802.11b et al
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802.11b et al
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The 6-month-old California Institute for Telecommunications & Information Technology at UC San Diego, which might help lay the foundation of the wireless Internet, has a steady flow of investments from govt & industry despite recent woes in the technology sector. The $103 billion state budget signed last week by Gov. Gray Davis incl the second of 4 installments of $25 million for the program.
Federal funding amounts to tens of millions of dollars to date. Business partners also are buying into the idea of a
wireless world, investing their own tens of millions with the hope of good returns.
"The institute is basically looking at technology 5 to 10 years in the future and trying to do the research now so that
California and its industries will maintain the lead we already have in technology," said institute spokesman Doug
Ramsey. "We're sort of looking ahead, seeing where will the technology lead us." Ramsey said the institute expects
to have a 4 year budget of at least $400 million with the current level of support from govt & industry. The
state
originally awarded $100 million for the institute with the expectation of $200 million in matching funds.
Ramsey said the wireless Internet extends beyond the idea of sending e-mail or surfing the Web via cell phone. A
wireless world might include sensors in roads, buildings, people and the environment that feed information
continually to the Internet. "We see the Internet, which is today largely composed of computers that are networked
together, morphing together in lots of small devices in embedded systems," said the institute's UCSD division dir.
Ramesh Rao. "And this is a wireless kind of thing. If you want to embed these things in the physical world, you
can't have wires & things."
"A lot of large companies are losing the ability to fund these very long-term-payoff types of projects," said Mark
Kelley, chief technical officer of San Diego-based Leap Wireless, a partner with the institute. "We believe it's
absolutely critical that universities pick up the slack." North County's technology companies encompass an
enormous spectrum from genetic research at Carlsbad's Isis Pharmaceuticals to cellular telephone technology at
ArrayComm in Del Mar to optical wireless Internet technology at AirFiber in Rancho Bernardo.
Ramsey said one project is already well under way. Researchers at UCSD are developing a new way to respond to
automobile accidents: Wireless sensors in the road will alert a mobile robot. The robot will arrive at the
scene to send video & audio via wireless communications to a control room, where dispatchers can decide
how to respond. Cones on wheels, also equipped with wireless links, will deploy themselves around the
accident. The Calif. Transportation Dept. is cooperating with the researchers on the project.
Gov. Davis on hand to break ground for new bldgs
Facilities hailed as integral to state
Gov. Gray Davis & Qualcomm founder Irwin Jacobs broke ground on UCSD's 2 new engineering buildings at 5.31.02 Earl Warren College ceremony in front of a crowd of over 330 students, politicians, UCSD faculty and
entrepreneurs. Davis & Jacobs, along with UC Pres. Richard Atkinson & UCSD Chancellor Robert
Dynes, dedicated the Calif. Inst. for Telecommunications & Information Technology and the Computer
Science & Engineering Bldg by digging the first few shovels of dirt at the Warren construction site after a number of short speeches. "Each time we break ground on a new campus building, I believe we lay a foundation for new ideas and for new generations of learners," Dynes said.
The speakers concentrated primarily on the UC's partnerships with corporations like Qualcomm, on UCSD's
technological research and on its impact on the economy. "[California's economy] can't live off Silicon Valley
forever," Davis said. "The best way to drive the economy is to invest in research universities." Davis &
Atkinson both cited Forbes Magazine's recent ranking of San Diego as the best American city in which to do
business, with the most diversified economy. "Out of 10 cities on chosen, six were in California," Davis said.
While acknowledging Silicon Valley's leading role in California's economy, Davis briefly alluded to a more
diversified plan for the future. "My vision is not of one Silicon Valley, but many Silicon Valleys, each propelling
scientific breakthroughs, cutting-edge jobs and cutting-edge industries," Davis said.
When Atkinson first approached Davis with the proposal to expand UCSD, Davis expected two-to-one matching
funds from the university. "I explained [matching funds] would be difficult to achieve, but in hindsight, the governor
was right," Atkinson said. "We achieved almost three-to-one matching funds, due in large part to money received
from California industries." The chief donor was San Diego-based Qualcomm Corporation and Irwin & Joan
Jacobs, co. founder & his wife. Irwin Jacobs explained how he & his company became involved with
UCSD's expansion.
16 year old Warren freshman, Jacobs School Scholar and Cal-(IT)2 fellow Ezekiel Bhasker also mounted the
podium to make a speech and cue the official groundbreaking. "When I came to UCSD, I did so because I
recognized it was one of the finest universities, one of the finest research institutions, in the country," Bhasker said. "This groundbreaking means a lot to me because I'm a part of the Jacobs School of Engineering and Cal-
(IT)2."
Not all attendees were pleased with the governor's visit & the ceremony, citing a lack of emphasis on
undergraduates and a recently proposed California budget that cuts $162 million from the UC, incl $32 million cut
to research programs. UCSD student David Fischer denounced the emphasis on graduate research & corporate influence. "I think this is hurting us through undergraduate education," Fischer said. "[Cal-(IT)2] is an example of corporations getting their interests into the universities, trying to get us out of college and into the corporate sector faster."
re CAL(IT)2 letter to editor
In response to your June 3 article "Gov. Davis on hand … ", while one dissenting
opinion was briefly conveyed, the majority of the article paints the involvement of Cal(IT)2 in UCSD
affairs in an entirely positive light. We would like to encourage your readers to question the motives &
supposed benefits of having these 50 or so corporations give so much money to UCSD.
These are not donations, but investments, much like the campaign contributions that ensure that our
politicians serve business needs over those of the public good. That's how Dick Cheney's oil buddies got to
write our national energy policy. That's why Gov. Davis let Californians get bilked in the bogus, manufactured
"energy crisis." We are led to believe Cal(IT)2 is donating money to help UCSD achieve the public interest. Look at it from the other side, and you realize 6th College's state & federal funding are subsidizing these companies' R&D and employee training agenda. Even Cal(IT)2 CTO Mark Kelly had audacity to state "it's absolutely critical that universities pick up the slack" for corporate research. We need to question the administrators, politicians & business leaders, and resist the intrusion of corporate agenda on campus. We need to reduce our dependence on private money by calling on the legislature to adequately fund public institutions. And we need to educate ourselves about this corporate takeover.
As director of the core curriculum for 6th College, I would like to invite you all to come talk with us here about the plans for and orientations of 6th College. It is clear to us from your recent letter to the editor published in the Guardian on 12 August that you have little if any personal familiarity with the staff of 6th and what we are hoping to do when students arrive this fall. Perhaps part of the act locally, think globally dictum should be to meet locally with those you are holding up to scrutiny? Trusting that we can begin a conversation, yours, Hillel Schwartz dir. Core Curriculum 6th College
Feb. 2002 SD Metropolitan
That triangulation program, called Campus Explorer, was developed by a 15-year-old undergraduate who spent
the summer perfecting the algorithms. The ultimate goal is to improve the location technology to the point where,
for example, not only will a student know a friend is in the library, but what floor she is on and where on that floor.
Sociologists will study how the devices are used and whether they improve learning or the university experience.
The students keep them when they graduate.
Duke U. will give iPod music players to all new freshmen in a 'see what happens' project
This fall's crop of freshmen at Duke University will get a snazzy digital toy along with their campus maps, dormitory-room keys, and orientation booklets: a brand-new iPod, paid for by the university. The iPod, a palm-size digital-music player from Apple Computer, has been a hot item among young people, and this week's release of new models of the iPod has generated a wave of media buzz. Instead of playing music from tapes or CD's, the devices play songs from an onboard hard drive that can hold thousands of digital music files.
That money will come from a fund for incorporating information technology into instruction. Apple gave the university an undisclosed discount on the iPods, which normally sell for $300 to $400 apiece. The goal of the giveaway is education, not entertainment, Duke officials say.
Duke Center for Instructional Technology dir. Lynne M. O'Brien said that she has spoken with an instructor in Spanish who plans to use the iPods to record and distribute assignments. A professor of environmental studies is interested in using iPods to record interviews in the field.
The devices can be attached to computers, and users can manage their digital collections using Apple's iTunes software, which can also be used to purchase digital music online, for about 99 cents per song. Some college officials hope that offering legitimate alternatives to illegal file trading will help reduce online piracy. But Tracy Futhey, Duke's vice president for information technology, said that dissuading students from swapping songs illegally was not the reason for the iPod experiment.
Thomas S. Walther, who is a senior in computer science, a student representative for Apple, and president of the university's Mac User Group, knew about the iPod project while Duke and Apple were still negotiating the terms of the deal. Some university staff members he talked with seemed skeptical about the project, he said.
3.5.02 Eileen Colkin Internet Week Psychology prof. G. Christian Jernstedt is leading the experiment in which all his students use PDAs connected to the college's wireless network to interactively participate in Q&A sessions. In addition to meeting the challenge of engaging more students in discussions, which can be particularly difficult in large classes, Jernstedt says the instant feedback from students helps him tailor the direction of his lectures in real time to meet the needs of the class. The fall semester was the first time Jernstedt used the system, and he says he'll continue with the wireless approach. The concept of a wireless classroom is the logical answer to the demands of college students to incorporate more advanced technologies into their educational experience. "Students are increasingly looking to technology, so the classroom experience is evolving," a Dartmouth spokeswoman says. "We started with a chalkboard, moved to projectors, and now this is the natural evolution. It's exciting." |
Designs on education
A closer look at Sixth College Spring 02 N.Van Borst '03 John Muir College Nightcap
This Sept., 330 young people will become the first class of UCSD's newest, as yet unnamed college. They lie at the
epicenter of ongoing debate, as faculty, administrators and researchers struggle to bring the college into
being. Ironically, new students may be the least informed about the nature of the struggle.
To understand 6th College, we must place it in context with the UC's projected enrollment increase. 6th College
emerges in many ways as a response & proposed solution to the problems posed by what some call "Tidal
Wave II." Likening the event to a natural disaster, faculty & administrators throughout the UC prepare to
bunker down while a projected 63,000 students file into the system over the next 6 years, an increase of 43%.
Proposals for handling the increase vary radically, from instituting year-round schooling to decreasing graduation
requirements or shuttling excess students off to programs overseas & in Washington, DC. At UCSD, where
some 8,000 of these students are slated to arrive, the administration seeks to preserve the "small college system"
through the creation of this new campus. 6th College's relation to Tidal Wave II does not begin & end
here.
The faculty committee that developed the college's theme, "Culture, Art & Technology," felt UCSD needed a
fresh outlook, diversion from what is often seen as the University's predominantly scientific focus. "The idea," one
member said, "[was] to keep UCSD from turning into La Jolla Tech." According to the college's administration, its
curriculum functions on the principle that Culture, Art & Technology are united by the creative process.
Exploring contemporary & historical interactions between these 3 terms, the program teaches fundamentally
interdisciplinary methodology by breaking down traditional boundaries and encouraging dynamic problem-solving.
"A new college has to be experimental," Core Sequence dir. Hillel Schwartz said, "so I thought, 'if I'm supposed to
be experimental, I'm going to be experimental on a philosophical level.'"
In Schwartz's eyes, critics of the college place too much emphasis on the program's technological component.
Judging from the curricula created by Schwartz & his staff, he may be right. 6th College, however, does not
begin & end with Schwartz's syllabi. As much as Schwartz, Provost Wienhausen and Dean of Students Julie
Wong insist that the themes of the educational pgm will be fully integrated into the student's experience, its
technological aspect takes preeminence when one examines the college as a whole.
6th College takes its own stance before ever allowing its students to "evaluate" the issues. Besides the PDAs,
"Reinventing the College Campus" promises a host of other gizmos, such as laptops, digital cameras, webboards,
& tools for "digital media creation," will be made available to students. Classes may teach students to be
critical of technology, but the college sends a mixed message by making it an integral part of students'
experiences, and loudly trumpeting that fact. Provost Wienhausen may claim criticism is "at the heart of what [they]
do," as she told The New Indicator, but the very organization of the school is technophilic to its core.
So how do these ideas fit together? What may seem a contradiction appears, on closer examination, a strategically
calculated endeavor. One might wonder how a college with a commitment to "live at the bleeding edge of
technology" can provide a critical look at that technology. The administration has determined that 6th College will
remain at the forefront a tech revolution fueled by market factors & private research, not student input. The
college promises to involve students in the "revolution" itself, by providing, through its connection with Cal-
(IT)2, privileged access to cutting-edge technology from the private sector.
Wienhausen herself stresses the "ethnographic" nature of the project at 6th: UCSD Communications Prof. Leigh
Starr will systematically study the way this "born wireless" community develops & interacts. The relationship
between Cal-(IT)2 & 6th College thus becomes clearer: the latter represents an ideal
microcommunity in which products "leveraged" from the Institute can be studied, evaluated & developed.
To prepare for the rising tide of students, a system-wide planning group called "UC2010" proposes the adoption of
a "New Business Architecture," "a more flexible, 'scalable' business model [for UC administration], designed to
deliver an integrated set of tools to the user's desktop." Meanwhile, 2003 marks the dawn of UCSD's first business
degree: the School of Management will admit students to an MBA pgm designed to "respond to the growing need
of California industry for personnel with strong management skills in the high technology & biotechnology
sectors," as Chancellor Dynes puts it.
But 6th College responds to the demands of Tidal Wave II in more dynamic ways than simply soliciting
corporate funding. Some individuals propose the development of IT-based "teaching solutions" as a remedy
to the challenges of rising enrollment, an area in which Provost Wienhausen has received numerous
accolades. Accordingly, the "ethnographic study" at 6th College provides an experiment in educational technology
as well as a clearinghouse for developing products. With the collaboration of its students, Wienhausen's college will
"revolutionize" teaching by moving it out of the classroom and on to the net.
Compare this to Cal-(IT)2's description of its workplace: "[The institute] is designed as an instrument
of research to encourage partners to combine in unusual teams to make fundamental discoveries. As a result, one
of its defining characteristics is a state of constant change." Sounds like the graduates of 6th College will be ideally
suited for their futures as IT developers. That plan is quite a stretch from the college's stated goal of "exploring the
intersection of Culture, Art & Technology." Even as its first year approaches, 6th College exists as many
different things in the minds of administrators, corporate executives, teachers and students. Yet while it may be too
early to say what shape the college will take when it emerges from its chrysalis, some individuals clearly have their
own "designs" for 6th College & UCSD. Or should we just call it "La Jolla Tech"?
High-profile distance learning projects have grabbed much attention in recent years. Today, though, most schools
are using the Web to streamline administrative functions and improve the quality of education & student life
both on campus & off. Schools are using portals that offer links to educational resources and that let teachers & students collaborate on course work & research. They're also installing wireless networks to slash cabling costs.
"I think they are starting to look at technology as potentially being strategically advantageous for a school as a
differentiator," says Oracle's higher-education sales group vp Lee Ramsayer. On the e-procurement front, the
education sector has lagged behind most other vertical industries, largely because of restrictive state laws and the decentralized structure of universities. But some schools are making strides.
A portion of the laptop's cost is factored into tuition, and students have an opportunity to buy the machines at
reduced rates once the school year starts. The laptop program lets the college standardize on one platform, says
Albertson CIO Allen Schmook. The hope is that the combination of the wireless network and standardization on the HP laptops will make it easier for students to collaborate on projects, check on work assignments or access online campus administrative services. The plan also saves the college the pains of hardwiring the older buildings on campus. It makes any Web app available to students anywhere, letting them save time instead of trekking to the library or back to their dorm room to access the Web.
