Other guidelines
To keep the wireless network secure, follow these guidelines:
•
Use a password with at least 20 random characters. You can use up to 63 characters in a WPA
password.
•
Avoid any common words or phrases, easy sequences of characters (such as all 1s), and
personally-identifiable information for passwords. Always use random strings composed of
uppercase and lowercase letters, numbers, and if allowed, special characters such as
punctuation.
•
Change the password periodically.
•
Change the default password provided by the manufacturer for administrator access to the
access point or wireless router. Some routers let you change the administrator name as well.
•
Turn off administrative access over wireless if possible. If you do this, you need to connect to
the router with a wired Ethernet connection when you want to make configuration changes.
•
Turn off remote administrative access over the Internet on your router, if possible. You can use
Remote Desktop to make an encrypted connection to a computer running behind your router
and make configuration changes from the local computer you are accessing over the Internet.
•
To avoid accidentally connecting to another party's wireless network, turn off the setting to
automatically connect to non-preferred networks. This is disabled by default in Windows XP.