![]() This application monitored the wireless traffic at 2.4 GHz frequency and logged the identifiers of hotspots, identifier addresses of devices connected to the hotspots, sources and targets of the communication, and GPS coordinates. ![]() (Figure 3: Avast’s traffic analyzing application, Trafi Canal) This application logged interesting wireless communication data and stored it for later statistical analysis. )Įach volunteer walked around a city with an adapter tucked away in his or her bag that constantly listened in on nearby wireless communication.įor this experiment, we developed our own application called Trafi Canal, which was based on the free tool Microsoft Network Monitor. (Figure 2: Laptop and Wi-Fi adapter hidden in the bag. This way, we could listen to the data transmitted between the access point and devices receiving it. ![]() This feature allowed us to listen to all wireless communication - even that which wasn’t targeted to our device. Our goal was to gather as much information about the use of wireless networks in these cities as possible.Įach volunteer was equipped with a laptop and a WiFi adapter with ability to be switched into monitor mode. ![]() In February, we sent several volunteers to 9 cities: Chicago, New York, San Francisco, Berlin, Barcelona, London, Taipei, Hong Kong and Seoul. (Figure 1: List of available wireless networks featuring both encrypted and unencrypted options.) Because of this, a key length of longer than 8 characters is strongly recommended. The length of a password is another important factor to its strength - a strongly encrypted communication with a short key length can still be cracked by hackers within a short amount of time. Hence, the use of a strong encryption such as WPA/WPA2 is suggested. However, the method and strength of these passwords matter: if a weak encryption method, such as WEP, is used, an attacker can simply crack the password and decrypt the device’s communication. To resolve this issue, many wireless networks use password protection. ![]() In the case of open wireless networks, the transmitted data are unencrypted and might be visible to others, as is shown in the screenshot below. While both options are available to users, the use of open, unprotected Wi-Fi networks has become increasingly popular across the globe. Behind the Scenes of Avast’s Global Wi-Fi Hack Experiment: How we collected and analyzed Wi-Fi data Wi-Fi and encryptionĭata transmitted over a wireless network can be either unencrypted or encrypted. ![]()
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