* Your wireless AP could be at risk from unauthorized users
If you haven’t heard the name Nicholas Tombros before, you are not alone; I hadn’t either. Tombros has the dubious honor of being the first spammer convicted under federal law and the first convicted war spammer in U.S. history.
The term “war spammer” is a concatenation of two terms: war driver and spammer. A war driver is someone who drives around looking for unprotected wireless access points (AP) and uses them to connect to the Internet. A war spammer is someone who drives around looking for wireless APs that are unprotected and takes advantage of that free access to send out spam.
Tombros’ charges are covered under a provision of the CAN-SPAM Act that prohibits breaking into someone else’s computer to send spam. No Trojans, no zombie PCs – he just used the public airwaves to connect to unsecured access points to send out his spam.
The scene of these events was in a residential neighborhood in southern California, but it could happen anywhere. War drivers don’t limit themselves to neighborhoods; they also cruise office parks, college campuses, and even parking lots and garages near large corporations, laptops at the ready.
The dangers of this occurring at your organization are much greater than just being the unwitting accomplice to a spammer. There are software tools commonly available that would allow potential ne’er-do-wells to read your e-mail, access your network and everything on it, and even log everything you do on the Internet. And if your ISP found you to be the source of spam, it would most likely shut you off immediately and ask questions later.
How serious is the problem? There is a group known as the WorldWide WarDrive (WWWD) that consists of volunteers armed with wireless-network-detection software and GPS receivers. Over the course of a week, the volunteers drive around mapping all the networks they can find and compile statistics that reveal where the wireless networks are and which ones are unprotected. Luckily, WWWD’s members aren’t malicious; they’re just trying to get the message across to network managers about how serious a problem wireless security has become.
This year’s search, which ended June 19, was the fourth year the WWWD has done its survey. The volunteers were able to locate 228,537 APs, of which about 38% had basic encryption enabled. That’s up from last year’s survey, which revealed a 32% encryption rate, but it means there are still an alarmingly large number of unprotected APs still out there.
So what can you do to avoid being a victim of a war driver/war spammer? The FBI provides the following advice:
* Enable the Wireless Protected Access (WPA) or Wired Equivalent Privacy (WEP) encryption and other security options provided by the wireless access point’s manufacturer and change the key periodically.
* Change the default Service Set Identifier network name and make sure your wireless access points don’t continually broadcast the SSID. The device’s software should provide a way to do so.
* If you haven’t already done so, change your router administration account name and password.
* Activate the Media Access Control (MAC) Address filtering feature of your router.
* Make sure your computer has an up-to-date operating system with all the current patches and service packs, virus protection, and a personal firewall (preferably a software firewall and hardware-based router/firewall).
The last recommendation is a good fit for both wired and wireless connections to the Internet and should be part of your company’s standard operating procedure.
Wireless networks are a boon to productivity, both at home and in the office, but along with the convenience comes the responsibility to secure your network. Not only will you be protecting your own assets, you just might be saving the rest of us from more spam.
Michael Day is CTO at Currid & Company. You can write to him at mailto:michael.day@currid.com
