News

Pinpointing Wi-Fi Problems

Location Enabled Network solution provider Newbury Networks says its WiFi Watchdog add-on not only tells administrators about intruders, it will tells where they are.

by Eric Griffith Managing Editor of Wi-Fi Planet [December 5, 2002]

There are a lot of enterprise-class products that will tell a system administrator when their Wi-Fi network has an intruder. Newbury Networks goes a step further. Its new WiFi Watchdog product will pinpoint an intruder's location to within three meters.

WiFi Watchdog is the latest layered application that works with Newbury Network's Locale Sever 3.0, a software platform for creating a Location-Enabled Network (LEN). Other layered add-ons for Locale Server include a Hotspot Manager and the Digital Concierge-Docent for pushing Web-based content to locations (such as in museum tours).

"[Secruity] is what resonates with enterprises," says Michael Maggio, president and CEO of Newbury Networks. Competitors like "Reefedge or Bluesocket, there's things they solve, but people don't know where the problems are. Is it someone in the parking lot? We can tell them where problems are so they can go after it."

WiFi Watchdog offers not only intrusion detection but also includes live monitoring to keep an eye on all users and devices (as well as denying access to unknown users), rogue access point detection, and path and pattern reports so administrators can see where on the wireless LAN the most problems occur.

Maggio says deploying a LEN around your current WLAN is simple—either surround your current setup with Locale Points (access points that are compatible with the Locale Sever), or convert your existing access points.

"We've taken a standard access point product sudch as under $100 access points from Linksys, D-Link, and others, and we put our firmware on it to put it into monitor mode," says Maggio. The goal is to keep deployment cheap on the hardware side.

The minimum price for Locale Server 3.0 with WiFi Watchdog is $20,000 but can range much higher depending on the deployment area. It will ship to customers in January 2003.

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