If you have an unsecured wireless network you are putting yourself at risk for a variety of possible internet threats. Some can be mild like having your bandwidth stolen and others can be very harmful like identity theft. Following is information about how you can protect yourself.

All you have to do is go to “wireless network connection” on your computer and check out the list of available networks. This will let you know if your connection is secured or not.

If it is secured be sure to check whether it uses WPA or WEP encryption methods. This is easy to learn, just right click on the network and look for the pop-up menu. Under the menu, just select “properties,” and the click on “encryption type.” You’ll see a box appear and if you look under the “security” tab you will see your encryption type.

Also, you’ll want to change your security settings in order for your wireless router to have the best security level. We’ll discuss that later.

Should you find that your network is unsecured you should take steps to get secured. Do this via your wireless router. Just type in the following “192.168.0.1″ into the address bar of the browser. It will then show your router’s default properties. From there just click on the wireless tab and then “security.”

It will be necessary to change the “authentication type” to WPA and then for “key” type in a newly created password to access your network. Now just hit “save” or “apply” and your good to go. You’ll probably want to double check that your changes have been made correctly.

You can do this by going back to “wireless network connections,” and rescanning for available networks. If you did it right, yours will appear as “security enabled.” You can reconnect by entering your new password.

Take these steps and you will feel more secure when you are surfing online.

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