Today’s Cybersecurity tip is: secure your home wifi/router
If you don’t have high-speed internet at home, today’s tip probably won’t be for you. Also, how do you survive? Anyway, here are some things you can do to shore up your home wifi router:
Change Default Password. Your Internet Service Provider (ISP) probably preset the administrator username and password. Log in (using their instructions provided) and change the password. If you have an option to change the admin username, do that too! Many times, the default username/password are universal and can be found on the internet.
Enable Network Encryption. In order to keep your home network traffic secure and private, you’ll want to turn on WPA or (ideally) WPA2 encryption. Each router has different instructions on how to do this.
Change Default SSID. Your Service Set ID (SSID) is the name of your network and might be set to the manufacturer’s default name. Pick a new, unique name for your network to show that you take the time to configure your network properly.
Disable Broadcast SSID. Now that you know the name of your network, turn off broadcast so that people can’t easily find your network without knowing the name. While this doesn’t necessarily protect your network, it does hide it making it a little harder to crack.
Advanced Options. Depending on your level of comfort, consider turning on the firewall (if it’s not already) and/or enabling MAC address filtering. These steps will ensure nobody can remotely connect to your router (other than your ISP) and only devices you specify will even be able to connect to the router.
You’ve taken huge steps in securing your home network and should be able to rest relatively easy knowing you’re browsing safely.
See you tomorrow!