In the day and age when life runs on Wi-Fi, a hacked WIFI system can prove to be detrimental. Imagine someone streaming movies all day using your hard-earned WI-FI. Neither is this practice fair nor something you would want to happen to you.
While setting a security password for your beloved router can make you feel safer, this practice alone is not enough to secure your WI-FI from predatory hackers. Read on to find out how to work with your telecommunications provider to protect your home WiFi system from hacking.
How To Hack-Proof Your Wireless Internet at Home
A lot of people have experienced unfair hacks and it’s an unfortunately prevalent occurrence. Luckily, most technology companies have heard peoples’ pleas and created the innovative hack-proof WI-FI router. The only downside is that it can be quite expensive.
Now, while there isn’t much that you can do about WI-FI freeloaders, you can take WI-FI matters into your own hands. In fact, you can further secure your WI-FI on your own without buying a hack-proof router you cannot afford.
Hack-proof Help Here:
1) Put your guard up: The first thing you can do is leverage WI-FI Protective Access (WPA), which is a necessary encryption to ensure that your router is holistically secure. Most WI-FI routers come readily equipped with a WPA2 as part of its default setting. Make sure that your WPA is turned on at all times. There is also an option to upgrade to a WPA3, which is more sophisticate and preferable.
Older routers have something called WEP (WI-FI Equivalent Security), an encryption-based service which is easier to hack. Knowing this, it’s a good idea for any WI-FI owner to analyze the router manual and see how to upgrade to a WPA. This may require owners to use firmware patches in order to upgrade to WPA2.
2) Secure your wall: Did you know that every router comes with a firewall? The firewall is a program that has been pre-installed on your router that makes it harder for hackers to attack. The firewall acts as a filter, monitoring all possible traffic. This makes it a desirable security option that ensures added safety to your firewall. Also check your firewall to assess if it is working correctly. The stealth mode that is allowed with most routers makes it impossible for hackers to find your router easily.
3) Weapons up with wireless: A way to throw hackers off and get them off your trail would be to disable the admin through wireless settings. In less technical terms, this means that only those who are connected to the router using an Ethernet cable connection can access the admin setting. If you are unsure where to find the disable option, look under the advanced setting options. Thereafter look under administration setting and an option will be visible to disable remote administration.
4) Outsmart the hacker: Previously, Virtual Private Networks (VPN) were mostly used by large businesses. Today VPN is easily accessible to anyone with the payment of a small fee. A VPN ensures safe and secure browsing habits that hide your browsing history from the eyes of hackers. A VPN also ensures that your location and IP address remain hiddentoo. There are many service providers who can offer you VPN deals and it’s up to you which offer is specifically suited to you.
5) Set your name well: Oftentimes when we purchase a router, the excitement of using it outweighs our need to change its default name. The SSID is simply jargon for your wireless network name and this needs to be a good one. It is easier to hack a router with the default name since these default names have common passwords. Hackers used rainbow tables that hold popular SSID names to hack your router. Thus the longer and more complex the SSID name you create the more impossible it is to hack.
6) Locked away safe: Lastly, a password is a must. Although it’ is not the only protective measure that you can use to prevent WI-FI hacks, it is still a necessary one. Using an amalgamation of alphabets and numerical code should suffice, but the password may require some creativity and thought too.
Spare yourself the unnecessary jargon, with these layman steps you can keep potential hackers at bay.
