WLC4402 SECURITY KEY

[vinodk_gupta]

Hi,

I have one WLC 4402 & arround 29 Access point (1130) in our enterprise network. Wireless users LAN segment is diffrent from wired users.Wireless users like Laptop users, Mobile users & ipad users which are connetced with this wireless & using enterprise network.

Presently we are using  WEP mode for security key. This WEP key are week & can be cracked easily. so security point of view i want to put strong encription mode.

Presently i do not have any radius server.

I found there are some modes are available Like WPA, WPA2 with PSK etc.

will there any problem with wireless users to access application after changing the mode?

Please suggest us which mode will be stronger & could not be crack. Could we achieve without radius server or not?

Thanks

Vinod Kumar Gupta

9810966625

[Justin Kurynny]

Vinod,

If you do not want to use or have a RADIUS server, you can use WPA2 with a pre-shared key (PSK). This is the strongest encryption you have available to you short of using 802.1X (RADIUS server). Use an ASCII key of at least 8 characters.

Users on most platforms will be prompted for the key when they select the network. This makes the join process pretty painless for them. If they had previously joined the network with a WEP key, then their old configuration will be invalid and their association will fail. In some cases, the client may just give up trying and will not prompt the user for the preshared key because it is looking for a WEP network.

I have one customer that is a University. They actually change the whole SSID of the network each semester, which forces every user to create a brand new association to a brand new SSID that was never before in use. This has cut down on support calls for them significantly. You may want to consider this approach (of simply creating a new WLAN/SSID) so that you're not dealing with stale WEP configurations on clients that don't handle the security change well. Creating a new WLAN has the added benefit of you being able to smoothly migrate users over to the new SSID without causing a network outage for users who cannot migrate right away (or who otherwise need help doing it).

Justin