This morning the alarm went off. The CERT in the United States issued an alert to warn of the existence of a virus capable of violating the WPA2 encryption of WiFi networks. This system is the one used by the vast majority of connections around the world. KRACK, which is the name of the virus, allows access to network traffic through a collection of errors located at the core of the WPA2 protocol .
This would mean that all wireless networks that have so-called WPA2 protection are vulnerable. And, as we said, they are practically all the WiFi networks that we use daily. One way to try to get rid of a possible attack is to hide the WiFi network that our router broadcasts . With this we will ensure that our WiFi network does not appear when someone performs a network search. That is, if the name of the WiFi network is not known and it is searched manually, it will not be accessible.
But how to hide the WiFi network? Well, it depends on each router , although most use similar terms. We are going to show you the example with the router that we have in the office, a TP-Link Archer C2600. If you have any other TP-Link model, the steps should be very similar. On the other hand, if you have a router from another brand or from the operator, the screens will be different. But the terms should be very similar. We started!
How to hide the WiFi network that our router emits
The first thing we must do is access the router . For this we will have to enter your IP address in the browser. The most common are: 192.168.0.1 or 192.168.1.0. It is also possible that our router has the address 192.168.1.1. It can actually be any address, but these are the most common.
If we have an operator router, we probably have this address on a sticker at the bottom of the router. If we cannot access with any of them, we will have to look for the gateway we have at this moment . How do we find out? Too easy:
- If we have Window 10 we have to write CMD in the Cortana application and write in the window that appears "ipconfig". The data that interests us is the one that says "Gateway".
- If we have a Mac we can go to "System Preferences", enter Network and then TCP / IP. In the "Router" section we will have the address we are looking for.
By putting this address in the web browser, a screen will appear that will ask for username and password. This is the password for the router, not the WiFi . Again, if we use an operator router, the most common is that this data is on a sticker at the base of the router.
If it is a neutral router, the most common is to have some combination with admin and 1234 . If you cannot enter with these combinations, you can search the Internet for the model of your router to find out the default username and password.
Once inside, this is the menu that we see on the TP-Link. As we mentioned, if you have a TP-Link it may be similar. If it is not, don't worry, you can go looking for the terms that we tell you.
Obviously, the first thing to do is enter the Wireless option in the menu . It may be that your router puts WiFi or, if it is in Spanish, wireless connection.
In the case of the TP-Link, as you can see, we already have the wireless network before our eyes. If we want to hide it, we simply have to mark "Hide SSID" and save the changes. If you see two WiFi networks, like us, it is because you have the 2.4 GHz network and also 5 GHz.
Attendant routers
We give you another example with a router from the Vodafone company . It is the Sercomm Vox 2.5 model, one of the fiber routers installed by the British company. This router usually has the IP address 192.168.0.1 and as username and password “vodafone” (without the quotes).
Once inside the router we will have to go to the WiFi section and in the General tab we will have the possibility to deactivate the option Issue SSID . From that moment our WiFi network will not appear if we do a search.
This does not mean that the network is not broadcasting. To connect a new device we will have to connect manually by entering the name of our WiFi network .
In the image above you have the menu of one of Orange's fiber routers . If you look closely, you will see that under the name of the WiFi network you have an option so that it is not visible. All this under the main WiFi menu.
So, as you have seen, it is very easy to hide the WiFi network so that not everyone can see it . It may not be the safest option to prevent someone from entering our network, but it sure helps.