A Novel Analysis of Wireless Network Monitoring using Wireshark

Abstract

In this paper, we describe Wireless networks have seen unprecedented rise in their size and number of users in recent years. This unprecedented rise is attributed to the rise in the number of mobile computing devices. Moreover the amount of data that is handled by these wireless networks has increased in recent years. One such wireless network that is widely used but is still prone to attacks is WiFi. Wi-Fi protocol (IEEE 802.11), over the years has been upgraded many times, but these upgrades have mainly resulted in increase in the overall data rate of the communication. Little has been done to improve the security of the protocol. This research focuses on inherent flaws in Wired Equivalent Privacy protocol (WEP) used by the 802.11 standard, Temporal Key Integrity Protocol (TKIP) which is considered an interim solution to legacy 802.11 equipment. The demand for ubiquitous personal communications is driving the development of wireless networks that can accommodate mobile voice and data users who move throughout buildings, cities, or countries. The objective of this chapter is to provide the fundamentals of wireless networks so that the general readers can be able to easily grasp some of the ideas in this area.