Connecting to a Wireless Network using WEP (Wired Equivalent Privacy) for Authentication and Encryption#

WEP can be used for both authentication and privacy with your wireless network. To connect with the network, a client must pass an authentication phase with its WAP. There are two types of authentication which can take place, Open System Authentication (OSA) or Shared Key Authentication (SKA). By default, your wireless adapter will likely implement the commonly used OSA. To change the method, you can use the ifconfig command.

• ifconfig ral0 auth_type 1 (Open System Authentication)
• ifconfig ral0 auth_type 2 (Shared Key Authentication)

If it is not know what authentication method to use, you can use the ifconfig utility to view the network parameters.

Once the authentication method is chosen, you can then enter your network name and WEP key with the ifconfig command.

The network name can be up to 32 characters long. The WEP keymust be either 40 bits long or 104 bits long. This means you will have to enter either 5 or 13 characters for the WEP key, or a 10 or 26 digit long hexadecimal value. For example:

• ifconfig ral0 ssid "corporate lan" nwkey corpseckey456 (user chosen 128 bit WEP)

Once you have entered the network name and encryption method, the 802.11 network should be active. This can be verified with the ifconfig utility. In the case of ad-hoc networks, the status will only show active if there is at least one other peer on the (ssid) network.

	ifconfig ral0 
	ral0: flags=8843<UP,BROADCAST,RUNNING,SIMPLEX,MULTICAST> mtu 1500 
		ssid "corporate lan" nwkey corpseckey456
		powersave off
		bssid 00:11:22:33:44:55 chan 11
		address: 11:44:88:44:88:44
		media: IEEE802.11 autoselect (OFDM36 mode 11g)
		status: active

Once the network status is active, you can send and receive packets on the wireless link. Please refer to the TCP/IP Configuration in a Wireless Network (Client in Infrastructure Mode, or Ad-hoc mode) section for TCP/IP interface configuration to complete your network configuration.