Question how do you find out if someone is using your inet?

[Ezteq]

Had a woman in the library the otherday asking if we had wireless connection because (and I quote) they used to use their neighbours but now *huffy sigh* he's blocked them! and her daughter needs it for her uni work!!

I shit you not, she really did say it and she really was put out that she wasn't allowed to free load any more lol, anyway it got me owndering how do you know if someone is doing it? I mean out Inet is encrypted and we always turn it off at the plug when not in use but is there some way you can see if someone is sucking your juice when they're not supposed to?

many ta's
xxx

 

[Laddey]

A network managing programme will let you know when somebody tries connecting to your network etc.

Somebody will be able to advise you on what programme is best, cant remember any myself

 

[Ezteq]

oh, you mean there isn't just something on the toolbar or whatever that i can click and it'll say whats going on?

man that sucks, thx though laddster

 

[- English -]

Try going into Network. See if you can pick anyothers PC's up. This isn't reliable though as you can hide your PC.

Just change your router pw regulary and you should be fine ;p

 

[Amanita]

We can monitor which computers are using our wireless router at any time... Maybe you can do that through your router's control panel?

 

[Cyradix]

yeah, you should be able to see which computers are connected via your router menu. (prob in the DHCP table)

 

[Zenith.UK]

=== Opinion ===
My opinion of this woman in the library is that she's a freeloader who should be paying for internet herself if it is so important to her daughter's university work.

=== Tech stuff ===
On all Speedtouch/Thomson wireless routes, there is a section called "Home Network" that summarises all the computers that have connected to your network and whether they are connected at that moment. I don't kow about other makes but surely there is a list of computers that have connected in your router's web admin panel. It may be under "DNS" where the hostnames are kept.

Four things you can do to prevent people freeloading off your network:

1. Prevent transmission of your SSID. It won't stop a determined attacker but it stops most "ordinary" wardrivers.
2. Use WPA2 with AES encryption. Not WEP or WPA/WPA2. Just WPA2 on it's own. WEP can be cracked in about 10 seconds and WPA takes 2-3 minutes.
3. Choose a long password or passphrase. Where possible, avoid using "proper" words or names. If you must use a "proper" word, replace or insert some numbers in there. If you can, throw in some non-standard characters like $,%,£ etc.
   eg. zenith could become z£n1t4
   (btw, I never use my nick as a password!)
4. If your router has MAC filtering, activate it and add the MAC (hardware) addresses of all allowed computers. The router should then reject network equipment that isn't on the list.

If you do a search for router monitoring toolbar, you get quite a few hits so there are facilities for polling your router to see if anyone has jumped on the wireless. Also check if your router supports SNMP, as that is another way for programs to check what your router is up to.

 

[Cadelin]

What Zenith said.

Use WPA2 and use a long password. Remember for a password like this you can create something that is 50 characters long and write it on a post-it note stuck to your router. The MAC filtering is also extremely useful. It can take a bit of effort to get the hang of but once you have understood what your router does and how to set things up it is well worth it, especially if you live in a crowded environment.

I have had my wireless stolen before and they wern't discrete about it either. I found out because my internet would literally grind to a halt as they were leeching all the bandwidth.