What puts some people off setting up a wireless home network is the fear that anything stored on their hard disk could be accessed by neighbours or hackers, and that the speed of a broadband connection could be whittled away by unauthorised users tapping in from outside.

While no network is ever totally immune to attack, there’s no reason a wireless network shouldn’t be as secure as one where all the devices are connected by cables, provided you take a few simple precautions. Armed with the information presented here, your network will be safe.

What’s the problem?
First, let’s be clear about what we mean by network security. What we are protecting is the access to the PC by physical means. Because Wifi is a form of radio, the signals can be intercepted and unauthorised signals can be sent to the radio receivers in your network: the wireless router and all wireless-enabled computers, storage devices, printers and so on.

A network that has not been secured by an encrypted password can be detected by anyone with a Wifi-enabled computer. Just writing this feature in the Computeractive office we have detected four wireless networks with no protection.

If we were happy to break the law, we could log into any of those networks and use that person’s broadband account to visit websites, download illegal copies of movies and music, even pornography. And, if the network’s owner had left any files in their Shared Documents folder, we could view, copy and possibly even edit the files. It’s a good thing we’re a law-abiding bunch.

The biggest threat most people face is a cheeky neighbour hopping on to your broadband connection to view web pages without paying for internet access, but it’s worth noting that if your connection was used to download seriously illegal material, you would be the first port of call for the police.

A secure network in itself will not block viruses, spyware or other web threats. For that you’ll need some basic rules about how to deal with email and web pages, and some tools to fend off malicious software.

A quick network tour
Wireless hardware, though technically advanced, is very easy to install and use and, once it has been correctly configured, you can more or less forget about it – which is where the problem lies. Router manufacturers often make setup a bit too easy.

That’s great for novices but means it’s up to the user to strengthen the wireless security settings after installing the equipment . All too often this vital task is shelved and then forgotten.

Broadband is delivered to homes either through standard telephone lines or by the same cable that delivers TV and telephone services. Cable subscribers require a modem, which is plugged into the incoming cable socket, and a router that is then connected to the modem. Sometimes the modem is built into a TV set-top box.