At Wake Forest University in North Carolina, campus officials are also experimenting with wireless technology.
"We're getting closer to the point where you can get a Web browser anywhere," says Wake Forest asst vp for
information systems Jay Dominick. The university also has a laptop program for students, Dominick says. Now that students have pervasive access to the network & a Web browser, Dominick says the challenge is building Web interfaces to data resources & applications. "Our goal is to allow the consumer of the information as much access to the information as possible," Dominick says.
Canadian uni fears Wi-Fi
Toronto A small Canadian university has ruled out campus-wide wireless internet access because its president fears the system's electromagnetic forces could pose a risk to students' health. Lakehead University, in Thunder Bay, Ontario, has only a limited Wi-Fi connections at present, in places where there is no fibre-optic internet connection. According to president Fred Gilbert, that is just fine.
"The jury is still out on the impact that electromagnetic forces have on human physiology," Gilbert told a university meeting last month, insisting that university policy would not change while he remained president. "Some studies have indicated that there are links to carcinogenetic occurrences in animals, including humans, that are related to energy fields associated with wireless hotspots, whether those hotspots are transmissions lines, whether they're outlets, plasma screens, or microwave ovens that leak."
Lakehead University published a transcript of Gilbert's remarks on its website. Spokeswoman Eleanor Abaya said the decision not to expand the university's few isolated wireless networks was a "personal decision" by Gilbert.
But the president's stance has prompted a backlash from students and from Canadian health authorities, who say his fears are overdone.
Lakehead students' union president Adam Krupper estimated about 1000 of the school's 7500 students have laptops that could pick up a wireless signal, and he said students "really, really" want Wi-Fi on campus.
Wake Forest built student portals using middleware from Software Research Northwest to tie into existing systems that store student information.
Much of the information fed into the student portals is housed on IBM RS/6000 servers running Oracle8i databases. The portals let students access and manage information about course work, as well as view records and transcripts. Students can also access the portals via the university's wireless LAN.
The university is also doing some custom coding to convert legacy data into XML and using Java to extract the
actual data from the presentation of the data so that it might be used within many different applications and
displayed in various formats. That approach will help as the university explores the use of handheld computers,
which display information differently from the way a desktop Web screen does. Wireless handhelds could apply to teaching when teachers move from lab to lecture hall and need information access or managing university
inventory, Dominick says.
This year, Wake Forest will integrate the university's wireless LAN with wireless handheld devices from Symbol
Technologies that include bar code scanners. The scanner reads bar codes on student IDs and wirelessly
accesses student records to determine the age of the student. Software from Planet Technologies processes the
information and returns either a "yes" or a "no" to the screen of the handheld to show whether the student is of
legal drinking age. Students who answer "yes" get one color wristband. Those who answer "no" get another color.
The handheld also keeps a log of who was at a party.
Officials at the university are also thinking about using handhelds for end-of-year room inspections, Dominick says.
"Anything that requires somebody to fill out a form, then take a piece of paper and type it into a database
seems like a good candidate for wireless handhelds," he says. … |
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Are Chinese students cheating by phone? 6.2.06 Alexa Olesen AP
Beijing China will scramble mobile phone signals in some exam halls and have police stand guard in a bid to stop cheating as millions of students take the highly competitive college entrance exams this month, state media said Friday.
Last year, some 1,700 students across the country were disciplined for cheating, including 30 students who used hidden telecommunications equipt to get answers during the test or who were caught selling exam contents, it said. Earlier this month, three people were arrested for selling fake exam papers over the Internet for 1,000 yuan a subject, it said. Some provinces were planning to use devices that would block mobile phone signals in exam halls though the Education Ministry warned that if such equipt was being used it should be proved safe to humans. |
China has suffered a series of scandals in recent months involving academics who were caught lying about their credentials or faking research. Last month, a dean at Shanghai Jiaotong University, one of China's top science schools, was dismissed after investigators found he faked research on what state media had hailed as a breakthrough new computer chip.
In April, another Shanghai university dismissed a scientist who it said lied about his academic record. Similar accusations led to the firing of a professor at elite Tsinghua University in Beijing in March. The scandals have been especially embarrassing to communist leaders at a time when they are promising to spend more on scientific research in hopes of developing profitable technologies.
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The U.S. Federal Communications Commission will soon vote on a plan to auction spectrum, with the winner required to offer free wireless Internet services. The winner of the 25Mhz piece of spectrum in the 2155MHz band would be required to use a specified amount of the spectrum to deliver free wireless Internet access. The operator could choose to use any technology, but in that range WiMax or many of the mobile technologies would make sense.
"We believe this is a good idea and demonstrates the FCC's commitment to supporting initiatives that have a positive impact on the next phase of broadband innovation. This will give consumers greater choices to access the Internet," said FCC spokeswoman Chelsea Fallon in a statement.
The current proposal also includes a requirement for a content filter that would aim to prevent minors from accessing adult content over the free network. The final plan could also include specified data rates for the free service.
While many of the bigger wireless operators filed individual comments, they typically stressed technical issues that would help ensure that any new service in the band doesn't interfere with their existing services. However, the CTIA, a trade group representing the operators, urged the FCC not to place requirements on the spectrum winner. "The commission should not require licensees to meet specific conditions, such as pricing plans, minimum data rates or content filtering," the CTIA wrote in a filing with the commission. If the FCC approves the plan for the 2155MHz spectrum during its June 12 meeting, it would then have to work out the auction procedures, a process that could take six months or longer.
7.17.01 Gerry Blackwell 80211-planet.com
Movement in America and elsewhere to build citywide networks of linked 802.11b access points owned &
operated by individuals in loose-knit community groups. Sit in the park with laptop or handheld PC and access the
Net at 1 Mbps via an antenna on the roof of somebody's nearby home. Cost to you for infrastructure services, the
access points & backbone links that provide the wireless access theoretically, zero. Civic minded individuals & companies will supposedly shell out the money to put up the antennas & radios.
Already groups do it in 12 U.S. cities, including 3 in Seattle and 2 in the Bay Area, also 6 groups in 5 cities in
Australia, at least one in Canada, as well as groups in France, Finland, Sweden and the UK, where there are 3.
A hobbyist or enthusiast sets up a radio in his apartment building and maybe an antenna on the roof then posts
notices in the building that anyone with a Wi-Fi (802.11b) modem or PC card can access the network.
The access points may or may not be linked and may or may not provide access out onto the Internet. It's still early days, in the enthusiast phase. But Internet access for the people is obviously the point here. The Bay Area
Wireless User Group already has 21 access nodes. SeattleWireless has 10. GuerillaNet in Boston
appears to have about 5.
Caruso is typical of the membership. SeattleWireless's mailings go out to over 200 users & node operators.
Most node operators, like Caruso, are networking or computer professionals, though a few now are home
enthusiasts. It costs about $1,000 to set up an access node, slightly less if you want to build your own antenna or
can use an old 486 PC running Linux for a server.
Brewster Kahle of SFLan, Bay Area group that kick-started the community net movement, has a slightly different
take. Kahle's day job is president of Alexa Internet, Amazon.com subsidiary that sells browser plug-ins &
related services. His company is also a prime mover behind & funder of the non-profit Internet Archive, a Web repository of historic video content.
That future may in fact be receding for many people, because of the too-slow rollout of too-expensive broadband
Internet access services. Kahle believes community nets may be the best hope for ubiquitous low-cost broadband
access, something the industry desperately needs, he argues. "We need to get video to people [over the Net],"
Kahle says. "If we don't, I think interest is going to wane. People are expecting more and more. Their computers
are super fast, their hard disks are huge. But the bandwidth sucks."
Are community wireless nets the way to break the logjam? There are still big obstacles, Kahle says. One is the
dearth of low-cost, high-power radios. Most 802.11b radios today are 30 or 100 milliwatts, even though FCC
regulations allow them to operate at up to 1 watt. One-watt radios & repeaters would mean greater range
& wider coverage. Lower prices would encourage more private, volunteer node operators to come forward.
The current $1,000 price tag, Kahle notes, is "above most people's play money."
It's possible that community WLANs could sneak a lot of non-paying users on to their networks and chew up
bandwidth without bringing in any additional revenue. But maybe there's also an opportunity here. Most people would be willing to pay for high-speed access, just not as much as the cable & phone companies are asking now or may be asking soon if their prices go up. Would it make economic sense for an ISP to connect to a community net backbone node with a big pipe and offer everybody on the net, incl occasional mobile users,
broadband access at rock-bottom prices ?
Report forecasts WLAN 'last-mile' boom
The ability of IEEE 802.11b to serve as a last-mile broadband access technology is boosting the wireless LAN
market still more, according to a report from Dallas, Texas wireless market researcher Alexander Resources.
The co. estimates WLAN service revenue for DSL/Cable extensions will reach about $5.5 billion worldwide by
2007. The growth of last mile / fixed WLAN applications is fueled in the U.S. by users lacking landline DSL or cable service. Alexander predicts these users will turn in growing numbers to WLAN service providers for high-speed Internet access.
The report, "Broadband Wireless LAN: Public Space & the Last Mile," looks at both the public hot spot and
last mile / fixed wireless WLAN opportunities. In both areas, an array of network providers are adopting 802.11b, or 11a, access points. The biggest chunk of worldwide WLAN service revenues, which the Alexander report pegs at $9.5 billion by 2007, will be from WLANs in public areas. The report predicts that 80% of all public WLANs will be deployed in cafes, bars and restaurants, but these venues will contribute only a small port of the revenues for the sector. Instead, the main revenue stream will flow from business users in airports, business hotels and exhibition centers. The report goes so far as to predict that the use of WLANs in such sites as cafes, which have garnered widespread publicity, actually will start declining. The result will 'dead spots' in revenue & service, the authors predict.
If considering such service, check the fine print: |
'Net access in public places hard hit by terror 10.22.01 C.Duffy Marsan & John Cox Network World
Public access networking, a market built on the premise that business travelers want high-speed Internet
access in airports, hotels and restaurants, may be another casualty of 9.11.01
terrorist attacks. 2 leading providers of Internet access to the hospitality industry, MobileStar Network
& Ardent Communications, failed in recent weeks, leaving big-name hotel & retail chains such
as Hilton Hotels & Starbucks Coffee without much-hyped connections for their customers.
… Cahners In-Stat analyst Amy Cravens. "One effect of 9.11.01 is that American, Delta and United
have decided to delay implementation of Boeing's Connexion in-flight broadband solution." These trends
indicate a dimmer outlook for public access networking, which already suffered from slow adoption by
users and concerns about security. "The marketing approaches have not succeeded in gaining the
needed subscription rates. Is this because users don't want to be connected all the time? Or the pricing
scheme is not right? It's hard to say," Cravens says. "It may be a market ahead of its time."
10.11.01 bankruptcy filing by Ardent (formerly CAIS Internet) was less shocking, as the company had
announced a reorganization & layoffs last spring when it moved beyond hotel Internet access to
providing VPN services to small & midsize businesses. "In the case of Ardent, they were suffering for
some time," says Paul Sullivan, CEO of rival Guest-Tek, which counts Hyatt Hotels as one of its
customers. "It was a business model that wasn't viable. They expected far higher take rates from the end
users. At the same time, their model required substantial up-front investment."
Rivals say the demise of MobileStar & Ardent are not signs of the imminent death of the public
access network market, but rather a shift in who will pay for these services. Surviving providers such as
WayPort & Guest-Tek require airports, hotels and restaurants to pay for the high-speed access
rather than charging end users. "The history of this [public access] market has been sort of a land grab:
paying a lot of capital for real estate & network infrastructure but getting little in the way of
subscriptions," says WayPort mktg vp Dan Lowden. "But our [hospitality] partners now see they have to
have this … They're now paying the capital costs and giving us a big chunk of the revenue."
Air2Web takes a different approach, creating a free wireless room reservation service for Six Continents
Hotels to provide to members of its Priority Club. Six Continents owns 3,000 properties. "The strongest
markets [for public access networking] are where you have some kind of built-in customer or incumbent,
such as the Holiday Inn Priority Club," says Air2Web sales engineering dir. Mark Indermaur. "The hotel
or airline employees can use the network you create, so that gives you a way to fund the capital
spending."
MobileStar pulls Starbucks wireless network
¹
MobileStar Network has pulled the plug on its high-speed wireless network, leaving some hotel & retail chains, such as Starbucks Coffee, without their highly touted public access connections. Most of its 90 or so employees have been laid off, and inquiries are being referred to Diablo Management Group, San Ramon, CA management & advisory firm for companies seeking bankruptcy or turnaround.
As of June 2001, about 350 Starbucks shops had been tied into the MobileStar backbone. MobileStar was founded in 1996, intending to create a web of wireless access points in hotels, airports, conference centers, restaurants and other public sites. Through these wireless links, consumers & business travelers would be able to access the Internet & corporate intranets at near-T-1 speeds. Investors included Mayfield Fund, Blueprint Ventures, Norwest Venture Partners, Sienna Ventures, and Texas Pacific Group.
Starbucks, DT launch Wi-Fi network
Coffee monolith Starbucks has launched a wireless LAN service in its coffeehouses throughout the U.S. in
conjunction with wireless subsidiaries of Deutsche Telekom AG, T-Mobile Intl AG and VoiceStream Wireless, the
companies announced Wed. Starbucks customers in approximately 1,200 U.S. stores will be able to check e-mail, use the Internet, watch streaming video or download multimedia presentations for a fee over the wireless LAN service, which uses the Wi-Fi or IEEE 802.11b protocol. The Wi-Fi network will be backed by T-1 connections over T-Mobile's backbone.
"One of the things we found was that if you weren't running (Windows) XP, it took 14 steps to set up the devices,
and we said 'that's not good,'" said HP's president Michael Capellas during a press conference at a Starbucks shop in San Francisco. "We challenged our team to solve this problem." HP provided some technology consulting for setting up the networks and is hoping the deal will spark sales of its wireless-ready PCs & handheld devices. HP also announced Wed. that it has joined the Open Mobile Alliance (OMA) group of some 200 companies working to set standards for wireless communications.
… MobileStar's Wi-Fi network pulled the plug on its high-speed wireless network last Oct. The service would have cost users 20¢ per minute or $15.95 per month, while using MicroSoft software & services. About 350 Starbucks shops had been tied into the MobileStar
backbone about 4 months before the partnership was ended. The fee for using T-Mobile HotSpot service varies
between different plans: from $2.55 for a pay-as-you-go service to $29.99 per month for unlimited local use and
$49.99 per month for unlimited national use in the U.S.. Starbucks, T-Mobile and HP are also offering users a free
one-time 24-hour trial of the wireless broadband service.
"It's somewhat of a brand-building exercise for T-Mobile," said Seamus McAteer, principal analyst at Zelos Group in San Francisco. "All of a sudden, T-Mobile is in every Starbucks." McAteer expects close to 50,000 subscribers to sign up over the next 2 years. This number, however, probably would not cover the cost of setting up &
maintaining the wireless network, he said.
5.26.03 BBC SkyLinc's Libra (Low Cost Integrated Radio Access) system offers a solution to the age-old problem of how to get broadband out affordably to the whole of the UK. Just 18 base stations would provide total UK coverage, from densely populated towns to the remotest cottage in the Scottish Highlands.
