Wireless network security question/story

[Fezzik]

I've had my wireless network for a while now and I'm pretty knowledgable about it. Its a linksys-g router and I have it set to most defaults. Mostly on default settings because I reset to factory the other day when I was messing around with some settings and screwed it up. I realize I was broadcasting to my neighbors for a few days, since I had'nt had time to properly configure. Ok, so heres the situation.

As luck would have it, a neighbor moves in next door and has a wireless card on his laptop. He realizes someone nearby is broadcasting wifi. So I come home today and my e-mail isnt working, so I figure its down for a few minutes and go outside and wash my car. The neighbor comes walking by and introduces himself and we start talking. He mentions about someone broadcasting wifi in the area and asked if it was me. I said it was and he asked if he could borrow it as long as I was broadcasting it "freely". I said I guess so. Then he said that he shut down the router about an hour ago since he didnt want anyone "hacking" my network. I dont trust him, since I dont know him. Im just a nice guy, because I know how much it sucks to move somewhere and not have internet access for weeks. I figure I'll let him borrow it for a few weeks until he can arrange for some of his own internet access.

So my question is, what type of security feature should I enable so that he cant access anything on any other computer on the network, but still have access to the network? Right now there are 3 computers on it, and hes the 4th. The 3 computers in the house dont need to be able to access each other if that helps. Thanks in advance.

[colecifer]

I know you wanna be a nice guy, but i wouldn't let him mooch internet. Especially because you don't know him very well. You don't know if he will abuse it or not, like if he downloads some music on Kazaa and you get busted it will be charged to you not him. Also he might try to take advantage of you and never get his own internet. Its going to be harder to tell him no the longer he uses it. However if you wish to share with him thats your call, i'm not sure exactly how to secure your computers from him.

[Fezzik]

Well colcifer, you make some good points. Im going to break him off sooner than I thought. I realized I really cant afford to chance anything like him downloading illegal music or kiddie porn. I really cant see him being upset about me cutting him off of something that was never his to begin with. I figure one night this week, I'll just lock down the router (like I should have had the whole time) and wait for him to come walking by.

If anyone has any ideas to the question in the 1st post, I would still like to know.

[glc]

Turn off file and print sharing and give each computer some random meaningless workgroup name. Change the router password.

[Fezzik]

For some reason the other night I remembered that he said something about bringing over a booster for the signal. Im not going to let him have that, since that basically means "you can share the interenet forever", lol.

So shortly after that I locked down the router. Blocked his specific MAC adderess, changed the SSID and turned off broadcast, threw in a 64-bit WEP key, made the max computers 3.

Anyone know of an better security feature than WEP. I seem to drop the connection a lot and it askes me for the key all the time.

[colecifer]

WPA is more secure but i'm not exactly sure who it works or if your router suppourts it.

[kingoftowns]

what you did is enough blocking the mac address will definitely keep him out, make sure you put a good new password on the network so he cant go into the settings and change them back to allow himself in.

[TeenPcknowit]

WPA is nearly indestructible. K.rose himself did not present a way to crack it on www.thebroken.com
But for what its worth, you shouldn't need any encryption if you have MAC address filtering.
Good luck.

[Matt_Smi]

You did the right thing, it is very scary that he shut down your router, if he changed the password on it while he was in there then he could have done a lot more too and you would have been pretty much help less. I think that MAC address filtering is the best thing you can do to secure you wireless network, the other steps you took are also good (changed SSID, turn off broadcasting, and use WEP). Like mentioned make sure you change the password for the router, so he cant get back in there and make any changes. I was thinking of starting to use WPA instead of WEP, but I think with MAC filtering there is really not much of a need. Plus WEP is still not easy to crack; I have heard that it takes days of sniffing packets to crack it, and unless someone really wants data on your network, not many will be determined enough to do that. What you have done should be plenty to keep the neighbor/s out.

[Fezzik]

Wow, thanks for all the great replys. I did change the router password right away that day. And as for him stealing my router, I can always use the handy reset button in the back. Afterall it is in my house. Thanks again guys and gals.