802.11 Planet brings together the best ideas and people in the world of Wi-Fi for business and the enterprise, Dec. 3-5
Blow your mind wide open at Supernova 2002, a 2-day conference Dec. 9-10 on decentralization, and the fundamental questions facing software, communications, and media.
The above are paid, sponsored links. Contact us for more information.
News.com's uninformed story on a new optical antenna: This story about a new focused infrared antenna misses a number of points. Yes, it's interesting that these scientists have created a way to make a better antenna using invisible light (infrared). But there are several points in the article about security that are just incorrect.
But the [Wi-Fi] technology, also known as 802.11b, has yet to make an impact on the business world because of fears about security breaches. Pass the bowl, dude! And tell that to the thousands upon thousands of Fortune 5000 companies who have deployed wireless in large and small ways. Any company large enough to worry about security breaches is almost certainly already employing a network authentication system which their WLAN can integrate with. System that employ EAP and EAP variants (PEAP and LEAP) as well as or in conjunction with 802.1x already have reliable security at this point, and future revisions and standardization will make them even more secure (and avoid the current man-in-the-middle attack potential, not yet discovered in the wild).
The writer also notes: Because of the way these networks [Bluetooth and Wi-Fi] are set up using radio frequencies, it is possible for just about anyone to tap into a network without the knowledge or permission of the people who administer it. Thank you for playing, and enjoy these lovely parting gifts. In fact, you can't tap into the network, and may not even be able to associate with an access point without using programs like AirSnort (just to break WEP) at which point VLAN or VPN security should defeat your ability to sniff real data.
Any company that isn't employing encryption on their wireless access points and locating them outside of the firewall (or on a separate VLAN) shoudl demand the head of their CIO or IT manager.
Oh, yeah, and just to be clear: these new optical antennas are secure because they are line of sight -- the whole reason we got into wireless radio networking in the first place!
Other News
Emerging Technology 2003: The call for proposals (CFP) is up for The O'Reilly Emerging Technology Conference. I'm chairing the Untethered track which will include interesting new and developing technologies on mesh networking, wireless electrical charging, phase-array antennas, community networking's impact, and a large variety of related trends. I take a page (or rather whole chapters) from Howard Rheingold's new book Smart Mobs in looking at the impact that these technologies could have: Howard is writing about the outcomes and behavioral changes; this conference will look at the details that coagulate into systems that drive behavioral change.
We are watching the detectors: Slashdot thread on a white paper about how to detect whether NetStumbler and similar programs are running on your network. Interesting, given that these are typically considered passive activities.
Microsoft releases 802.1x support for Windows 2000; 98/Me/NT 4 to follow: Microsoft now offers a supplicant (or the client-side software) necessary to handle 802.1x authentication within Windows 2000. The page noted says that Windows 98 (all versions), NT 4.0, and Windows Me support is to follow. [via Jim Thompson]
Ecademy offers free Wi-Fi news site: Excellent aggregation of feeds from many locations for news relating to Wi-Fi.
My luggage was never lonely: Bluetooth in a Samsonite piece of luggage. Nice idea, especially on the theft prevention side. (Hmm...could be like the president's football, the nuclear launch codes: once armed, your baggage could start screaming if it gets more than 30 feet away from your personal Bluetooth ID tag implanted in your neck.)
Blog blog blog blog: The power of news plus a blog is starting to increase in frequency. This blog is often cited, partly because of my relentless obsessive nature in reporting on the field, and because of the excellent contributors who constantly email me new information and resources. We all make a great team. I was on a panel discussion put together by the Society of Professional Journalists on blogging and journalism last week at the Seattle Times Auditorium. A few days ago, ur-blogger Rebecca Blood mentioned my blog in passing in this InfoWorld live forum. Let's all keep developing this latest twist.