The system works by floating a helium-filled envelope in the air, held stationary and fed signals via a fibre optic
pole, to offer net access at more than double the speed of most broadband services currently available w/ the same speeds in both directions. It would not slow down as more people use the service, the case with DSL. Problems such as bad weather conditions can be countered by an antenna stabilisation system which would make sure the antenna stays in place regardless of wind, rain or other conditions.
The technology has been around for years, w/ U.S. Govt operating several such aerostats as communication
systems on its borders and U.S. military employing similar technology for about 50 years. SkyLinc has been talking to a variety of internet service providers about introducing such a system and is hopeful that it will have commercial contracts in the next year. Initially the system is seen as most suitable for small businesses, and promises to be a tenth of the cost of leased lines which are often employed to provide high-speed access to firms.
Communities in remoter areas of the UK are already taking advantage of wireless technology and sharing out costs among themselves. Licenses for aerostats need to be obtained from the Aviation Authority; SkyLinc currently has 2 approved sites in Yorkshire. Cabinet Office's former director of e-commerce prof. Jim Norton said it could be between 5 & 10 years before such solutions become commercial reality. |
|
Bookmobile delivers wireless access Curbside Internet serves Texas patrons 12.31.02 Communications News
Finding Internet access at a public library is not unusual, but the staff of the Sterling Municipal Library in Baytown,
TX, had a broader vision in mind–curbside Internet access for patrons of their roving bookmobile.
The economics of the solution were important to Fischer & her staff, who were relying on a U.S. Dept of
Education grant for funding. They worked with consultants from NSync Services to explore a number of alternatives before settling on a high-speed 802.11b wireless solution from Avaya. The Avaya wireless solution offered a number of advantages. With an 11-Mbps transfer rate over an unlicensed 2.4-GHz spectrum, 802.11b offered Ethernet-equivalent performance, giving the library the speed & two-way connectivity it required without recurring monthly charges. Built-in encryption made the solution secure, eliminating the need for a VPN in this noncritical application. |
While the point-to-point topology required to connect the library to its bookmobile seemed simple, the trees that are a distinctive feature of Baytown presented a challenge, as did the low, 3 story profile of the library itself. Engineers from NSync Services found a solution in Baytown's 6 story San Jacinto Hospital, located only 100 ft from the library.
The hospital had a 60 ft permanent mast mounted atop the highest point on its roof, giving a clear view of the entire city. Engineers decided to use the hospital as a pivot point for relaying signals between the bookmobile & the library.
Avaya's omnidirectional outdoor antenna, installed atop the hospital's mast, was connected to its dual-slot AP1000 wireless access point, while the library received the company's 7-dbi outdoor antenna, Ethernet converter and router with a range of up to 5 mi.
Category 5 cable was used to connect the antenna to the library's LAN. A clear line of sight from the bookmobile to the antenna atop the hospital necessitated a heavy-duty, telescoping pneumatic mast on the bookmobile. Mounted on the back of the bookmobile and topped by 3 Avaya 12-dbi directional antennas & a one-watt amplifier, the mast extends from nine to 58 feet, easily clearing obstacles along the bookmobile route.
The company's Ethernet converter, wireless hub and PC cards provide connectivity for a desktop PC used by
bookmobile patrons to access the Internet, as well as a laptop PC used by the bookmobile staff to access the
library's network resources.
"Most of our bookmobile patrons are children," Fischer says. "With Internet access, we have a way to improve our homework assistance services and to help with basic computer skills. In addition, our librarians, for the first time, have access to our library network and to our Web-based circulation database from the bookmobile itself."
5.6.02 blurb Network World
New charges in Lowe's wi-fi hacks
Federal officials this week accused a third Michigan man of conspiring to steal credit card numbers from the Lowe's
chain of home improvement stores by taking advantage of an unsecured wi-fi network at store in suburban Detroit.
The new defendant, Brian Salcedo, 20, was named by the original suspects, Paul Timmins, 22, and Adam Botbyl,
20, in an FBI interview following their arrest, according to a govt affidavit filed in the case.
In 2000, as a juvenile, Salcedo was one of the first to be charged under Michigan's state computer crime law, for
allegedly hacking a local ISP. The disposition of the case not unknown.
6 months later, Botbyl allegedly admitted to agents, he & friend Salcedo hatched a plan to use the network to
steal credit card numbers from the hardware chain, and together they went to work from the parking lot of the
vulnerable store using Botbyl's Pontiac Grand Prix as an office, the affidavit says. According to the indictment, the
hackers used the wireless network to route through Lowe's corporate data center in North Carolina and connect to
the local networks at stores around the country.
Botbyl's confession was corroborated by Timmins, according to the FBI. The statements suggest that Timmins'
involvement was limited to providing the other two hackers with an 802.11b card, and having knowledge of what his
associates were up to. But all 3 men are charged in each count of the indictment.
Timmins works as a networking specialist for a Michigan software company; Botbyl is a student at the ITT
Technical Institute. The pair are known online as "noweb4u" and "itszer0" respectively, and are part of the Michigan
2600 hacker scene, an informal collection of technology aficionados.
To hell with proprietary encryption algorithms
I sat in the front seat of a Mustang convertible, ¹
²ª
³
next to the driver. In the back seat sat The Third Man, who was demonstrating how easy it is to break into a
wireless network using a laptop, Global Positioning System, wireless LAN card and free downloadable software.
We drove around Las Vegas the day before DefCon and found an endless supply of wireless networks. How do
you break in? Reboot your computer, the wireless access point sees you, Dynamic Host Configuration Protocol
assigns you an IP number, and you're a remote wireless node on the net. In only 2 cases did we find networks that use the Wired Equivalent Privacy (WEP) algorithm. WEP is fundamentally useless because the 26-bit algorithm can be routinely cracked in less than 4 hours, again using downloadable tools. Why anyone would use wireless nets is beyond me, esp. knowing that break & enter is as simple as firing up Windows from a car or the nearest McDonald's. complete article
3.5.02 Jim Geier Network World
Network managers are reluctant to update WEP keys because of the long, tedious process of going to each end user's device to make the changes. …
In response, companies such as Illuminet & TTS-Linx are developing public wireless LAN products that focus
on strong security mechanisms well beyond WEP. In addition, 802.11 working group Wireless Ethernet
Compatibility Alliance, Wireless ISP Roaming and vendors are aggressively developing solutions.
If authentication result is positive, the access point will enable other specific traffic (such as Dynamic Host
Configuration Protocol, Post Office Protocol 3 and Simple Mail Transfer Protocol) from the client to flow through the
access point to the protected side of the network. If the client logs off, the access point will disable the client's ports.
EAP alone doesn't define all the techniques for securing a wireless connection. Security also needs to implement
an "authentication type," such the Lightweight Extensible Authentication Protocol (LEAP) or EAP Transport Layer
Security (EAP-TLS). Both methods include mutual authentication between client & access point. LEAP
dynamically generates WEP keys within Cisco-based wireless LANs. EAP-TLS is an authentication type that
requires clients and access points to possess digital certificates, which enables the dynamic distribution of WEP
keys over a secure connection. Windows XP supports EAP-TLS for wireless network authentication. Most wireless
LAN vendors now support EAP-TLS as well.
An issue with these 802.1x products is that they still use WEP for encryption, which is based on relatively weak
keys. However, at least 802.1x changes the keys often enough to minimize problems. Administrators can set up
systems to change keys every hour, every 10 minutes or once each session.
2. Initialization vectors are short (24 bit). This causes the generated keystream to repeat, which allows for
easy encryption of data for a moderately sophisticated adversary.
3. 40 bit cryptographic keys are inadequate, allowing a brute-force attack.
4. Cryptographic keys are shared, making them easily compromised.
5. Cryptographic keys cannot be updated automatically & frequently.
6. The RC4 keystream is inappropriately used in the Wired Equivalent Privacy protocol, leaving it open to
an attack to recover the key.
7. Packet integrity is poor, making message modification possible.
8. No user authentication occurs; only the device is authenticated.
9. Only Service Set Identification occurs, this identity-based method is highly vulnerable in a wireless
system. 10. Device authentication is based on simple, one-way challenge response, subject to the "man-in-the- middle" attack.
802.1x authentication
1. Wireless client sends authentication request to either wireless access point or 802.1x enabled switch.
Update your NDIS drivers to make this happen properly.
2. Wireless access point or 802.1x-enabled switch repackages authentication request to send on to
RADIUS server. Make sure RADIUS server is compatible with your chosen EAP & 802.1x std as well as back-
end database.
3. RADIUS server examines request and may proxy the request to another server or consult an
authentication database directly.
4. If access is authenticated, RADIUS server informs wireless access point or 802.1x enabled switch. 5. Wireless access point or 802.1x-enabled switch informs client of access. Check that WEP has been activated at this point, because not all clients synchronize properly.
Wireless commerce obstacles not just technical
The NIMBY problem didn't start with the wireless Internet, and it won't stop there. But it plays a huge role in how
fast & effectively wireless communications will pervade e-commerce. In some areas it could be a key factor in
preventing wireless commerce from even being available. NIMBY ("not in my backyard") is a principle that's near
& dear to most pressure groups here in Washington, as well as in most state capitals & large cities. While
almost everyone wants instant, unfettered communications over fat pipes, many people want the associated
transmission towers to be located only on the moon, or at least in someone else's backyard where they're out of
sight but not out of range.
Unfortunately, the NIMBY problem isn't the only thing getting in the way of wireless communications. Security for
some wireless networks is a joke. Rumors from privacy advocates are that the FBI will focus its Carnivore filtering
software on wireless communications.
There are other challenges. Companies struggling to revise their business plans now that the New Economy has
gone south aren't inclined to plow a lot of money into wireless projects. On the service front, a lack of standards is
making it even harder for wireless communications to take hold in the U.S. To cap it all, your microwave oven can
bring down your whole network unless you keep your wireless access points far enough away from it.
In Washington, for example, Dist. of Columbia govt issued all of the necessary permits for the construction of a 700
ft transmission tower, mostly for digital e-commerce & tv, then changed its mind under public pressure though
the tower was nearly complete. While D.C.'s tower debacle isn't exactly the norm, wireless providers are finding
that they can't bank on things once considered firm, like building permits & govt approvals.
There's a problem of shared spectrum. The FCC routinely grants permission for wireless communications services to use
the same freq. ranges on a "not-to-interfere" basis, meaning that if a service interferes with another, the two have
to
work out the differences. Even when it works, the remedy can be expensive & time-consuming. So in many
cases, competing service providers resort to litigation or more FCC filings, meaning more money & time
wasted.
9.3.01 Oliver Rist Internet Week That's a lot of money for networks that basically offer the same amount of throughput as ISDN in a tightly enclosed geographic area. Throughput & reliability I get from my wired connections far exceeds what I can get from wireless. I'm fairly confident of CDMA's wireless throughput claims; some competitors, like GSM or GPRS, are making even higher claims that, as far as I can tell, have never been proved outside of a lab.
Wireless's real problem: security. Just this week, software called AirSnort hit the Internet. Utilizing nothing more
than a Linux system with an 802.11b wireless card installed, AirSnort specializes in breaking the WEP encryption
that protects an 802.11 network. Once inside, AirSnort offers convenient packet-reading features that let hackers
manage operations, such as password grabs, quickly & easily. Many people might say releasing AirSnort
publicly is a crime. But I disagree. The software was released mainly to let network security officers demonstrate
how insecure wireless networks really are before their senior managers make buying decisions. Given the hype
surrounding wireless right now, AirSnort is a good thing. Now wireless is trying to move into home markets. Even though HomeRF & Bluetooth are effectively dead on arrival, 802.11b is making inroads into your neighborhood, and vendors are pushing it merrily along. That's probably fine if you live alone in the boonies. But if you're living in a condo complex, even a cordless phone, which operates on the same frequency, could cause problems. It's fantastic technology. But instead of worrying only about throughput & deployment, maybe wireless vendors ought to first worry a little more about workable security, reliability and usability. |
12.17.01 Steve Janss Network World In 2001, several people wrote programs for hacking 802.11b's WEP, primarily by capitalizing on its improper use of RC4's initialization vectors. These days, any hacker or script kiddie can use one of several tools, such as WEPCrack or AirSnort, which yields WEP keys in fairly short order. For example, I cracked my 128-bit static-key WEP network in less than 18 hours. Nearly all 802.11b vendors offer 128-bit key extensions to WEP so most would implement the 128-bit version.
None of this really matters, as it's the WEP algorithm that's vulnerable. Once a hacker has the keys, it provides
access to the network. The hacker can then load the keys into any wireless sniffer, such as WildPacket's Airopeek or Sniffer Technologies Sniffer Wireless, and gain full access to broadcast data. Download the tools and test your own wireless LAN; just remember it's against federal wiretapping laws to view any data on someone else's network without permission.
Could this be the year you go wireless?
… Security is one sticking point that has kept some organizations from becoming wireless early adopters.
Since the ratification of 802.11a/b technology in 1999, wireless networks have been protected with WEP. However, it soon became apparent that the WEP standards were not secure enough for the comfort of many administrators. Because of WEP's short initialization vectors and static keys, connections protected by this kind of encryption are vulnerable to attack if hackers collect enough transmission information.
Fortunately, a new encryption standard is on the horizon. When IEEE ratifies 802.11i later this
year, these products will be protected by WPA, which is expected to wipe out the wireless vulnerabilities of old.
Securing the wireless LAN
Wireless LANs are too inexpensive to ignore, … start with Matthew Gast's 802.11 Wireless Networks: The
Definitive Guide. …
Third, arm yourself. Wireless tools like Airmagnet are fabulous for enterprise network managers. If you only have a few access points to
worry about, a laptop or PocketPC with some public domain tools such as NetStumbler is a fine start. Without at least some tools, you're completely in the dark about
the 2.4-GHz aura beginning to surround your network.
Down & dirty with WLAN security
Choices for 802.1x supplicant software are limited. If you've made the jump to Windows XP or the .Net version of
Windows CE, it's built-in. Microsoft only supports 802.1x EAP in XP and you have to use Microsoft digital certificates for authentication.
Authentication is handled by an authentication server, normally a RADIUS server that has been extended to
support the Extensible Authentication Protocol (EAP). Technically,
it doesn't have to be a RADIUS server and even can be built in to the wireless access point on the low end. But any
enterprise sized wireless deployment is going to have a RADIUS server as part of the picture because it centralizes
authentication and scales well. RADIUS servers vary in 3 major areas: operating system support, EAP
authentication method support and back-end user database support. No server supported every possible
combination out of the box.
Although EAP has more than a dozen authentication methods defined, only 4 are commonly used: Message Digest
5 (MD5), a one-way authentication of supplicant to network using passwords; Transport Layer Security, which uses
PKI-issued digital certificates for strong mutual authentication; and Tunneled TLS (TTLS), which combines
network-
based certificates with other authentication such as tokens or passwords, and Cisco LEAP.
Unfortunately, selecting anything stronger than MD5 means you need some sort of PKI in place to issue
certificates. In the iLabs, we jumped this hurdle by using built-in Windows 2000 Server certification authority.
