WiFi in the workplace

Do you use WiFi too? Chances are that while you are reading this article, you are doing so on a laptop, tablet or phone connected to a WiFi network. Not all WiFi networks are the same. There is quite a difference between an everyday home network and a business network, and it starts with the equipment.

Businesses often buy consumer equipment and install it themselves. This is supposed to keep costs down. However, they run into problems when lots of people are working in the office. The loss in productivity soon outweighs the savings on equipment. Business equipment provides a stable connection and allows all devices to work together properly. Investing in business equipment does not have to be expensive either. The benefits, however, are worth their weight in gold.

The difference between consumer and professional equipment

The equipment has a better build quality, so it offers much more stability. On top of that, business equipment is often supported for 5-7 years, compared with an average of 2 to 3 years for consumer equipment. Business WiFi equipment also often has (more extensive) 'logging' functionality. This keeps track of what goes wrong with the WiFi connection between the device and the access point. It can also help troubleshoot other issues.

Firewall

That network is also important nowadays with working from home in mind. Business equipment makes this possible, because it supports VPN connections. Your employees can then work from home securely and without problems by connecting to the office, with the reassurance of professional equipment. With business equipment, all these benefits can be configured and managed. With ordinary consumer equipment, the options for setting preferences are very limited. You depend on your service provider, or on the limited functionality of a consumer router, to make sure everything is set up correctly. That goes for security too. The biggest danger with this kind of equipment is plug, play and forget.

Security

Have you ever thought about the security of your business WiFi network? Your WiFi network is probably protected with what is known as a Pre-Shared-Key.
This Pre-Shared-Key is needed to connect to the network and is, in principle, secure. But what happens when an employee leaves? They still have the WiFi password and will therefore be able to keep logging in. Have you perhaps already shared the WiFi Pre-Shared-Key with guests? Sharing this Pre-Shared-Key is of course not as secure as it seems. After all, anyone who has this code can connect to your internal network. Changing the WiFi password every time an employee leaves or you have given a guest the Pre-Shared-Key is not exactly practical either, because lots of devices use this code and it has to be changed on every one of them.

Solution

We can solve this problem for you. We do this by using a different standard. With this standard, an employee connects to the WiFi network with their user account. In Microsoft Windows, on a computer joined to the company network, this process can even happen completely 'seamlessly', so the user does not even notice. When the employee then leaves and their user account is disabled, they can no longer connect to the WiFi, so they no longer have access to the company network.
This removes the risk of the Pre-Shared-Key (the shared password).
For guest networks we use a solution where we set up a separate WiFi network specifically for guests. From there, they cannot reach the company's internal network.

Curious whether your WiFi is properly protected? Contact us. We are happy to help.
To get you started, here are a few quick tips for your connection at home:

• Replace the default password on your router and other network devices
• Turn on automatic updates for your network equipment, if possible
• Choose the strongest encryption for your network
• Come up with a strong WPA-PSK password and change it once a year
• Change your passwords regularly