One of the best ways to make sure information is kept secure is to broadcast it using a published standard, and to try to make sure the signal goes as far as possible. Right? Well, maybe that isn't the best strategy after all. Unfortunately for us, the convenience of wireless access to a network means that a lot of people use a wireless network, and that means that a lot of data is being broadcast in the clear.

In this article, I'll build a lightweight wireless sniffer that runs on open source software. You'll see how simple it is to interact with wireless networks. The information the sniffer collects offers some insights on key wireless security issues.

By Peter Seebach at IBM developerWorks.

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