Can you give me the post he quoted that in it? Thanks in advance. Wow, I really needed that kind of info for a starting point. I don't have much knowledge as you in this field for sure, so as I told you before: anything will be helpful to me. Hacking WLAN networks is fun, and still have space for new techniques and stuff. But trying to do what not much have done? Will be really awesome. Is there any WiFi book you recommend reading? You really seem to have a lot of experience in this field, and I really wish to benefit from you, if you don't mind for sure Thanks for the links to Ubertooth One and HackRF, and all the great info you shared here. I really appreciate every single second you spent writing that reply for me and others. --- Double Post Merged, 31 Jul 2012 --- do you mean this kit: http://www.alfa.com.tw/in/front/bin/ptdetail.phtml?Part=AWUS036NHA http://www.data-alliance.net/servlet/-strse-372/Alfa-AWUS036NH-2000mW-1000mW/Detail edited post: It seems the same as what we have, it even has the 5dbi antena! To do long distances its important to have a higher dbi with higher W right? Or am I wrong in that!
Read the RFCs around 802.11 protocols... Then maybe the good classic Wi-Foo: The Secrets of Wireless Hacking and the great Hacking Exposed Wireless: Wireless Security Secrets & Solutions And get your hand dirty, try to break it, build your own scripts and C++ versions of popular tools like reaver-WPS (maybe you can come up with something more stable...) or just try to exploit some security vulnerability you might find on those books... Pen testing is easier than it seems to be, everything you need is there, you just need to have enough time and knowledge about the protocols in order to find flaws around and then use them! :snake The best example I can find is reaver-wps... the security issue that reaver takes advantage has been around for a long time but nobody spent enough time reading the WPS RFC in order to discover that it's actually possible to brute force it 4 digits at the time and how routers should handle WPS transactions... Easy to find, easy to implement, easy to take advantage of. --- Double Post Merged, 31 Jul 2012 --- Dude! for the 10000th time, get an "NHA", the other suck and are a waste of money. I personally own every Alfa card and most of their devices and... take my word "NHA" is THE best wireless card they've ever made. Works great with everything is very "hacking" friendly and you won't regret it! You can read my resume about the most popular Alfa cards here!
I have both books, I read a small amount from the Exposed one, but maybe didn't understand a lot so I left it on the shelf and didn't continue. I'll get back to it then, after I finish my reading list. For sure knowing the RFC(s) is the best way to pentest any protocol not just the WiFi, but problem is: Do we have enough time for that? Especially when you have to do your day to day job activities, plus other life stuff I knew that the black Alpha was the one you ment in your post but was not 100% sure. Thanks for confirmation. BTW, to increase the distance coverage: Do I only have to buy a longer antenna? or what do I need? I currently have the ones I told you about, I try my best to get the Alpha *NHA version for sure, but as noted in your review it works on 650mW which I think will not do long distance coverage, only 100m right? Thanks for being patient with me Geek
Signal range is a very sensitive question... basically there are various factors that can actually interfere with the range of your wirelesses: Physical output power of your wireless card; As you said, your NHA has an output power of 650mW but that's not enough to correctly tell the max possible range you can get, this is just the starting point... 650mW is a good wireless card, 2W like the "H" version is actually illegal in most countries and can give you cancer or be very useful killing mosquitos at night! shah... 200mW is a standard wireless card. Software defined output power of your wireless card; Every country has its own max output power, so linux, windows, and OSX kernels define the max output power your card will be using given your current location. If you're in Bolivia you can use the 2W legally This is set using another unit called power ratio in decibels (dB). In short 2W = 33dBm. This value by default is set to 20dBm witch is about 200mW. Most people buy expensive antennas and wireless cards without increasing this value first... So if you have an "H" Alfa running in backtrack it will be set to 200mW only, you need to manually increase this value in order to get a better range, but watch out for your legal limits, this things are actually monitored since a 2W Alfa might interfere with military equipment around. Wireless card sensitivity; Your wireless card can have 2W of output power but if the sensitivity is a crap you won't be able to get wireless networks