What You Need To Know About A Wireless Network
Wireless networks are more flexible, faster and easier to use, while being more affordable to deploy and maintain. Wireless networks are normally classified as infrastructure (cellular) and non-infrastructure (ad-hoc). Wireless networks are especially important in organizations that need to implement wireless computing solutions. Wireless networks are rapidly becoming a cost-effective alternative for providing network connectivity for banking information systems. Wireless Networks are increasingly becoming the only solution to getting broadband connectivity to rural areas. As the name suggests, wireless networks (WiFi) allow you to connect to the internet relying on radio waves rather than wires to connect computers to the internet.
The variety of wireless data networks that exist can make it difficult to categorize and compare. Wireless networks that run over other wireless networks utilize the lower layer networks to provide security and encryption, operating on licensed or unlicensed portions of the frequency spectrum. Wireless networks offer several advantages over wired networks, with mobility, flexibility, ease of deployment, and low cost being the principle advantages. Wireless auto configuration dynamically selects the wireless network to which to attempt connection. Wireless networks are typically very flexible, which helps with their rapid deployment. Wireless security will see major improvements over the next two years with the arrival of new specifications for securing LAN connections.
While some wireless data networks run over wireless voice networks, other wireless networks run on their own physical layer networks, utilizing antennas built into handheld devices to large antennas mounted on towers. Stand-alone wireless networks either provide their own security and encryption features or relies upon a Virtual Private Network (VPN) to provide those features. Some wireless networks are fixed, other wireless networks are mobile, with antennas that can move constantly.
Security features can scramble or encrypt network traffic so that its contents cannot easily be deciphered. Security testing can helps ensure that only known wireless systems and devices are operating, the controls are functioning properly, and vulnerabilities are addressed. In many cases, multiple layers of security and encryption for wireless networks may be desirable. Called Wired Equivalency Privacy (WEP) this security protocol allows a person to set up to a 128-bit security key that is shared between a mobile device and its access point. Recently, a stronger security protocol called Wi-Fi Protected Access (WPA) was developed and is beginning to see deployment. It's possible to set up strong security for a Wi-Fi hotspot, enabling WEP or WPA, but users would have to obtain the encryption keys before connecting. Wireless networks are a great avenue to allow laptop and handheld users to get access to a network without having to dedicate network hardware to them. Wireless networks are excellent means for giving access from kiosk type systems for public Internet connections, or for areas where you want visitors to be able to look at your corporate web site or to browse other information. Wireless networks are becoming increasingly popular, particularly among enterprise organizations, and are more challenging to manage than wired networks because they require more network nodes, device types, network types, and network layers.
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