E-DOC-CTC-20080421-0010 v1.0
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4 Wireless
4.3 Securing Your Wireless Connection
Introduction
By using encryption, communication between the wireless clients and your Thomson Gateway is protected
by a passphrase. Only clients which use the correct network name (SSID) and passphrase can connect to your
network.
Encryption methods
During the years a number of encryption types have been developed. The list below gives you an overview of
the supported encryption types ordered by security level, you will find the highest level of security at the top
of the list:
WPA-PSK Encryption:
The wireless data is being encrypted with a user-defined key. Wireless clients must be configured with
this key before they can connect to the Thomson Gateway.
WEP Encryption:
The first encryption type used for wireless connections. Like WPA-PSK it uses a user-defined key, but WEP
has been proven to have some security issues. We strongly recommend you to use WPA-PSK instead.
WPA-PSK versions
The Thomson Gateway supports the following WPA-PSK versions:
WPA2 (also referred to as WPA2-PSK):
WPA2 is the most secure version, but not all wireless clients already support it. Before you select this
version, make sure all of your wireless clients support it.
WPA+WPA2:
If not all of your wireless clients support WPA2 or you are not sure if they support WPA2, we recommend
you to choose WPA+WPA2. Wireless clients that support WPA2 will use WPA2, the others will use WPA.
WPA:
If none of your wireless clients support WPA2 choose this option.
Which encryption method should I use?
We strongly recommend you to use the highest level of encryption that is supported by all your wireless
clients.
Configuring the wireless encryption
Proceed as follows:
1 Open the Thomson Gateway Web Interface.
2 On the left menu, click Home Network.
To use WPA2 on Windows XP Service Pack 2 (SP2)you first have to install Wi-Fi Protected Access 2
(WPA2)/Wireless Provisioning Services Information Element (WPS IE) update or install SP3.
You can find the WPS IE update on http://support.microsoft.com/kb/917021
.