far from you... if the sensitivity is very hight you'll just be listening to noise... In order to take full advantage of a big antenna you need a card with a good output power (1W) and a good sensitivity or you won't be able to "hear" the other access point/wireless card "speaking" at a long distance. Antenna you're using; The antenna is very important, bigger antenna best range! But keep in mind the output power of your card and it's sensitivity. A good antenna will just increase the amount of RF spectrum you can get or send... But if you card sensitivitysucks it's useless! You can also find different kind of antennas: Omnidirectional Radiates radio wave power uniformly in all directions in one plane, with the radiated power decreasing with elevation angle above or below the plane, dropping to zero on the antenna's axis. -- This are the most common wireless antennas you can find them everywhere in routers, TVs, cell phones etc... Directional Radiates greater power in one or more directions allowing for increased performance on transmit and receive and reduced interference from unwanted sources. Directional antennas like Yagi-Uda antennas provide increased performance over dipole antennas when a greater concentration of radiation in a certain direction is desired. -- They can save your day if you need a 40Km 802.11 link! (H) (And yes it's possible, I did it before). Sectorial Is a type of directional microwave antenna with a sector-shaped radiation pattern. The word "sector" is used in the geometric sense; some portion of the circumference of a circle measured in degrees of arc. 60°, 90° and 120° designs are typical, often with a few degrees 'extra' to ensure overlap and mounted in multiples when wider or full-circle coverage is required. -- This antennas are generally used by mobile carriers... great on Wifi to if you want to deploy wifi for a small town or something. The setup might take you time because you've to think about the angles but once you get it right it's just perfect! Dipole Can be made of a simple wire, with a center-fed driven element. It consists of two metal conductors of rod or wire, oriented parallel and collinear with each other (in line with each other), with a small space between them. The radio frequency voltage is applied to the antenna at the center, between the two conductors. These antennas are the simplest practical antennas from a theoretical point of view. They are used alone as antennas, notably in traditional "rabbit ears" television antennas, and as the driven element in many other types of antennas, such as the Yagi. -- Very common too and you can find a lot of them around. Wifi home made antennas are usually this type. Others... You can read here about almost every kind of RF antenna out there. You can also make your own type if you understand a little of physics and electronics it's easy to design something new and useful. Maybe you'll revolutionize the RF world again? Who knows! Weather conditions; The best possible condition for 802.11 is a very dry night. This happens because the water resonance frequency is between 2.4-2.5Ghz... So 802.11 is very sensitive to humidity in the air. This also explains why this is the unlicensed band... basically this band is very bad for long range/industrial applications. Electrical interferences; We all like our Microwaves but keep in mind that they operate at 2.4Ghz and make a lot of noise (You can see it with the ubertooth one or any spectrum analyzer...) In other hand a Fridge is a very good wireless repeater! Other Wifi, phones, and crappy devices can also give you serious problems. Specially if they don't respect the RFCs that speak about RF etiquette... You've a lot about signal coexistence and protocol efficiency. Physical interferences; Walls, water pipes etc... All the above factor applied to the device that is communicating with you on the other side... This one is VERY important! If you're using some overkill 100000€ wireless system and you're trying to reach a Thomson router at 100KM you won't be able to do it. You need similar equipment on the other side. :? This post actually contains a lot of information, take your time to read it, thing about it, read the sources I linked and I hope everyone on the forum can benefit from it :?
Thank you TCB13 for the great post, I'm really thankful to you. It for sure helped me out, and gave me a big sack of information. Please don't hesitate to share such knowledge with us. Thanks again mate, and wish you good luck
Hello everybody, first post here... I've to say, this is the casual kit, he owns a lot more hardware! :O
Hi AndreX ! Welcome to Xiaopan Forums and we hope you can find a lot of interesting things for yourself. although this is not the introduction thread, You are more than welcome...
TCB13@ I increased today the power just you discussed yesterday. Your posts really helped me out a lot.