TLS authentication uses digital certificates on both the authentication server & supplicant sides. TLS is
essentially the same protocol used in Web servers for "https:" URLs, also commonly used in secure Simple Mail
Transfer Protocol, Post Office Protocol and Internet Message Access Protocol services. If you've already bought
into a PKI solution, TLS authentication in 802.1x is a great option.
If you don't want to issue certificates to all your wireless users, you have to move onto TTLS authentication.
With TTLS, it's easy to give certificates to your authentication servers, because you have so few of them. So you
use those certificates for one-way TLS authentication (network to user), and once you have a safe, encrypted and
integrity-checked channel, EAP inside of the TLS tunnel is used for any other authentication, such as a token or
even username/password pairs. TTLS offers strong mutual authentication without having to distribute &
manage certificates for all your users.
As an interim measure, Cisco created a nonstandard 802.1x authentication called Lightweight EAP (LEAP) built
into Cisco's wireless drivers that run on its Aironet adapters and built in to its access points, available on most
Windows platforms, Macintosh & Linux. While Cisco's LEAP doesn't offer the strongest security, it does
service the most platforms, as long as you buy Cisco Aironet cards for your laptops & desktops. Cisco's
Secure Access Control Server proprietary EAP extensions only work with the Cisco WLAN equipt
When selecting a wireless access point, make sure it supports not only 802.1x but also the authentication method
(MD5, TLS, TTLS, etc.) you selected. The only interoperability issue is in WEP key establishment. When a wireless
supplicant authenticates using a strong authentication method such as TLS or TTLS, the wireless access point is
able to create a unique session key for use with WEP with that client. This dramatically increases total security of
WEP and makes it acceptable as an encryption protocol in a much wider range of network environments.
8.30.02 Jim Wagner internetnetnews.com
According to HCS Systems security consultant Mark Coley, most IT departments don't have the money or
inclination to fix their wireless vulnerabilities. "There's an increasing amount of apathy when it comes to wireless
security," he said. "In many cases, you'll see networks where they've put the access point inside the firewall and
mistakenly place them on workstation subnets where DHCP from the servers is available. My advice is to place
them outside the firewall and treat them as external interfaces."
Legalities behind wardriving & packet-sniffing are still being hammered out at the federal level … FCC
doesn't have much to say in the matter, minus a legislative mandate, outside its existing Part 15 rules, which
govern the use of APs & other wireless equipt. The rule is used to prevent 2.4 GHz operators from interfering
with licensed spectrum owners.
The FBI is in similar straits. According to Coley, "sniffing" out wireless networks isn't illegal, and to a large extent
neither is connecting with the AP, even if it's being used to access the Internet for free. There is a case, he said, in
Texas to change that rule; a man is being tried for wire-tapping fraud for associating his laptop with an open
wireless network.
Not everyone is convinced WiFi is such a serious threat. Equipt manufacturer Alvarion asst mktg vp Chris Rangel
said wireless break-ins are happening in controlled environments, not in the real world. "I'm not trying to minimize
the vulnerability, it is there, but this wide-range breaking into just doesn't happen," he said. "I think that in terms of
actual break-ins, this has been much more of a media event.
"If someone's really going to go after you, those things aren't going to stop them," he said. "It's like locking your
door; it's only going to keep the halfway-honest people from coming in. He agrees with Coley's assessment,
however, on improperly configured wireless equipt on the corporate network. Many companies, he said, don't even
enable WEP security on their APs, as well as leaving the default service set identifiers (SSIDs) password on the
machine. SSIDs are used to differentiate WLAN environments. "It's quite easy to go out with a default PC card and
get on a network, because no one's changed the defaults," he said. N.Carolina's Public Instruction Dept sr network admin Steve McCuchin, overseeing security of 2,400 K-12 schools, said securing wireless networks can be easily solved, even without funding & training. "Change the passwords; don't broadcast your AP's make & model number. That just gives hackers a launching ground to see where to get around the security," he said. "Take a laptop outside, see how far your network extends, and turn the power down if its going too far."
7.26.02 John Leyden Register UK Puffer, who was employed briefly by the county's technology department in 1999, could get 5 years in jail and faces a $250,000 fine on each count if convicted, the Houston Chronicle reports. He's accused of accessing the system March 8 in an alleged intrusion that cost the county a reported $5,000 to clean up. Dist. Clerk Charles Bacarisse told the paper that no confidential information was disclosed but the alleged intrusion eventually resulted in the county closing its wireless LAN only a month after it was activated. But is the prosecution a case of shooting the messenger? On March 18, Puffer demonstrated to a county official and a Chronicle reporter how easy it was to gain access to the court's system using only a laptop computer and a wireless LAN card. Puffer first noticed the problem while scanning for insecure 802.11 networks throughout Houston earlier that month, around the time that the alleged offence took place.
7.25.02 Michael Sutton ZDNet
Concept of downstream liability is being tested in Scottish courts. Scottish Internet service provider
FirstNet Online Management sued Nike last year after hackers redirected Nike's Web site traffic to the
protest Internet site s11.org, resulting in a temporary service disruption for some of FirstNet's clients.
FirstNet blamed Nike's poor security for the incident. Further underscoring just how seriously corporations
consider these risks, insurance companies now offer protection from downstream liability lawsuits. The Wi-Fi encryption scheme can be cracked, and unencrypted networks can easily be identified during "war driving" expeditions. However, the weakest link in Wi-Fi networks continues to be the human factor. If the objective is to locate an insecure network to launch an attack from, a hacker is likely to ignore networks with basic security controls and search for "out of the box" implementations. Corporations will find it hard to argue against negligence when even the most basic security controls were not implemented. |
8.19.02 Ellen Messmer Network World
Sources say U.S. Defense Dept is also considering restrictions on wireless LAN use for classified &
nonclassified environments. "We don't use them yet because we've heard the bugs aren't out of them and we don't
want to be the guinea pigs," says L.A. retailer Carpetland CFO Alan Comins .
"Our IT consultant told us not to use them," he adds.
Among NIST's recommendations is that wireless LAN access points be located only where no unauthorized
individuals can access them. With freeware such as AirSnort, hackers access wireless LAN access points from up to 1,000 ft away. NIST also suggests
that agencies put firewalls between wireless & wire-based LANs. Another 50 or so recommendations will be
included in the report, called "Wireless Network Security."
The NIST report arrives at a time when the IEEE is attempting to standardize on port authentication in 802.11
wireless LANs. But it's critical to move ahead on 802.1X because the 802.11b specification, as the NIST report points out, lacks any "true authentication" of users. Only a user's wireless LAN-enabled device is authenticated via what's called the Service Set Identification (SSID). The NIST report suggests that wireless LANs should include VPN clients & gateways for privacy & authentication. Wired Equivalent Privacy (WEP), the 802.11 standard for encryption, has been shown to be too easily broken using freeware such as WEPCrack. |
Govt contractor Science Applications International Corp. (SAIC) is experimenting with a "honeypot" to detect & trap hackers trying to break into wireless LANs from a distance (sometimes referred to as "wardriving"). The goal is to gather information about how hackers get in. While SAIC officials declined to discuss the project in depth, it is known to be based on Cisco wireless LAN access points deployed in the Wash. D.C. area.
barcode dogtags, LAN authorized triggers 6.3.02 John Cox Network World
The U.S. Marines are famous for bringing everything they need with them to a hostile beach. Now they've begun
bringing their networks, too. Wireless LANs & rugged handheld computers are starting to make it easier for
the
Marines to track everything from office furniture & multifuel survival stoves, to machine guns & armored
amphibious landing craft. The Marines have deployed a little more than 2,000 Spectrum24 wireless LAN access
points & ruggedized handheld computers with built-in bar-code scanners, all from Symbol Technologies, as
part of the Automatic Identification Technology (AIT) project.
Another benefit is making these equipt checks much faster. "We haven't done any formal studies, but we know it's
saving time," Clement says. The project office has created a system that packs into a padded metal suitcase and
can be lugged anywhere. Currently the wireless LAN is 802.11, which uses the older 2.4-GHz frequency hopping
radio, with a data rate of 2M bit/sec. At the time of the competitive bid for AIT, 11M bit/sec 802.11b products were
not available. The Marines are looking ahead to upgrading to 802.11b because that is now a widely deployed
industry standard.
For now, the system is not intended to be used on battlefields because inventory control under fire is not a top
priority. But Clement says he expects the systems will move closer to the sound of gunfire over time. Using the
handhelds, Marines can move quickly around sprawling warehouses, supply depots, docks and ships, accurately
scanning the bar codes on every piece of equipt, cargo container or vehicle. Increasingly, these tags are so-
called 2D bar codes, which can store more than a thousand characters of data, compared with just 20 in
supermarket bar codes, Clement says. As a result, the 2D tags can identify when, and from where, an item was
shipped or even who last used it. In the future, the wireless AIT system will be used for manifesting the troops themselves: Tags will include identification numbers, blood type and other personnel data, and let the Marines keep track of who gets on and off helicopters and landing craft. For now, Clement says, AIT is focused on what he calls the "three E's." "We're trying to make this efficient, effective and easy to use," he says. |
Wi-Fi industry may face setback 12.17.02 Kenneth Li The Street.com
Defense officials reportedly are seeking to place restrictions on the Wi-Fi industry, due to possible interference
between wireless signals & military radar. Wi-Fi lets home users connect a range of devices without cords to
the Internet and is one of few potential growth spots in otherwise depressed semiconductor & communications
equipt industry.
Defense officials reportedly are looking to curtail Wi-Fi technology, saying in-home wireless transmitters may
interfere with wireless signals employed by military radar, hence undermining national security, according to a
report in NY Times. Fearing the potential long-term impact of such a move, technology companies including
Microsoft & Intel met with Defense Dept officials last week to discuss the problem, according to the Times
report.
FCC & Defense Dept official didn't return calls seeking comment. Last week, FCC chair Michael Powell, and National Telecommunications & Information Assn administrator
Nancy Victory met to coordinate efforts to discuss spectrum-conflict issues among wireless concerns.
3.18.02 Tom Smith Internet Week "There's basically a warehouse on the battlefield, and that's where certain supplies are stored," said Fort Belvoir, VA Army's Program Executive Office for Enterprise Information Systems (PEO EIS) CIO Pete Johnson. "If a unit orders supplies that aren't locally stored, they're shipped to the local warehouse."
Developed internally by the Army, the relevant IT systems with which wireless LANs will communicate control
warehouses & inventory, such as helicopter & airplane parts for aviation units. Those systems have
connectivity back to central Army systems, which in turn have connections to Army suppliers, such as those that
make or distribute spare parts. The Army's internally developed supply chain systems apply the Army's business
rules related to maintenance, such as keeping up-to-date information on the combat readiness of a vehicle. "If you
pull a tank from an engine, it's no longer battle-ready, so readiness data is compiled then sent back up to the
national level so the Army as a whole can see the status of assets," Johnson said.
That prompted the Army to issue a wireless LAN policy stating it was not permitted to use 802.11 natively, or
without additional encryption safeguards, and that whatever supplemental encryption was used must satisfy
Federal Information Processing Standards (FIPS) requirements. That requirement, in turn, prompted PEO EIS to
begin investigating products that would supply additional encryption. It chose Fortress Technologies products. Fortress is currently working
on FIPS certification for its AirFortress product, but it has other products that have already achieved FIPS
certification, Johnson said, which gave him confidence co. products would meet federal govt security standards.
The Army's introduction of new WLAN security requirements delayed the rollout of some WLAN equipt. Johnson
said PEO EIS had planned to double its WLAN systems to 4,000 this year, but has had to delay 2,000 new
purchases in order to buy the AirFortress security system. He declined to cite the Army's overall investment in the
wireless & security technology. AirFortress gateways start at $1,995. Once it's operational, the plan beginning
CAISI wireless deployment in the next 60 days at the Fort Bragg, N.C., Army base, Johnson said he expects PEO
EIS will use triple DES encryption on the AirFortress product, with 168-bit keys. AirFortress offers multiple
encryption options. That encryption will supplement the encryption that's available in the wireless LAN radios. |
|
Pentagon reconstruction testing wearable PCs 8.29.02 Roy Mark internetnews.com
Defense Dept is evaluating Xybernaut's wearable computers configured with Protolex field force automation tools
during the reconstruction of the Pentagon. Mobile/wearable computing solution, incl inspection, maintenance,
quality assurance and project management capabilities, was developed by the Lanham, MD based Protolex for use
by site supervisors.
Protolex software offers wireless, voice navigation & data entry for site supervisors to manage the scheduling
& performance of the many subcontractors involved in repairing the Pentagon. Currently, 30 different sub-
contractor organizations are involved.
Schematic diagrams & technical specs can be viewed on the FPD in dark settings or in full sunlight.
Additionally, OSHA workplace safety regulations can be downloaded onto the wearable computers for easy access
& insertion into the report forms during inspections.
Before work crews arrive on-site at 7 a.m., supervisors will have used the wearable computer to prepare a daily
summary of items needing attention. At that time, the supervisors will also have prioritized work orders delegating
action-item responsibility to the various sub-contractors. |
Institute of Electrical & Electronic Engineers is standards body ratifying 802.11 specification. Ex. Task Group B
was responsible for 802.11b. Additions & revisions incl:
|
802.11 original WLAN standard, finalized June 1997, and ratified by IEEE. Specified 2.4 GHz
operating freq. w/ data rates of 1 Mbps & 2 Mbps.
802.11a high-speed WLAN standard for the 5 GHz band. Specifies 8 available radio channels,
uses Orthogonal Frequency Division Multiplexing (OFDM) and supports data rates up to 54 Mbps
802.11b WLAN standard for 2.4 GHz band, 802.11b uses High Rate DSSS and supports data
rates of up to 11 Mbps. It specifies 3 available radio channels. Most wireless LAN installations today comply with
802.11b, which is also the basis for Wi-Fi certification from the Wireless Ethernet Compatibility Alliance
(WECA).
802.11c Provides required information to ensure proper bridge operations. Product developers
utilize this standard when developing access points.
802.11d Specification supplementary to Media Access Control (MAC) layer in 802.11. Allows
access points to communicate information on the permissible radio channels with acceptable power levels for user
devices. The 802.11 standards cannot legally operate in some countries; its purpose is to add features &
restrictions to allow WLANs to operate within the rules of these countries.
802.11e 802.11e task group is currently refining the 802.11 MAC layer to improve quality of
service for better support of audio & video applications, such as MPEG-2.
802.11f 802.11 standard does not currently specify the communications between access points
from different vendors. This specification, still in development, defines inter-access-point communications to
facilitate multiple vendor-distributed WLAN networks.
802.11g This specification will allow for higher-speed extensions in the 2.4 GHz band, up to 54
Mbps, while implementing all mandatory elements of 802.11b. It also uses OFDM instead of DSSS as the basis for
providing the higher data rate extensions.
802.11h This specification defines the spectrum management of the 5 GHz band for use in
Europe & in APAC. It provides dynamic channel selection (DCS) and transmits power control (TPC) for
devices operating in the 5 GHz band (802.11a). 802.11h is enabling sales of 802.11a networks in Europe. 802.11i This is specification that seeks to address weaknesses in the Wired Equivalent Privacy (WEP) encryption protocol. 802.11i is actively defining enhancements to the MAC Layer to counter problems. 802.11i will incorporate 802.1x and stronger encryption techniques, such as Advanced Encryption Standard (AES). |
Feb. 2002 Network Magazine
|
|
T-Mobile phones to ride wireless router 7.27.07 Peter Svensson AP
NYC Your own cellular tower at home would always have a strong signal on your mobile phone, and you wouldn't be paying to use the carrier's network. That's the gist of what T-Mobile USA is rolling out Wednesday: the option to use your Wi-Fi router instead of the cellular network on two new T-Mobile phones.
