Deploying Secure 802.11 Wireless Networks with Microsoft Windows
Appendix B
Wireless ISPs and Windows Provisioning Services
Public-access wireless hotspots are a high-growth area in wireless networking. Wireless Internet service providers (WISPs) are deploying public hotspots at thousands of locations around the world to provide their customers with many points of wireless-based network access. There are several challenges that wireless users and WISPs face in using hotspots, however. Recognizing this, Microsoft plans to update the Microsoft Windows XP wireless service to help address these challenges.
The challenges faced by wireless users and WISPs include the following:
The current security model for WISP sign-up and usage is insecure.
Hotspot wireless access points (APs) are typically configured for open system authentication and with Wired Equivalent Privacy (WEP) encryption disabled.
Users without additional hotspot client software cannot easily detect hotspots.
Users cannot gain information about the WISP or search for the WISP s hotspot locations. If they sign up at one hotspot, they are not necessarily configured to use other hotspots of the same WISP.
Additional hotspot client software typically conflicts with the wireless client software built into the operating system of the wireless client.
Additional hotspot client software helps the user access the hotspots of that specific WISP s network. However, installing it might cause conflicts with the existing wireless client software, such as the Microsoft Windows XP Wireless Zero Configuration (WZC) service. As a result, information technology departments within organizations are reluctant to deploy hotspot client software to their users. Additionally, updates to the WISP configuration usually require updates to the wireless client software.
WISPs lack common methods to sign up new users and update the configurations of existing users.
Users are typically required to launch a Web browser such as Microsoft Internet Explorer to sign up to the WISP service and for subsequent logins. Each WISP has a different set of configuration screens that users must navigate to sign up for wireless service and different methods of updating the configuration of the installed WISP client software.