How secure is the wireless network at NTNU?

Wireless networks are unsecure

There is a general opinion amongst people that wireless networks are unsecure, and should not be used when transmitting sensitive information. This opinion is helped by different articles is news and media.

Background for this perception

Wireless networks transmit data as radio signals. These signals can be intercepted and theoretically processed and understood by anyone who is within distance of the transmitter. Because of this wireless networks are open for everyone with a wireless network card. This makes it quite easy for dishonest users to listen to data that is transmitted and capture passwords, account information and other sensitive information.

Solutions for achieving security

Fortunately there are several ways to make a wireless network secure. One of these engages encryption, by means of WEP (Wireless Encryption Protocol). The signals between the base station and the client are encrypted with a shared key.

WEP has, unfortunately, a couple of negative aspects, which make this solution far from ideal. The encryption is relatively weak, so breaking the key is quite simple. This gives you a false sense of security. An other aspect with WEP is the key, which has to be known by both the base station and the client. Administration and allocation of the keys is a problem.

Another solution for achieving a secure wireless network is to use Access lists. This requires that all computers, which want to use the wireless network, have to be registered before they can use the network. This solution has a couple of problems too. Administration of the access lists is one of them. It is also possible for clients to use a fake identity to gain access to the wireless network.

NTNU's solution

Due to the problems with the solutions mentioned above NTNU has chosen a different solution. NTNU uses a solution which demand some extra resources, but is much more secure than the other solutions; VPN. This solution demands that clients, which want to access the wireless network, have to authenticate themselves with the username and password. All data transmitted is encrypted with a strong algorithm, which is very hard to break. You can read more about this at VPN.

Resulting security

VPN provides a high degree of security, so wireless network connections are at least as secure as network connections through cable. So you do not have to worry about security.