This isn't like having a cell phone that also happens to work as a cordless phone. You have the same number, whether you're on Wi-Fi or cellular. In an engineering feat, the new phones will hand over calls that are already in progress from Wi-Fi to the cellular network if you leave the hotspot, so you can start a call at home and then keep talking as you walk out.
T-Mobile's phones also automatically connect to the company's 8,500 commercial hotspots in the U.S., including many Starbucks locations. The technology behind the service is known as UMA, or Unlicensed Mobile Access, and has broad support among cell-phone manufacturers, so we can expect to see more of it. European carriers are already using it. T-Mobile is the first major U.S. carrier to get on board, after trying it out in the Seattle area since October. Cincinnati Bell launched a similar service last month.
I tested the cellular-to-Wi-Fi handover a dozen times, and now and then noticed a momentary audio drop-off. One call was apparently dropped at handover, but it seems acceptable to have that happen occasionally. There was no noticeable difference in sound quality between the two wireless technologies, an impressive result considering the often spotty audio yielded by other services that use broadband connections for phone calls.
The new phones, the Nokia 6086 and Samsung t409, cost $50 with a two-year contract and a calling plan that costs at least $40 month (but remember that taxes and other fees bring the actual cost closer to $50). They're unremarkable camera phones. I tested the Nokia, which was solid, but has rather poor audio quality overall.
The phones will connect to any Wi-Fi router, but for your home, T-Mobile recommends either of two routers it's providing for free, after a $50 rebate. The one I tested was a modification of the Linksys WRT54G. That's a popular model, but setup was a hassle, as it usually is for routers, with a misleading manual and installation software that didn't work.
- It has a button that will allow the phone to connect to an encrypted router without typing in the Wi-Fi password. This is a great feature. Strangely, I couldn't find any documentation, and had to call the company to learn how to use it, but T-Mobile will no doubt straighten this out and update its manual.
- It quadruples the phone's battery life. I wasn't able to stringently test this claim, but it's clear that even without the T-Mobile router, the Nokia phone did quite well. Wi-Fi is much more power-intensive than cellular, and I've tested phones before that used only Wi-Fi and generally went dead after 24 hours on standby. The Nokia phone ran for about two days in mixed cellular and Wi-Fi use with my own router, and three days with the T-Mobile router.
T-Mobile says the phone has up to a week of standby time on cellular, and up to three days on Wi-Fi. At the promotional price of $10 a month for a single line, I think this is a reasonable value if your home coverage is spotty. T-Mobile, a rather distant fourth in wireless subscriber numbers in the U.S., doesn't have the most extensive network.
The regular price of $20 a month seems high, especially since you'd be paying T-Mobile to use your own broadband connection for calling, taking the load off T-Mobile's cellular network. If you already have enough minutes on your cellular plan, what you can do is this: Buy one of the UMA phones, but don't sign up for the monthly Wi-Fi add-on.
UMA could be a real money saver if T-Mobile would combine free Wi-Fi calling with prepaid cellular - the company has cheap rates for low-volume callers. |
Emerging technology: wireless LAN standards excerpt 2.6.02 Andy Dornan Network Magazine
In the telecom world, wireless is almost synonymous with hype. From Bluetooth to third-generation (3G), no new
technology has performed as promised. Everything is either slower than anticipated or late to arrive, or both.
The number of IEEE 802.11b users grew from almost zero in early 2001 to more than 15 million at the end. That
still isn't much compared to cell phones & wired Ethernet, but growth will likely continue. It isn't clear which, if
any, of these network managers should choose. Higher data rates come at the expense of compatibility, and all
types of 802.11 still have serious weaknesses, most notably security
Letters after number "802.11" tell the order in which the standards were first proposed. 802.11b was ready first
because it was based on relatively simple technology, Direct Sequence Spread Spectrum (DSSS), as opposed to
802.11a's Orthogonal Frequency Division Multiplexing (OFDM). More complex technology provides a higher data
rate.
To reduce errors, both types of 802.11 automatically reduce the Physical layer data rate. IEEE 802.11b has 3 lower
data rates (5.5, 2, and 1Mbit/sec), and 802.11a has 7 (48, 36, 24, 18, 12, 9, and 6Mbits/sec). The lower rates are
used most of the time. Maximum is only available in an interference-free environment, and over a very short
range.
Precise number of channels varies by country because each regulator allocates different amount of spectrum for
unlicensed use. There are always more channels at 5GHz band. In U.S., 2.4GHz band is wide enough for only 3,
whereas 5GHz has room for 11. The first 802.11a cards to ship support only 8 of these, but it's still enough for most
purposes.
Thousands of companies sell 802.11b equipt, nearly all based on chips & reference designs from only 2
vendors. Whoever's design is accepted as a standard is almost guaranteed a large market share among the OEMs.
Largest 802.11b chipmaker is currently Intersil, which
proposed using OFDM in 2.4GHz band. Texas Instruments,
which aspires to make 802.11 chips, instead wanted its own enhanced version of DSSS. The final draft of the
standard is a compromise, including both.
Wireless LAN range is also hotly debated. Most 802.11b networks officially reach up to 100 meters (m), 330 ft, but
this is only a rough guide: A higher power transmitter can extend the reach, while interference & signal
blocking reduce it. Range reduction scenarios are more commonly encountered: Since wireless LANs are usually
used inside, safety rules limit a transmission's power, and walls or other objects interfere.
According to Atheros' tests, 802.11a provides a higher data rate than 802.11b at every measured distance when
used in a typical office environment. The explanation is that 5GHz technologies use OFDM, which is designed to be
resistant to multipath effects. The benefits of OFDM and the drawbacks of higher frequencies cancel each other
out, making the range of 802.11a & 802.11b approximately the same. Coverage area depends on the range squared, so 802.11g could cover the same area as the other systems with fewer than half as many access points. Though Intersil and its other backers are currently focusing on backward- compatibility, 802.11g's range could be its greatest selling point in the long-term. |
Crowded areas such as conference centers & airports need the highest density of coverage they can get, and
will eventually move to 802.11a. Large installed base means that they're likely to stick with 802.11b. IEEE 802.11g
is compatible with this installed base, but it probably won't be available before dual-mode 802.11a and 802.11b
systems.
Other problem with longer range is that the signal is more likely to "leak." If you haven't set up a secure system,
intruders can crack into your network from further away. If you have, it means that you're jamming somebody else's
airwaves. Both are issues in skyscraper office buildings that house several companies.
This spreading can be overcome by using access points with directional antennae, which focus their transmission
and reception on a specific area. The most common types radiate in an arc rather than a full sphere: They can
attach to a wall and only provide coverage on one side of it. More complex antennae are available that can adjust
to cover different shaped regions, but these usually require trained radio engineers to set up.
Directional antennae are frequency-specific, which could lead some users to choose 802.11g over 802.11a: The
former is based on the same frequency as 802.11b, and hence could re-use the same antenna; the latter would
need a new one. A dual-mode 802.11a/b access point requires 2 separate antennae. This applies to regular (omni-
directional) antennae too, but these are cheap to mass-produce: There's one built into every interface card, and
vendors don't see any problem in miniaturizing them enough to produce dual-mode cards.
For users who don't need a directional antenna, upgrading from 802.11b to 802.11a shouldn't be a problem. Some
vendors already sell "flexible" access points that are really just small chassis that link 2 or more CardBus slots to an
Ethernet cable. The slots can be used for any combination of 802.11 types, allowing the access point to be
upgraded using the same cards as laptops. Cards generally support only one radio channel at a time, so several
cards of the same type can be used to set up a switched network.
802.11b is clearly the most popular wireless LAN standard; neither of its successors are guaranteed the same
acceptance. All share the same poor security and no support for QoS. IEEE is working on many new standards to
fix weaknesses, but many users need security now. This prompted vendors & governts to step in with their
own solutions.
All 802.11b products currently incorporate a system called Wired Equivalent Privacy (WEP), which encrypts all
transmissions using 40-bit keys. However, most networks don't use it, as it's switched off by default out of a naive
belief that ease-of-use is more important than security. Even if they do use it, it's still easy to break into. Every user
has the same key, meaning that the entire network is compromised if one laptop is stolen. It's also vulnerable to a
fairly simple attack, which hackers have conveniently packaged into a freely downloadable program called
Airsnort.
Some newer products incorporate a system known informally as WEP2. IEEE recently renamed it Temporal Key
Integrity Protocol (TKIP), in an attempt to disguise its ancestry. It uses 128-bit keys but is fully backward-compatible
with WEP, and thus vulnerable to the same attacks. According to Microsoft engineer Bernard Aboba who chairs
IETF's Authentication, Authorization, and Accounting working group, TKIP may even be more vulnerable because it
adds support for Kerberos passwords, which can often be guessed through a simple dictionary attack.
Many vendors are promoting an emerging standard called 802.1x as a solution. However, this only covers
authentication, not full security, and it isn't yet complete. "We support it, but we don't recommend it because it does
have holes," says Intel's Cox. He recommends protecting all access points with a firewall, and running all traffic
through the same type of VPN used for remote access over the Internet.
HomeRF2 is another wireless LAN standard that's already made it into shipping products. As the name suggests,
this was intended as cheap & simple standard for home networking, but unfortunately it's turned out to be
neither. Thanks to the success of 802.11b, HomeRF2 products often cost more than those based on the more
popular standard, though they do include both QoS and a better encryption system than WEP. Ironically, this could
make them a good choice for enterprises that don't want their wireless traffic easily readable by the outside
world.
European regulators are so dissatisfied with 802.11 that they aren't permitting 802.11a to be used at all. Instead,
they've reserved their 5GHz band for HiperLAN2, a system developed by the European Telecommunication
Standards Institute (ETSI), the same group behind most cell phone standards. HiperLAN2 is almost identical to
802.11a at the Physical layer; it uses OFDM, and even has the same data rates. But higher up the protocol stack,
it's closer to ATM than to Ethernet.
Some people prefer the name "hype LAN" because it's been talked about for so long without any real deployment.
This criticism certainly fits the original standard (HiperLAN1), first set back in 1992 but never actually adopted by
any equipt manufacturers. However, HiperLAN2 is real. European & Japanese vendors are working on it, with
the first products expected to ship within 2003.
NTT DoCoMo already built a dual-mode system that
combines HiperLAN2 with cordless phone; it can even use the 2 simultaneously. The advantage here isn't
backward-compatibility or even extra bandwidth: The phone has a maximum data rate of about 32Kbits/sec, which
doesn't add significantly to HiperLAN2's 54Mbits/sec. Rather, it's that the Japanese cordless phone standard uses
very low transmission power, which prolongs battery life. A Web surfer can set up an asymmetric link that receives
multimedia content via the LAN (reception requires less power than transmission) and sends mouse clicks back
through the phone.
Ericsson is the only other vendor to have demonstrated a
HiperLAN2 prototype in public. Like DoCoMo, Ericsson is more well-known for cellular networks than wireless
LANs, which should give us some hints about HiperLAN's true intent. Despite the name, it's not really a LAN
protocol at all: It's designed for broadband mobile data services, and could form the foundation of fourth-generation
(4G) cellular networks.
HiperLAN's detractors sometimes claim that this emphasis on services means it will require an access point. This
isn't true, though many service providers probably wish that it was. It is correct to say that HiperLAN can't operate
as a true peer-to-peer system: Any network that enforces QoS needs one node to take charge and act as air traffic
controller. However, this "master" node doesn't necessarily have to be mounted on a wall or connected to a
wire.
Bluetooth & HomeRF both include QoS for ad-hoc networks between mobile devices, with nodes
automatically falling into master & slave roles according to predefined criteria. There's no reason HiperLAN2
can't do the same.
Critics of HiperLAN also claim that the technology is being boosted artificially by European regulators' insistence on
it rather than 802.11a. While this is true, the regulators appear to be motivated less by protectionism and more by a
desire to see a system that can use 4G services. Even the HiperLAN2 forum says that it doesn't object to 802.11a,
provided that the standard can meet its requirements for QoS, power control, and security.
There's also a joint venture between ETSI & IEEE called the 5GHz Partnership Project (5GPP), which aims to
merge 802.11a and HiperLAN2 into a single standard, tentatively known as the 5GHz Unified Protocol (5-UP). By
tying 2 or 3 channels together, this standard would offer even higher data rates than the existing systems. 3
channels will provide a real throughput of about 100Mbits/sec, more than most laptop PCs can handle.
These new systems should begin to appear in 2003. With high data rates, guaranteed QoS, and airtight security,
they could pose a real challenge both to 3G & wired networks.
3.18.04 AP
Hannover, Germany Increasing complexity & stronger security is making it harder for new
wireless computer networking products to hook up with each other, an industry group promoting the technology
said Thursday at the CeBIT tech fair.
The group certifies Wi-Fi equipt in an attempt to help the technology grow, by sparing consumers hair-pulling
experiences as they try to use Wi-Fi-enabled laptops or handheld computers. The Wi-Fi Alliance has certified 1,100 devices since 2000.
Faster wi-fi hits hurdles
New devices for improved technology lack a unifying standard
Today's wireless networks struggle with some jobs, such as sending high-definition video signals from a personal computer to a television set. Companies have been racing for years to fix the problem. But they can't agree on whether the race is over.
Among the results: The new devices often can't communicate with one another at their intended top speeds.
The situation underscores a recurring conflict with technological innovation: Companies want to beat rivals to market, but most also want to achieve standardization, which helps products work together, spurs further technology improvements and drives prices down.
The 802.11n products are based partly on a technology called MIMO, for multiple input, multiple output, pioneered by chip maker Airgo Networks Inc. which has sold proprietary chips based on the concept. The new gear boosts the theoretical top speed of Wi-Fi networks to 270 megabits per second from 54 megabits, though hardware makers say speeds are likely to average around 100 megabits to 150 megabits per second.
After lengthy delays, and the formation of a short-lived splinter group led by chip makers Intel Corp., Broadcom Corp., Marvell Technology Group Ltd. and Atheros Communications Inc., IEEE published a draft standard. Now Broadcom, Marvell and Atheros are using the tentative IEEE guidelines in so-called DraftN networking chips. "We feel very good about where we are," said Broadcom sr vp Bob Rango.
Meanwhile, the proposed IEEE standard hasn't been able to command enough votes to be finalized. Opponents such as Airgo note that the IEEE has received some 12,000 comments about the draft technology, and some predict existing chips may have to be changed to accommodate technology improvements.
The other problem is trying to get the competing DraftN products to exchange data at top speed. Until the Wi-Fi Alliance uses a final standard to develop compatibility tests, makers of competing products must do informal tests and exchange information they might tend to keep secret.
It will take some time for users to see networking devices based on those chips that are completely compatible, he said. Sellers of DraftN products insist that other bugs eventually will be worked out. While Airgo's proprietary technology has fans, some add there is no substitute for a technology that has the backing of multiple vendors.
