nixCraft Linux Sys Admin Blog

How To Secure Home Wi-Fi ( Wireless ) Network

Posted: 04 May 2008 03:52 PM CDT

In this practical introduction to the basics of securing your home wireless network, you will learn how to secure a network of game consoles, phones, and PCs. Following are totally useless security measurements specified in arstechnica's guide:

=> MAC filtering
=> Disable DHCP
=> Disable SSID

You need to enable WPA / WPA2 to protect network (don't use wep). I also recommend disabling Universal Plug and Play (UPnP) support. The UPnP protocol does not implement any authentication, so UPnP device implementations must implement their own authentication mechanisms, or implement the Device Security Service. Unfortunately, many UPnP device implementations lack authentication mechanisms, and by default assume local systems and their users are completely trustworthy. Most notably, Routers and firewalls running the UPnP IGD protocol are vulnerable to attack since the framers of the protocol omitted to add any standard authentication method.

My recommendation

Always use WPA / WPA2 with TKIP or AES encrypting with a strong paraphrase
Change paraphrase every month
Disable UPnP
Disable wireless router remote (public IP based) management and ssh / telnet port features. Only use your local PC for telnet / ssh or router management.
Turn on firewall, port scan and DoS protection (which is a default for many routers)
Turn on email notification when DoS or port scan attack detected
You may find our WPA / WPA2 Linux configuration guide useful
Additional tips for Windows user - Use an anti virus, firewall / internet secruity suite. Most important don't use bloated Norton product. My personal recommendation is NOD32 or kaspersky anti-Virus. Both are extremely light on system resources and detecting viruses. Either is an excellent anti-virus solution. Keep your operating system and virus databases always up to date.

=> Read: The ABCs of securing your wireless network

If you have more security tips, please add them in the comments.

Mplayer Select Video Out Driver with mplayer -vo Option

Posted: 04 May 2008 01:40 PM CDT

If you see error that read as follows while playing video files:
It seems there is no Xvideo support for your video card available.

Try mplayer command as follows:
$ mplayer -vo xv file.avi

Under XFree86 4.0.2 or newer, you can use your card's hardware YUV routines using the XVideo extension. This is what the option -vo xv uses. Also, this driver supports adjusting brightness/contrast/hue/etc. Type following for other (non-xv) video out drivers list:
$ mplayer -vo help