ISPs on drive to secure their Wi-Fi networks

MUMBAI, INDIA: Wireless technology has always fascinated humans, specially with the freedom it offers and the easy-to-use devices and gadgets. We have come a long way from the old-age walkie talkies to the Wi-Fi enabled mobile phones and the latest Wi-Max technology that provides ubiquitous Internet connectivity.

Security, however, has always remained the key concern for such technology. In fact, last years' Mumbai terror attacks exposed the dark side of unsecured Wi-Fi network, which was intercepted by the terrorists for sending e-mails and key details to terror outfits based outside India.

Subsequently, the Mumbai Police and its Cyber Cell carried out a massive drive to crack down on unauthorized and unsecured Wi-Fi networks across city for security reasons.

And now, the Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (TRAI) has pulled its strings on the Internet Service Providers (ISPs) and asked them to take strong steps in strengthening the security of Wi-Fi networks.

TRAI notified all the ISPs across the country to authenticate their users that access Internet over wireless networks and devices. As per TRAI's guidelines for Wi-Fi equipment, all the necessary setting pertaining to device security should be in place, using protected user name and password.

The users behind Wi-Fi device should be registered in the device configuration with aid of MAC addresses and ensure that no other customer premises equipment (CPE), other than registered one, is allowed Wi-Fi network access. Also, customer needs to furnish all Wi-Fi device details to service providers.

The norms have asked ISPs to gather customer details including names, personal email ID, addresses along technical informations such as wireless device's make and serial number or MAC code.

“We are signing an undertaking with our customers (using Wi-Fi for internal network) to comply with TRAI's guidelines and are spreading awareness among them by various means,” said A K Sekhar, YOU Telecom's CTO.

“Authentication is compulsory of any wireless customer in our network,” Sekhar stressed. Moreover, from security stand point, YOU Telecom is using the latest WPA2 key security mechanism, he said.

“Wi-Fi Protected Access (WPA and WPA2) is a certification program created by the Wi-Fi Alliance to secure wireless computer networks. This protocol was created in responses to several serious weaknesses researchers had found in the previous system – wired equivalent privacy (WEP),” Sekhar explained.

In this technology, laptop or the desktop users can access our network where we've defined the key and that is encrypted for secured access over wireless network, he added.

YOU Telecom, owned by the Citigroup Venture Capital International (CVCI), formerly known as Iqara Broadband, has over 100,000 broadband subscribers across 11 cities and its Wi-Fi services are available in Navi Mumbai, Pune, Thane and Mumbai.

Though, TRAI's notification has received an overwhelming response from the ISP community, they still face a few constraints such as lack of customer support and false information.

“We are taking actions and all available steps but it's very difficult to track down on people who use routers and other devices. At times people don't disclose or inform us about the devices used by them and hide it from ISP. Hence it's very difficult to keep check on such individuals,” commented Asif Khan, Digicable Network's CTO.

Digicable is among the largest cable distribution company with over 20000 customers in Mumbai and offers services across 14 states.

In reply, about wireless Internet users, Khan said, “We are still in process to figure out the total counter of customers which are accessing wireless Internet.”

Even Sekhar agreed to constraints faced by ISPs, but expressed confidence that all will take necessary steps in this direction, soon.