Mobile apps need simplifying
¹
It's probably fine if a user subscribes to one wireless network with Internet services, uses its handheld device for
access and only wants to view the limited number of accessible sites. But in order to accommodate the rising tide
of handheld users & their potential online spending, one vendor is encouraging site operators to strip out the
complex elements being served up to tethered users. Making that adjustment is not exactly a cheap
proposition.
IDC estimates the number of wireless Web subscribers will skyrocket to more than 29 million in 2004. The value of
their transactions is estimated at nearly $21 billion in that same time frame. In the next year, employment company
Kelly Services will concentrate on making its site more accessible to those seeking information via handheld
devices. "We need to get people's eyes on our jobs," said Kelly Services digital marketing dir. David Fenech. "One
of our main initiatives is recruiting workers, so we have to stand out in all the channels people use to find jobs. That
includes wireless." Unfortunately, for most U.S. companies, making the transition from rich content to basic information is not a simple process, according to Mueller. He explained that companies will have to go back through the content on their sites and put information in hierarchical order. Another challenge is the lack of standardization. "Even though we have behemoth service providers like AT&T, Verizon and Qualcomm, there aren't any standards," Mueller said. Programs will need to be written to implement WAP more widely.
4.15.02 Ellen Messmer Network World Vers. 1.0 pkg costs $2,500 incl client authentication software for Windows-based PCs or laptops running XP, 2000, 98 or Millennium Edition and second Odyssey Server component that runs on Win 2000 or XP. Odyssey server typically housed on an Ethernet LAN compels each user with a wireless device to prove identity through a password or other means defined by the challenge-response mechanism in the IEEE security standard 802.1x. "IEEE 802.1x requires mutual authentication between client & server for 802.11 a, b, and g," says Funk vp Joe Ryan. "Wireless LAN adapter cards had to be updated for it, and many major vendors have now done that, such as Avaya, Cisco, Agere and 3Com."
Funk for a decade marketed Steel-Belted Radius authentication servers for large companies & ISPs. The co.
introduced its first wireless LAN authentication server aimed at small to midsize organizations, Odyssey, which
uses Remote Authentication Dial-In User Service authentication protocol for transferring authentication requests
between other back-end servers, such as those used for hardware-based token authentication where specialized
servers perform a user look-up & approval process then transfer authentication information back through
RADIUS.
Funk's Odyssey competes against Cisco's Secure Access Control Server, except that Cisco supports proprietary
extensions to the Extensible Authentication Protocol which results in the Cisco ACS only working with the
Cisco wireless LAN equipt.
"To begin with, Microsoft only supports 802.1x EAP in XP and you have to use Microsoft digital
certificates for authentication," Ryan says. Some organizations might prefer passwords to certificates. And
they also might want to extend wireless LAN authentication to users of older versions of Windows without 802.1x
embedded in the software. For that reason, Funk is offering 802.1x client software, which doesn't require
certificates, for XP, Win 2000, 98, Millennium Edition, and later in the year, CE.
7.15.02 Brian Morrissey 80211-planet.com "Wireless networking gives organizations a reliable way to link an increasingly mobile and dynamic workforce," said 3Com's LAN Infrastructure Div. vp & GM Patrick Guay. "3Com Wireless LAN Building-to-Building Bridge can now link multiple buildings in a campus over a greater distance, and in a simpler way, while taking advantage of powerful features including security and network management enhancements." Excluding access points & cables, the bridge will cost $990 when available worldwide early August. 3Com said bridging technology compatible with any access point given Wireless Ethernet Compatibility Alliance seal of approval. It will support both 40-bit & 128-bit Wired Equivalent Privacy protocol, in addition to the ability to fold it into a Virtual Private Network. |
4.15.02 Ephraim Schwartz Infoworld
Fusion Lighting uses standard magnetron, kind used in millions of microwave ovens, to focus energy on a
quartz sphere the size of a golf ball filled with inert krypton or argon gas and sulfur. The microwave energy focused
on the bulb excites the gas and transforms it into plasma to create extremely efficient light, full-spectrum,
nearly
identical to sunlight at 75% less cost than running fluorescent lighting, according to independent analyst
& Dedham, MA ARC Advisory Group discrete automation research dir. Sal Spadaat.
The magnetron that generates the microwave energy uses the 2.4GHz spectrum, which is unlicensed. With
magnetrons being mass produced for microwave ovens, they're a low-cost solution for creating this light. Pope Air
Force Base officials liked fusion lighting so much, they chose it over their IEEE 802.11b wireless LAN, which was
co-located with the lighting at the base. "I was told the two conflict and 802.11 was turned off," Kipling says.
The bigger problem, Spada says, is that there is too much traffic on the 2.4GHz spectrum, generated by everything
from paint drying & microwave ovens, to satellite radio & Bluetooth ¹. For example, Spada says, you can put Bluetooth & Wi-Fi together, but
resulting data degradation will give a user the performance of a 9600 baud modem.
2.4GHz spectrum by intl treaty was designed as an ISM (Industry Scientific & Medical) band and not
meant for communications, Kipling says. Of course, 802.11a, which uses the 5.5MHz spectrum, is also an ISM
band, but it's far, far less congested.
Air time: ready for wireless microcarriers?
¹
²
I remember a local, low-cost PC clone manufacturer that did a booming business in the early 1990s before major
players like Dell decided to own the consumer market. So what did the company do when it couldn't make money
on PCs? It became an ISP. It didn't require a huge amount of capital to get started, and
established players like AOL hadn't exactly set high expectations for service quality. Over time, these local or
regional ISPs expanded their customer bases with low-cost, no-frills offerings. Some have survived to this day,
while bigger players have swallowed up many others (their customer lists, if not their employees).
Today's equivalent may be the wireless microcarrier. All it takes is a few hundred dollars for an access point and
the skill to negotiate a deal with the owners of target sites, hotels being the most popular location, and you're in
business. That may be a bit of an over-simplification, but it's safe to say this wireless hot-spot market doesn't have
huge barriers to entry. So, it's no surprise these services are popping up all over the place.
Boingo offers similar services, and the company has strong management & financial backing. It also claims
the largest wireless broadband footprint in the world. Instead of deploying its own network infrastructure, Boingo
purchases from 802.11b microcarriers on a wholesale basis, integrates these networks and sells a single service to
its customers. Boingo markets to, supports & bills the end user. Its pricing model is an interesting one: there is
a $7.95 fee for a single day's service, a $24.95 charge for 10 connect days in a month and a $75 fee for unlimited
monthly connectivity.
Windows security certificates vulnerable to attack
Attackers could remotely corrupt or delete digital certificates stored on computers running most versions of the
Windows operating system due to a flaw in a software component, Microsoft announced in a security bulletin
Wednesday. Microsoft rated the problem critical, and advised all users to install a security patch
immediately.
The certificates are used in a number of functions by Windows operating systems, incl encrypting e-mail, securing
& authenticating Web transactions, or protecting the Windows 2000 and Windows XP Encrypting File
Systems. If the certificates are deleted or corrupted, then access to the affected functions may be denied.
The flaw affects Windows 98, 98SE, Millennium Edition, NT 4.0, 2000 and XP, Microsoft said. It might also affect
earlier versions of the operating system, but these were no longer supported and so had not been tested, it said.
To fix the problem, Microsoft recommends installing a patch that disables the flawed ActiveX control by setting its
"kill bit" and replacing it with a new control.
Q What do you see as the biggest challenges facing the Internet?
Q What fears about the Internet keep you up at night?
5.28.02 Gerry Blackwell 80211-planet.com Any small retailer with a PC, access point and broadband connection can download the software, load it on their PC and start signing up Joltage customers. Customers pay $1.99 per hour or $24.95 a month for up to 60 hours & 500 MB of download. They don't need software. They add a Joltage connection profile to their network settings and they're ready to log on anywhere they can find an affiliate hotspot, over 45 locations so far. "That's one of our key differentiators," says chief operating officer Roberto Aguas. "The low barrier of entry both on the subscriber side and for hotspot owners." Other hotspot service providers require users to install client software. If you find yourself in one of the service provider's hotspots but haven't previously signed up and received the software, you're out of luck. Users can sign up and get access right away at a Joltage site.
"And on the owner side," Aguas notes, "it's also free, where others charge $300 to $400 for their gateway software.
We truly believe that in today's economy our model is the only one that is viable." He means that in light of the
failure of MobileStar & other pioneers it's clear nobody can afford to build all of the network
infrastructure. The beauty of the Joltage model is that hotspot owner-partners supply the hardware, Joltage
provides the software & back-office infrastructure.
That comes to 40%. The other 10% they have to earn: 5% for sticking with Joltage for at least 5
months, up to 5% for keeping quality of service high. Their portion of that last 5% is worked out by dividing
the 12-hour business day by the number of hours their access point is up & running. The cost & risk of
entry for hotspot owners is low, but not zero. They need a PC, of course. They almost certainly already have one,
but it must be one running Windows NT, 2000 or XP so they might need to upgrade.
Joltage's business model begs a few questions, but Aguas was able to answer most of them convincingly enough. For starters, we wondered what kind of broadband connection hotspot owners need, both from the point of view of the legality of reselling and from the perspective of having sufficient bandwidth.
As for the amount of bandwidth needed, theoretically, it could be anything down to a 56Kbps dial-up connection,
Aguas says. That is what some hotspot owners in Latin America are using, he points out. Practically speaking, a
consumer-grade DSL connection would probably be a minimum.
How will hotspot owners respond to such "recommendations," which could significantly increase the amount of 'skin they have in the game?' Presumably it hasn't come up yet, but Aguas insists it would not be a question of Joltage selling the site owner on an upgrade. It would only be providing free information that could help the hotspot owner. "If they don't [upgrade], it's okay with us," he says. Then he admits: badly degraded performance at one hotspot will hurt Joltage overall.
Security is another big question mark. It's likely that at least some site owners will have their main business PCs
doing double duty as hotspot gateways. It's well understood in wireless circles how vulnerable WLANs are, but
hotspot owners cannot be counted on to understand these issues. Joltage's security had better be foolproof.
It is, Aguas claims. "We spent an equal amount of time building the security as we did on all of the back-end
infrastructure," he says. So confidant is Joltage in its security that it plans to run a promotion offering prizes for
anyone who can break it.
Joltage is in the process of negotiating deals with major multi-site owners, including some with properties around
the world that it hopes will help break the chicken-egg logjam. It is also, as noted, trying to attract broadband
service providers as distributor-partners. |
|
Firewire applied to Wi-Fi
Improving audio/video service quality over WLANs 1.11.02 Matthew Peretz 802.11-Planet.com
Two IEEE Standards Collaborate
IEEE P1394.1 chairman Peter Johansson, author of proposal attempting to improve IEEE 802.11 QoS for A/V
streams by applying fundamental principals & mechanisms based on the IEEE 1394 architecture. "Both 1394 TA Wireless working group and 802.11 Task Group E concur on the fundamental QoS concepts necessary for high-quality audio & video streams, such as scheduling & channel access," Johansson said in explaining the motivation behind the collaboration. "Wireless 1394 to some extent is an oxymoron," he added, further explaining that it's more of the paradigms & behaviors of data transfer that are applicable to wireless LANs than the actual 1394 technology as it is implemented by PC manufacturers for wired devices.
As WLAN use spreads far beyond simple data transfer to intense multimedia applications, need to address Quality of Service (QoS) issues becomes extremely important. QoS is a networking term that is a bit more complex than it might sound. QoS refers to the concept of being able to control & measure data transmission rates, or throughput, and error rates. Specifically, QoS refers to implementing guarantees of meeting specified data transmission rates & error percentages. "Back in March, a number of us went to the 802.11 meeting," Johansson explained, and "we discovered that they [802.11] were interested in A/V (audio/video) QoS." Delivering text & other relatively simple types of data around a network doesn't necessarily require complex QoS mechanisms. For much of what networks historically moved around in business applications strict measures for QoS didn't matter because the data wasn't multimedia and the end-user wouldn't notice or be materially affected by latencies. |
1394TA's WWG proposal to enhance QoS for IEEE 802.11 is designed to establish QoS based on scheduled
management of channel access guarantees. The behaviors of 1394 that the group seeks to emulate for 802.11
involve things like: accurate clock distribution, connection management protocols, and command sets. The 1394TA WWG's goal is to "complete a spec showing how you re-produce 1394 behaviors," said Johansson. Ultimately, the 1394 WWG will develop a 1394 protocol adaptation layer (PAL) for devices using the 802.11e QoS provisions.
Audio & video experts agree 802.11 must address MAC (medium access control) services encompassing
scheduled access to the radio channel. 1394TA exec. dir. James Snider said experience gained with wired 1394
devices can be applied, and the firmware adapted, for use in the wired or wireless environment.
HDTV over 802.11a
Wi-Fi camera + server ($450)
¹
The FCC also noted ultra wideband's potential for short-range, high-speed data transmissions. Despite public
safety or medical imaging aspects of UWB, it has been this last category of wireless broadband transmission, fully capable of supporting broadcast quality video, that has set off a flurry of commercial activity that has UWB's
proponents predicting a boom in UWB-driven home networking products that will find themselves under next year's Christmas tree.
In more practical terms, ultra wideband technology, on paper at least, seems to be ideal for consumer electronics
applications such as camcorders, laptops, DVDs, and digital cameras to wirelessly communicate with each in a
home environment. The wirelessly networked home, of course, has long been an elusive goal for consumer
electronics companies. Wireless transmission of video is seen as the key to making it become a reality.
Today's digital video transmissions use MPEG-2 for encoding and require up to 12 Mbps to broadcast the video. In addition, higher rate encoding standards such as HDTV and MPEG-2HD (High Definition) use higher rate
transmissions in excess of 20 Mbps per video stream.
Leading DVD companies have stated that they are moving to MPEG-2HD, underscoring the need for a wireless
home technology that can deliver extremely high bandwidth for multiple channels of digital video transmission.
According to the Consumer Electronics Association of America, DVD equipt sales for North America are forecasted to reach approximately 17 million units in 2003, representing a significant market opportunity for wireless connectivity solutions. "Companies are definitely ramping up for a Christmas 2003 major rollout," said Wash.D.C. independent, investor side research firm Precursor Group analyst David Hoover . "It's a lot easier to stream audio & video with UWB. The consumer electronics market is what we believe will be the first niche market for UWB."
Since the February FCC ruling freeing spectrum for the commercial use of UWB, Intel, Cisco, and Motorola have all said they will enter the UWB market with products in late 2003.
Huntsville, AL based Time Domain Corp., one of the earliest players in the ultra
wideband field with U.S. West as a minority partner, announced in June it was expanding the co. semiconductor
design capabilities with the opening of a new design center in Nevada City, CA. The company is working on its
third-generation chipset, which is targeted to deliver hundreds of megabits per second throughput for multimedia
traffic.
In July, XtremeSpectrum, northern VA UWB
developer that attracted a $12 million investment round in June and counts Texas Instruments among its investors ,
demonstrated the "extreme bandwidth" & "wire-like" video quality of its new Trinity chipset.
"With 6 simultaneous streams of video, this demonstration is intended to showcase not only the high performance
capabilities of our ultra-wideband product, but Trinity's ability to co-exist with systems & products in the
popular 2.4 GHz & PCS/cellular ranges found in most homes today," said XtremeSpectrum CEO Martin
Rofheart.
