Many wireless routers were supplied in the past with wireless security turned off. The chances are that this was to reduce any support calls to both manufacturer and isp. With wireless security turned off you typically plugged in your wireless router and fired up your laptop or desktop computer and hey presto you were connected wirelessly.
This is all fine for convenience but not too good at all in security terms. With wireless security turned off you leave yourself completely open to offer free broadband to all your neighbours and passers by who want to stop and use your internet connection for whatever purposes they choose. If you have a shared folder of all your family pictures on one of your computer then thats free access too.
Turning on wireless security is easy. If you have a netgear router open the wireless router control panel by firing up your favourite web browser and typing http://192.168.0.1 into the address bar then press enter. If you are asked for a username and password then by default its admin and password respectively. You should now see the control panel page.
Look on the left hand side and you will see a list of options. Click on the one that is titled ‘Wireless’. A new page will open. Usually at the bottom of this page you will see a section called security. You should tick ( if the security type is a list of tick boxes ) or drop down ( if the security type is a drop down combo list box ) the option ‘WPA PSK’. Note that some routers may also offer ‘WPA2 PSK + WPA PSK’ which is also fine. Once you have ticked or chosen this option then you will see a passphrase field ( sometimes called a wireless key or just key ). In this field type a passphrase at least 8 characters long. Dont choose something which is obvious. A good choice would be a mixture of letters and numbers, for example ‘Dq4867LP97′. Once you have done this click apply and thats all there is to do. You have now enabled wireless security. If you have any laptops or desktop computers which are connected wirelessly then you will need to connect again except this time you will be asked for your wireless key. Type the same characters which you typed in as the passphrase in the router control panel and you will then be connected.
If you have any friends or relatives who visit and need internet access then simply provide them with the passphrase and they too can connect to your wireless network,
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