Tip of the Month

February 2005

Analysis – On the “Fly”

Author – Saurabh Bhasin

If you are like me, you did not leave your notebook behind this holiday season! You were sitting at the terminal gate capturing packets before boarding your flight, in the hotel lobby or even on the subway while trying to get to Times Square. Maybe not on the subway but everywhere else, you can learn so much about the different protocols that you might not ever see during your daily network analysis drills. Tab over to the Experts tab and you will see events that are not normal (and should not be on any network!) like Ad-Hoc Networks, ICMP errors, POP3 errors and more.

No matter how much I appreciated the free hotspot at the famous New York airport, I was surprised to see how many people did not care to read the fine print and continued to use protocols that sent out information in clear text over the air. This could mean revealing information like your AOL screen-name, your POP3 information for personal accounts, websites being accessed and much more to people who might be out there eavesdropping. With increasing emphasis on security, here are a few travel tips for your next wireless experience at a public hotspot:

1. VPN, your best friend!
2. If you don’t have access to a VPN, try to use “secure” protocols
3. Always inquire if WEP is an option
4. Keep your instant messaging to minimal
5. Always have your Analyzer going, you will be surprised how much you learn
6. Take an extra minute and fill out that customer survey!