With existing FCC restrictions in place, XtremeSpectrum is predicting that its products will have a range of 30 ft
with
data rates around 100 Mbps with no drop off. Intel's director of wireless technology, Ben Manny, says his company
has a goal of 500 Mbps. "One of the major consumer opportunities is solving the problem of wireless digital video
& audio distribution within the home. Consumers want it, consumer electronics OEMs want to provide it and
now, with emerging technologies, wireless companies are ready to deliver it. Indeed, by adding wireless to
everything from TVs to home theater gear to set-top boxes, this vision can become reality," Rofheart said earlier
this summer.
The FCC has been attempting since 1998 to a find a way to approve & promote UWB technology
"The standards adopted today represent a cautious first step with UWB technology. These standards are based in
large measure on standards that the National Telecommunications & Information Administration (NTIA)
believes are necessary to protect against interference to vital federal govt operations," read an FCC statement
issued in February. "Since there is no production UWB equipt available and there is little operational experience
with the impact of UWB on other radio services, the Commission chose in this First Report & Order to err on
the side of conservatism in setting emission limits when there were unresolved interference issues."
The FCC said it intends within the next 6-12 months to review the standards for UWB devices and issue a further
notice of proposed rule making to explore more flexible standards and address the operation of additional types of
UWB operations & technology. That "cautious" first step by the FCC brought a finger-pointing, table-thumping
lecture from Rep. Billy Tauzin R-LA, strong supporter of UWB technology, at a June House hearing convened to deal with
the potential ultra wideband interference issues raised by the NTIA.
Tauzin cited a 1989 ruling by the FCC that opened the door for widespread use of cell phones & other
wireless devices including PDAs & laptops. At the time, the NTIA, the military and other agencies contended
the use of these devices could interfere with applications already running in the spectrum, fears that the FCC
ignored and were ultimately proved to be unfounded. "In 1989, the FCC told the NTIA to prove it and not deal in
imagined problems," Tauzin said. "Sound spectrum management involves a balancing of govt and non-govt
interests. While balancing these interests always involves policy issues, good spectrum management requires that
sound policy be supported by sound engineering. I don't think that necessarily happened this time."
Tauzin then specifically asked FCC Office of Engineering & Technology deputy chief Julius P. Knapp &
NTIA deputy asst sec. Michael Gallagher if "there is any evidence of interference" from UWB devices. Both replied
no, but contended there are not currently enough UWB devices operating to empirically prove the point. "It's really
no more than background noise; it's under the radar and it is inherently more secure," said Precursor analyst
Hoover.
What happens to 802.11x if ultra wideband technology becomes the de facto home networking standard?
"If you ask the (UWB) industry guys if ultra wideband is a potential threat to 802.11, they will all say absolutely not,"
a wireless analyst who asked not to be identified told Internetnews.com. "They are not looking to take on fights but,
yes, UWB, because of its inherent advantage in streaming video, is a threat to 802.11."
802.11a carries a data transfer rate of 54 Mbps and can reach roughly twice that speed using proprietary 'turbo'
architectures. In theory, 802.11a has a hypothetically greater range than UWB. However, as an Ethernet derivative
designed as a packet based data networking protocol, it is unsuitable for intensive multi-media applications since it
depends on data packets arriving in order and in time.
Another fundamental flaw in 802.11a technology is that it's power consumption requirements of around 1.5 to 2
W makes it almost completely unsuitable for battery dependent devices like PDAs, and even many laptops
with short battery lives. Then there is the question of cost. Currently, consumer NIC cards for 802.11a are roughly
$150 to $200, which could be too high for broad consumer adoption. XtremeSpectrum's chip set is approximately
$20 per 100,000 units.
According to Paulo these initial product shipments won't gain market momentum until 2004 and beyond, but Paulo
is conservative about UWB's share of the total wireless home market, anticipating that UWB won't comprise more
than 5% of the total shipments through 2006. Until that time, 802.11x should be the dominant home wireless
technology.
UWB
x-ray specs
In February, the FCC authorized the commercial deployment of a new wireless technology that can transmit data, voice and video over short distances with more flexibility than other radio frequencies. Known as ultra wideband (UWB), the FCC said the technology holds "great promise for a vast array of new applications." The agency somberly noted that UWB promises "significant benefits" for public safety, pointing out the technology's ability to power radar imaging of objects buried under the ground or behind walls, providing a rescue workers at catastrophic disasater sites with a valuable, lifesaving tool. UWB also may lead to breakthroughs in medical imaging and also has wired potential as well.
The high spark of low power
8.2.02 Roy Mark 80211-planet.com
Unlike conventional wireless radio systems that operate within a relatively narrow bandwidth (i.e. Bluetooth, IEEE
802.11b, IEEE 802.11a) ultra wideband operates across a wide range of frequency spectrum by transmitting a
series of very narrow & low power pulses. The UWB industry says this combination of broader spectrum,
lower power and pulsed data means that ultra wideband causes less interference than conventional narrowband
radio solutions.
Using the popular MPEG2 video format, XtremeSpectrum broadcast 6 video streams to 6 separate flat panel
displays simultaneously across the room using a single ultra wideband connection. According to the company, the
streaming video, enabled by the Trinity chipset, offered "true wire-like" performance while co-existing with an
802.11b system, a microwave oven, a cellular/PCS phone and a cordless phone, all in simultaneous
operation.
"Not only does Trinity co-exist with these various technologies, but the video remains unperturbed despite
moving people, furniture and walls, all of which are factors in a typical residential scenario. Based on this
demonstration, we believe ultra wideband will become the pervasive wireless technology for consumer connectivity
applications."
XtremeSpectrum officials & other UWB proponents are predicting tv sets that wirelessly send different
programs to other tv sets in the house, camcorders that wirelessly connect with monitors and portable, flat screen
computer monitors that can be wirelessly tethered to a CPU located anywhere in the home, not mention to wireless
connections between VCRs & TVs to streamline wires behind the home entertainment center.
[ Quantum leap for police surveillance ability, making cameras truly
ubiquitous even behind locked doors. ]
because of the potential commercial applications. However, the agency had to fight the concerns of military,
aviation, fire, police and rescue officials that interference from UWB devices could potentially disrupt critical public
services and crucial military operations.
UWB also presented a novel regulatory issue to the FCC because time pulse technology does not displace existing
frequency users but, instead, overlays wide swaths of existing spectrum. In its Feb. ruling, the FCC decreed UWB
devices must operate in the frequency band 3.1-10.6 GHz. It also said the equipt must be designed to ensure that
operation can only occur indoors or it must consist of hand-held devices that may be employed for such activities
as peer-to-peer operation.
Another analyst said UWB technology allows an "unprecedented amount of high-density bandwidth applications"
without requiring assignment of a new frequency bandwidth, essentially "creating" a new band of spectrum in
the noise floor.
XtremeSpectrum mktg vp Chris Fisher disagrees. Prior to joining XtremeSpectrum, Fisher worked for Radiata, a
developer of IEEE 802.11a technology that was acquired by Cisco Systems in 2001. "802.11a is going to be hugely
successful for data networking, but it was never designed to support video streaming," Fisher said.
"Our customer base (consumer electronics manufacturers) made their own internal evaluations. They looked at
802.11 & Bluetooth and decided they were not adequate for the transmission of wire-like video," said Fisher,
who sees a future for 802.11x in demanding enterprise or public access markets.
Further bolstering the hopes of both the nascent UWB industry and 802.11x supporters is a June market research
report by InStat/MDR analyst Gemma Paulo predicting that UWB will gradually grow its marketshare in the home
market, with the first UWB devices unveiled at next January's Consumer Electronic Show in Las Vegas, followed by
shipping products by Christmas season 2003.
incl finding access points put on the network 8.19.02 Ron Nutter Network World
For PDA tools, it may be possible to use something other than a Compaq IPAQ, check the supported equipt list on
the sites of the tools that you are interested in. Before deciding on which tool is the best, see if you can get a demo
of the ones you are really interested in. Depending on the environment you are working in, some of the products
may have better decoding capability for your needs.
D-Link first to market with dual band router
¹
²
Irvine, CA based D-Link recently broke through a price barrier with the DI-604, a router that sells for only $59
MSRP, potentially making Ethernet routers commodity product like Ethernet NICs. The company hasn't quite done
that with its new wireless router, but it is the first to integrate 2 different flavors of 802.11 in to home or small office
router. For security the DI-764 uses an integrated NAT firewall and has full virtual private network (VPN) pass-thru support for multiple IPSec, L2TP and PPTP sessions. The router will block IP addresses, URLs, or domain names you preset, and features MAC address authentication with logging to prevent intrusions. A Web browser-based interface is used for configuration; there is a setup wizard to create quick file & Internet sharing out of the box. Different configuration profiles can be saved to a hard drive as back up should the router be reset. Because it has a built in Web server (for the configuration), it also can support remote management. 1year warranty and free tech support. |
notable |
|
Wi-Fi camera + server ($450) ¹ Linksys WUSB11 wireless USB network adapter Linksys WAP11 tuning iConverse's Mobile Studio & Interaction Server Apple Airport ¹ ² | |
4.12.02 Ed Sutherland 80211-planet.com
Recently, Gregory Rehm held the first 802.11b Homebrew Antenna Shootout. The competition matched a
commercial antenna against several home-grown designs. Rehm says he found himself searching his
cupboard and sizing up the canned food aisle at the grocery store for future antennas.
Rehm reports the 40-ounce beef stew can employing a waveguide antenna design took top honors,
with the 26.5-ounce pasta can and a coffee can trailing. What conclusion can one draw from the
shootout?
Most of these designs involved physically aiming your antenna. To direct your homemade antenna's
signal, you have to either hold the device in your hands or rig it to a simple tripod. What if you don't go in
for such labor-intensive methods and have some Legos handy? If soup cans are too low tech for you, a hybrid solution might come from the buy-out of satellite television provider Primestar by DirectTV. An electric engineering professor in Washington State has published a way to create a directional 802.11 antenna using discarded Primestar dishes. This is how it's done. Homebrew 802.11 devices will not outperform most commercial products. You can forget about a potato chip container or soup can following today's move toward Non Line-of-Sight wireless connections; one tree branch and you're toast. So, what draws people to tinker with their Airport AP or WLAN card? The same drive for freedom that powered people like homebrew computer fan Steve Wozniak is at the heart of the free wireless movement today. |
6.5.02 Dan Jones sr ed. Unstrung "for what it is worth -- one engineer's understanding of the current issues, and some extrapolation of current physical research into the 2.4GHz spectrum. "Current FCC regulations limit power output to 1 Watt EIRP (Effective Isotropic Radiated Power) for 802.11b (2.4GHz) devices. Most cards are 30 milliwatt, and there are a few 100mW and 200mW cards out there. Compare this with microwave ovens, which can emit 500 to 700 Watts to heat up your dinner. Of course, microwave ovens are shielded, but even a small amount of leakage would emit more radiation than these 802.11 devices."
However, Sifry fears that some of the more outré methods being used to boost the range of WLAN systems could
prove to be hazardous: "Of course, if you illegally crank up the power or narrow the beam [exactly as the Pringles
can antenna does], the EIRP goes way up, so there are potential health threats associated with using illegal
equipt."
Despite low emissions of commercial WLAN equipt, Meta Group mobile & pervasive computing group VP
Jack
Gold sums up just how much we don't know about the effects of widespread use of wireless technology.
"I'm not sure anyone knows the long-term effect of walking around in lots of radio fields … I think it may take
years before we have proof one way or the other about the effects," he says. "Of course, I am not a medical
researcher, so I am not able to give a medical opinion -- but from all that I've read, the jury is still out on this." reply "The real issue is not EIRP (more an interference consideration) but rather the resulting power flux density due to amplifiers and/or high gain antenna. … normal safety limit for this band is 200 microwatt per cm2 if you are to safely meet the limits of specific absorption rate. … To measure these things correctly follow procedures in standards from IEC/TC106"
7.11.01 Elisa Batista Wired No one in media has ever questioned it, except for one Time magazine health columnist. In May, Janice M. Horowitz, who appears regularly in Time 's health pages, wrote a first-hand account entitled "Radio Freakquency." In it, she described how she asked Metricom to remove an appliance from outside her apartment building because of the unknown long-term effects of its radiated power. While one analyst said her fears are "a minor concern for a small niche" of the population, they are nonetheless an on-going contentious debate in the wireless technology world. The most recent study on cell phone emissions was released last week by Seoul National University in South Korea. In the report, Professor Suh Jung-seon found that cell phones did not have an effect on human & mouse cells under emissions rates of 1.5 watts per kilogram for 12 hours. |
Yagi antenna design for 802.11b wireless A.S. Clapp … folks who are very involved with HAM radio and other professions and hobbies that involve work with high frequency microwave radiation warn that 2.4 GHz just happens to also be the resonant frequency of water. This is very important considering that we as humans are 98% made of the stuff. It has been warned that exposure to even as little as a 1/4 watt amplified with a 14db antenna, such as described here, could lead to severe vision problems and possibly other health issues. …
6.27.02 New Scientist The magnetic wood, so called because it is packed with minute magnetic particles, is the brainchild of Hideo Oka and a team of electronics engineers at Iwate University in Morioka, northern Japan. They chose wood as their preferred blocking material because it offers more natural, aesthetic options for interior design. Oka hopes that it will soon be possible to buy the novel wood panelling by the metre at your local hardware store.
While normal wood is transparent to radio waves, Oka's blocks them because it contains fine particles of a
magnetic material called nickel-zinc ferrite. When an electromagnetic wave hits the ferrite particles, the magnetic
part of the wave is absorbed.
Oka tested each wood in turn by putting collars of each material over a short antenna that broadcasts radio waves
at the typical GSM mobile phone frequencies of 900 MHz and 1.8 GHz. The antenna can also broadcast at
frequencies up to 2.5 GHz, which covers the range commonly used for wireless networks like Bluetooth and
emerging IEEE 802.11 std known as Wi-Fi. A receiver measured strength of radio waves transmitted through the
material. The wood-based shields could be used to make doors & walls for rooms or even entire buildings where mobile phones simply won't work. While the prospect of being forcefully cut off might horrify some cellphone addicts, Oka says theatre-goers & restaurant customers might appreciate the silence. Panels that absorb radio waves could also help with a problem emerging in Japanese cities, where many homes are being fitted with wireless computing networks. If several networks are set up close together, they can interfere with each other. The new panels could divide up the house into different areas, allowing several networks can operate close by. Oka believes he can make the wood cheap enough for it to be viable. And he now hopes to cut the cost still further by making the panels from recycled magnetic materials & waste wood. |
When the cells absorbed 75 watts per kilogram, a 47-fold increase, there was some stress on the cell membranes,
but the cells showed no chromosome aberrations. Still, the report like many others before it does not declare that
cell phones are either safe or dangerous. Therefore, the debate continues and it apparently doesn't only apply to
cell phones.
In her May 14 column, Horowitz, who lives in New York City, wrote that she noticed "an odd, toaster oven-size box
with a 2-foot antenna dangling below it," outside her apartment building. She found out that the box was a small
relay station designed to send signals to and from wireless modems, and that it was placed "outside my window
courtesy of Metricom's Ricochet network."
After making calls to engineers & spectrum experts, Horowitz discovered the device's frequencies traveled in
the same frequency range as microwave ovens. Moreover, Metricom's radios operated in two "license-free
frequency bands," which means neither the co. nor govt are "required to go to street corners and audit the invisible
electromagnetic field they're emitting."
