did you setup the WET11 correctly? Especially the WEP setting needs to be correct, otherwise it won't get a link to the AP. This means that the bit width needs to be the same on AP and WET11, and of course the key itself needs to be correct.
Try connecting a PC to the WET11 instead of the empeg and check the settings with that. You could also try to remove WEP security from your AP.
And don't forget to set the right SSID. On some devices, you also need to set the right channel. Also: Did you set up any MAC address filtering on the AP?

cu,
sven

Thanks Sven. I'm pretty sure all those things have been done. It works fine with every device BUT the Empeg. Small correction, the link light is on on the Empeg, but the LAN light does not light on the WET11. It lights when connected to everything else. The crossover switch doesn't help.

Stu

Small correction, the link light is on on the Empeg, but the LAN light does not light on the WET11.

Wait a sec. Do I get this right, and the wireless connection works OK (in this case you should be able to locate the WET11 with the PC management software from the rest of your LAN), but the wired connection to the empeg doesn't work?
Try inserting a hub or switch between the two to rule out incompatibilities between the two devices (though this shouldn't be the case since others are obviously able to connect empeg an WET11), Also try exchanging the cable. I once had a similar problem and finally realized that I didn't only change devices during testing, but also the -defective- cable, so that it seemed as if one device failed reproducably, which it really wasn't, I always used the same defective cable on that device and working cables with everything else.

Also: how do you power the WET11 and the empeg, how do you power the other devices? Could it be a problem with too low/high voltage or some sort of electric interference?

Ciao,
Sven.

May also be worth checking you dont have a conflict in IP addresses between WET11 and empeg

I just connected my WET11 to my PC, fired up the setup software, configured it to use DHCP, then connected my PC back to the router and the WET11 to the empeg. Picked it up straight away. I should state that the empeg is DHCP as well.