I am the Elephant

One of my current job duties involves detecting, locating, and confiscating rogue wireless access points here at work.

From a security standpoint, wireless devices are a nightmare. On multiple occasions, (probably) well-meaning employees have brought wireless routers from home and connected to our network here at work. Sometimes people do this to add wireless network access to an area that does not currently have it. We’ve had people bring wireless routers to work before that didn’t even know they were wireless routers (the antenna on top should have been a clue). One guy who “just needed a few extra network ports) suddenly disrupted operations by plugging in a wireless router with DHCP enabled.

There are two ways to prevent this. The first is education. We tell people what they are and are not allowed to bring to work and connect to our network. (Essentially the rule is, if the hardware wasn’t issued by us, it shouldn’t be on the network.) As you can probably guess, many people believe that rules only apply to everybody else. The second way to prevent unauthorized network connectivity is through technical reasons. Unfortunately due to the size of our campus and the number of different organizations co-located here, a complete list of every authorized network device is essentially impossible to maintain.

With prevention essentially ruled out, that’s where I come in. One of my job tasks involves driving around our campus on a regular basis, searching for wireless devices. Yes. I get paid to wardrive. While it sounds very exciting, it’s actually one of the most boring things in the world to watch. Typically our wardriving outings take two hours. The first hour is spend messing with the laptop, trying to get our wireless card, an external antenna, our software and our hardware to all cooperate. The second hour is spent driving around a small campus in one of our cars, doing 20mph.

We also respond to complaints about rogue wireless devices. We recieved one such call yesterday. A user complained that his laptop was repeatedly trying to connect to a non-authorized wireless access point. That’s when we mobilze. It’s like wardriving, except we walk. Warwalking, I suppose.

Yesterday, three of us set off on foot to find this supposed unauthorized wireless access point. I carried the laptop while my co-worker carried the large, wired antenna. The third guy was taller than me (I’m 6’0”) and was wearing a purple shirt and a purple tie. To say that the three of us looked conspicuous is an understatement. When we got to the building in question, we found that the door was locked and we needed to knock to enter. Yeah. We pretty much blew any element of surprise, and I made several jokes about looking like Ghostbusters again.

By the time we actually entered the building, word that “security” had arrived spread like wildfire. On our laptop we immediately detected one wireless access point. Using our directional antenna we began walking toward it until … BLIP. It disappeared. Someone had powered it off. We saw a second one and moments later … BLIP. It died, too.

The three of us couldn’t have been any more conspicuous unless we had been leading a parade. With no chance of discovering anything, we bravely turned our tails and fled. We definiately need a different plan of attack next time. My iPhone does a pretty good job of detecting wiireless access points (WiFiFoFum works great). Maybe I can rig up something a little less obvious using a backpack or something.