Even though Metricom provided Horowitz with a pile of documents, and a FCC engineer told her the radiated
power
from the device "falls way below a level that would put anyone at risk," her concerns were not assuaged. At one
point, Horowitz said she put aluminum foil on her windows to block out the contraption's radio waves which, by the
way, is not an effective method, a Metricom source said.
"For most folks, (the FCC's explanation) is reassurance enough," Horowitz said. "Not for me. After all, I never
asked
to live in a wireless world. While Metricom says its emissions fall below the FCC guidelines, no one knows the long-
term effects of even the lowest levels of radiated power generated 24/7."
The Metricom source, who asked that his name or job title not be used, said, "There's always people that will be
inquiring about (health hazards). But on the whole, (Horowitz) is an exception to the rule. Most people are educated
on our technology and how it works and know there really is no immediate danger." The source said the level of
radiation Horowitz was exposed to was so minimal that "you're more at risk using a cell phone than using our
radios, because it's right next to your head."
Dr. Richard Freeman, chairman of the Applied Sciences dept at UCDavis, is irked by reports that deem cellular
phone technology unsafe to humans. He said even if cellular & wireless technology operate in the same
frequency range as microwave ovens and "go through walls & humans," their emissions are "so small that it
just simply would not have an effect on you."
Under FCC regulations, Metricom's radio receivers can operate from one to six watts. Compare that to a
microwave oven's emissions, which are "measured in hundreds of watts," Freeman said. "If you think about it, it's
the only way to heat up your food," he said. "If you could put your hand in a microwave oven, it would get hot and it
would be uncomfortable."
Scientists have yet to find any conclusive evidence that mobile phones damage the human brain. This latest study
was carried out by Professor Leif Salford and colleagues at Lund University in Malmo. They experimented on rats
aged between 12 & 26 weeks. Their brains are regarded as being in the same stage of development as
teenagers. The rats were exposed to two hours of radiation, equivalent to that emitted by mobile phones.
Their brains were examined under a microscope 50 days later.
The researchers found that rats which had been exposed to medium & high levels of radiation had an
abundance of dead brain cells. Professor Salford said there was good reason to believe that mobile phones could
have the same effect on humans. "A rat's brain is very much the same as a human's. They have the same blood-
brain barrier and neurons," he told BBC News Online. "We have good reason to believe that what happens in rat's
brains also happens in humans."
Professor Salford said that there was also a chance exposure to mobile phone radiation could trigger Alzheimer's
disease in some people. "What we are saying is those neurons that are already prone to Alzheimer's disease may
be stimulated earlier in life. However, this theory is hypothetical. We do not have evidence yet that the human brain
is affected in this way."
The study is published in Environmental Health Perspectives, U.S. govt's National Health Institute of Environmental
Health Sciences journal. Writing in the journal, the researchers concluded: "We cannot exclude that after some
decades of often daily use, a whole generation of users may suffer negative effects maybe already in their middle
age."
Professor Salford said mobile phone users should not be alarmed by the findings. "This is a negative finding and
yes it doesn't seem to be particularly good. But this is one observation, in one laboratory with a small number of
animals. This study will have to be repeated before we get alarmed. Nevertheless, it is strong enough to merit more
research into this area."
But he added: "Perhaps putting a mobile phone repeatedly to your head is something that might not be good in the
long term. Maybe we should think about restricting our use of mobile phones."
A UK govt funded study, published 3 years ago, found no evidence to suggest mobile phones affect health.
However, the report by the Independent Expert Group on Mobile Phones recommended that teenagers should only
make essential calls and that these should be as short as possible.
A spokeswoman for the Mobile Operators Association dismissed this latest study. She said: "Independent scientific
review bodies in the UK and around the world have consistently concluded that the weight of scientific evidence to
date suggests that exposure to radio waves from mobile phones operating within the intl exposure guidelines do
not cause health problems."
One study was led by De-Kun Li, a reproductive epidemiologist at the Kaiser Foundation Research Institute in
Oakland, California. His team asked 1063 women around San Francisco who were in the first 10 weeks of
pregnancy to spend a day wearing a meter around their waists that measured magnetic field levels every 10
seconds. Overall, they found that women exposed to peak levels of 1.6 microteslas or greater were nearly twice as
likely to miscarry as women not exposed to such strong fields.
More significantly, says Li, among the 622 women who said the measuring period had been a typical day, those
who experienced high peak fields were three times as likely to have a miscarriage. "That's another confirmation
that the effect is due to EMF," says Li.
Other factors can have a more dramatic effect, however. The risk of a miscarriage increases tenfold as women
age, for example, from 5% for women under 30 years old to 50% for those in their mid-40s. Li's team didn't
look at what was producing the fields, but appliances such as shavers, hairdryers and vacuum cleaners can
produce strong alternating magnetic fields, as can electric vehicles such as trams & trains. The key is
proximity to the source, as fields drop off rapidly with distance.
The team did not examine which appliances were producing the strong fields, but devices with powerful motors are
known to be the worst culprits. Vacuum cleaners & drills emit around 20 microteslas, more than 12 times
higher than the critical level in the study. Food mixers give off around 10.
Alternating magnetic fields also have associated electric fields. The few previous studies of the effect of low-
frequency EMFs on miscarriages, such as one involving 727 women done in 1991 by Raymond Neutra's group at
the California Dept of Health Services in Oakland, have been inconclusive.
But Li thinks this is because Neutra looked at people's average exposure to electromagnetic fields over time, not
peak values. "People have never looked at peak EMFs before," Li says. "My study opens a new chapter for these
EMF effects. Not just for miscarriages, but for other health effects."
When Neutra reanalysed the data from his earlier study, which has only now been published, he discovered the
results were similar to Li's. Women exposed to peak EMF levels greater than 1.4 microteslas were nearly twice as
likely to miscarry.
In the past, EMFs have been blamed for various other ill effects, especially leukemia in children. But no one can
explain how relatively weak fields might cause the DNA mutations that lead to cancer, and most studies have failed
to find evidence of a link. The peak values measured by Li are way below the recommended exposure limit of 1600
microteslas. Above this level, EMFs can induce electric currents in the body, which leads to localized heating.
Li speculates that EMF spikes could cause miscarriages by subtly disrupting cell-to-cell communication. "But as
epidemiologists, we should not feel weaker because we don't understand the mechanisms."
|
Whether in jail or at the supermarket, your image might be on the Net, you can't do anything about it. 6.18.01 Katharine Mieszkowski Salon
Decked out in full riot gear, a police battalion storms a women's jail cell. "Ladies, you're gonna step out single file,
one at a time, stand against the wall!" bellows an officer. The cops wear Army boots & helmets. They carry
batons & shields. They look like they're prepared to quell rampant mayhem in the streets. Instead, they're
entering a secure women's holding cell, supposedly to search for contraband.
"Put your hands on the glass! Ladies, keep your hands on the wall at all times," yells another officer, as female
cops pat down the women and the riot police search the now empty women's cell. The pat-down spectacle is
apparently too much for the male inmates behind the glass watching the free show. "They flashing me! They
flashing too much of what they ain't got," complains one of the women.
The images are hosted on Crime.com, a site now owned by USA Networks and started by the co-founder of the
reality TV show "Cops." Bonus scenes include the shakedown video,
which the site bills as "Special Ops," a 2 minute low-budget movie that provides extra titillation for Web-enabled
prying eyes. Watching the video provides the same kind of fascination as a train wreck, but the legality of the
world's first jail webcam has come
under fire.
"These people's images are being used on a commercial Web site without their permission and, in most cases,
without their knowledge," says Middle Ground co-founder Donna Leone Hamm. "We're saying: 'Take the webcams
down. You can leave the cameras up for security, fine, you're allowed to do that. But you have to take them off the
Web site. That is an inappropriate invasion of privacy.'"
But it also raises a scarier question: What rights do any of us have to our own images these days? Is your image
property you own or something you give up by venturing out in public? As surveillance by security cameras, in
every public space from airports to parking garages to convenience stores, becomes the norm, one estimate
suggests that we're each taped an average of 30 times a day.
Compounding the problem, video cameras are getting cheaper & smaller. Privacy experts predict that it won't
be long before security cameras are networked. Can Big Brother-style tracking of individuals' whereabouts be far
behind? In the early days of the Web, exhibitionists like Jenni of Jennicam couldn't wait to webcast their lives to the
world. But like it or not, we're all becoming more like Jenni every day.
For as perversely fascinating as it may be to peek in on the spectacle at the Madison St. Jail, we may have more in
common with the inmates than we'd like to think. From "Snooper Bowl" football fans in Florida to ferry passengers
in Rhode Island, surveillance subjects are starting to realize that they don't control the dissemination of their own
images.
He may have jumped the gun. According to legal experts, in most states there are no legal grounds to object to
your image being captured in a public place, unless it's a place with an "expectation of privacy," like a bathroom
stall. Nonprofit civil liberties organization Electronic Frontier Fdtn exec. dir. Shari Steele explains: "People are
putting cameras in all sorts of public facilities. They're everywhere. We, as a society, have just decided that that's
acceptable."
In one case, the county's insurance company paid out $8 million to the family of a man who died in a restraining
chair while in custody at the jail. Arpaio says the jail webcam is just a sign that he & his officers have nothing
to hide: "It's there to let the whole world know that we're doing nothing wrong. I'm tired of my officers being accused
of killing people."
Middle Ground's Hamm even suggests that the "shakedown," which is marketed on the sites as the first one in 4
years at the jail, is "a staged event for the webcam ... It's a titillating opportunity for the viewers to see something
other than prisoners standing around doing nothing. It wasn't exciting enough, so they had to stage something."
The only problem is, many of the people caught in the jail webcam haven't been convicted of anything. They're
"pretrial detainees," says Eisenberg, many of them unable to make bail. "The people in the booking area where the
webcams [are] not only haven't been convicted of a crime but haven't been charged with a crime yet ... He is acting
as the judge, jury and the entire justice system without the authority to do that."
The webcam at Madison St. Jail may seem like an outlandish & absurd mockery, but it can also be seen as
merely the leading edge of a campaign to invade privacy unthinkable in the days before the Internet and
omnipresent video cameras. Privacy Times editor
& publisher Evan Hendricks sees the aggregation of images over time from the webcams at Madison St. Jail
as a real threat to inmates' rights. "You could set up your computer so you could automatically check this jail cam,
and you could be downloading images off of it, and later you could apply facial-recognition technology and make a
database of everyone who has been arrested at that Arizona jail."
Such a database might be extremely valuable to local employers screening the people they hire. As Hendricks
explains, while conviction information becomes a part of the public record, arrest information does not, and that's
where the webcam changes the rules. "This whole thing is a potential end run around the traditional privacy that's
developed for arrest information," says Hendricks.
Technology that can match faces to names is neither futuristic nor far-fetched, as the Super Bowl fans discovered.
19 "matches" were found when images of their faces were captured & compared with face-recognition
technology against thousands of images of wanted criminals provided by the FBI, Secret Service and local police.
Executives at Viisage, which provided the face-recognition technology used at the Super Bowl this year, are
puzzled by all the fuss about the filming of football fans, whose images were compared with thousands of images
of
wanted criminals provided by the FBI, Secret Service and local police. Viisage CEO Tom Colatosti says: "The
average person is on a surveillance camera 30 times a day."
"When you go to a gas station, in an elevator, in a parking lot, shopping mall, ATM, Dunkin' Donuts, 7-Eleven,
highway. Surveillance is a part of our everyday life." at casinos & banks and airports & border
crossings.
But privacy experts like UCLA information studies assoc.
prof. Phil Agre, "Technology & Privacy: The New Landscape," co-editor, says that while that kind of tracking
hasn't happened yet, it's coming. "As soon as face recognition goes prime time, the world changes instantaneously
overnight. You walk past a store and you get junk mail from that store. You walk into the store and the salesperson
mysteriously knows your name. People going into business, selling files of who has been where: a market springs
up. I'm not saying the consequences are all bad; it has law enforcement & crime protection as well as Big
Brother kind of consequences."
Already, throughout the borough of Newham in London, 300 cameras monitor the streets looking for known
criminals. "If you institute this properly, you can get the support of the public," says Visionics Frances Zelazny, co. that makes the face-recognition
technology used in Newham. "You always have the fringe, but in general this is a neighborhood where people feel
afraid." |
In Garland Simon's future, everyone & everything will be on camera, all the time. 10.2.02 Damien Cave Salon Back in 1998, Cammunity was little more than an underdeveloped video search engine that returned plenty of pornography in its results. But since Simon took over in Aug. 1999, Cammunity.com has grown into a 16-person, venture-funded business, a network of 10,000 smut-free webcams, filming everything from traffic at the Geo.Washington Bridge to the pandas at the Atlanta zoo.
Former ABC Sports & USA Networks exec. Simon wants to harness the power of all these
mechanical, online eyes and plans to vastly increase the size of her webcam network. In the long run, she hopes to
build a democratic media giant that earns a sizable profit while offering a viable alternative to calculated &
saccharine top-down offerings of traditional media giants like Disney. [
Greenwash ]
So far, the Atlanta co. only draws about 200,000 unique visitors each month. Meanwhile, the market for reality-
based content seems to be shrinking, judging by CBS's recent cancellation of "Big Brother." There's also the
nagging problem that the most popular webcams on the Net aren't aimed at nature scenes, which is what Simon
prefers to watch. Instead, they focus on shallow exhibitionists like DotComGuy & Jennifer Ringley of
JenniCam fame.
Q Why would someone come to Cammunity.cam when shows like "Big Brother" are turning away
viewers in droves? Isn't the public tiring of "real-world" programming?
Q What's the business model?
Q Where is your content being picked up?
Q What are the majority of people filming?
We've got a lady who has a webcam fixed on her mailbox because she strongly believes that the mailman
terrorizes her dog. She wants to watch from work.
Q Are there limitations on content?
Q Is it checked by people, or bots? And how does the search function work? How does it know that
someone who used to film dogs is now filming high school football?
Q What about the viewers: How many do you have and who are they?
Q Ultimately, where do you think the webcam community is going?
We think it's going toward choice. The consumer wants more choices.
Q Will the future's Quentin Tarantino, who said he learned to become a director by watching movies
in video stores, cut his teeth on webcams?
Even that milksop has been ignored in Reaganomic giveaway of Wi-Fi bandwidth to unlicensed use with no
oversight of corp. technology development for the land rush to that public property of spectrum space. ]
DragNet is still being tested, but its biggest plus, according to England, is its ability to keep up with an enormous
volume of network traffic. The product is designed to stream data to storage at gigabit speeds, but NA didn't reveal
how different-sized networks might affect speeds during operation. Many segments of the technology market are
still struggling, but computer security has remained strong and is the focus of many larger companies' acquisition
strategies. |
For now it seems that we have as much control over our images in public spaces as do the inmates of Madison St. Jail. "If you're in a public place, you don't have much defense, unless your image is being used for commercial purposes," says "It's Mine, Not Yours! Take Back Your Personal Information & Privacy" author Thomas Coleman. If there used to be no easy way for the images from the cameras in the Madison St. Jail to make it into your living room, now there's an easy way for your own image to go places that you can't even picture.
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