Secure home network

Two things are vital to keeping your network safe: proper settings and prudence.

• The first step is easy; you just need to adjust the settings on your router once.
• The second step, however, takes more effort. Whenever you're online, you'll need to be prudent about your activities.

Here are some router and network settings tips that will help keep your home network safe.

Before I begin, note that with most routers you'll need to access the Web interface to change the settings. You can read Home router setup in this series for the full details. For Apple products, you can customize the applicable settings via the AirPort Utility, which is freely downloadable and included in Mac OS 10.7 or later.

Without a Web interface, Apple's routers trade flexibility and features for immunity to certain types of hacking. You still want to use the AirPort Utility to create strong Wi-Fi and log-in passwords however.

1. Encrypt your Wi-Fi network
Give your Wi-Fi network, identified by its SSID (a string of characters), a password so that (ideally) only those users you know and trust can connect to your network. This password should be hard to guess, but easy to remember and type - even on a small smartphone keyboard. The password should be at least eight characters long and should include both numbers and letters. And if your router lets you use passwords with spaces, that's even better.

• Note that depending on the router, this password will be referred to in the Web interface as either the encryption key, the pass-key, the pre-shared key, or the passphrase.
• You also need to consider which industry security standards your router supports.

2. Change important default settings

A router comes with many default settings. Since those are set by the vendor, they are public knowledge. Using the default settings may help make the setup process easier, but it also makes your router more susceptible to unauthorized access.

The two settings that you should change to keep your router safe are its default IP address and default log-in password.

Making a strong router log-in password and turning off remote management and UPnP are a few ways to keep a router safer from intruders.

• First, in the Local Area Network (or LAN) setup part of the interface, set the router's IP address. You can change it to almost anything you want as long as the value of each dotted-decimal notation (the numbers separated by the dots in the IP address) is a number from 1 to 254. So for example, instead of the conventional 192.168.x.1, you can make it 10.11.12.13 or 1.2.1.2 or 20.21.22.23 and so on.
• Note that once you change the IP address, you'll need to use that new address to access the router's Web interface from then on. Also, avoid making the router's IP address the same as the IP assigned to your modem by your Internet service provider, called the WAN (wide-area network) IP address. ou can change the router's default log-in password via the Tools or Administration parts of the Web interface. 
  
  You can change the router's IP address to almost anything you want as long as the value of each dot-separated group is a number from 1 to 254. 
   
• Make sure that this password is hard to guess and different from the password used for the Wi-Fi network mentioned above.

3. Turn off remote access-related features

• Most routers are accessible over the Internet, so even when you're not at home you can remotely manage and use FTP (specifically for routers that come with a USB port to host an external hard drive for network storage)
• Also, you should turn off the UPnP feature. It lets a UPnP-compatible device change certain router settings without logging in to the Web interface, and it could be exploited by hackers.

4. Update the router's firmware

• Depending on the router, updating the firmware can take a few easy clicks, or you may have to first download the firmware and install it manually.
• Typically, firmware updates from the manufacturer help improve a router's performance and security.

5. Log out properly

• Make sure that you log out of the router's Web interface when you're finished making changes.
• Some interfaces have a log-out button, but with others you'll need to close the browser too

Bonus step: Turn on power line adapters' security features
Another thing that can easily be overlooked: if you use power line adapters in your network, it's a good idea to turn on their security features. This is especially important if you live in an apartment building, as unscrupulous neighbors could tap into your network by using an adapter in their homes.

That's it! If you follow these steps, your router and your home network will be more secure. If  have questions on keeping your network safe, send them usway via Facebook or Google+ or just post them in the comments section below.



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