Security Analyst – Jeff Soehner CISSP, GXPN,GPYC,GMOB,GCIH

Ubiquity has produced a very nice range of Access points that are quite affordable for the home user. Sure you can get away with a consumer grade router that includes Wi-Fi but for those of us who are a little more concerned with security, have several devices and wish to use a multipronged deployment you need to consider a separate solution.

For just over 300.00 we Canadians can have three Ubiquity Access Points (model UAP) each capable of creating/extending Wi-Fi in your home up to a maximum radius of approx. 400ft. (YMMV – solid objects such as concrete, walls, etc. and electrical wiring can interfere and reduce your effective coverage area). Installation can be as simple as putting an AP on each floor in various sections of your home.

You can even add an outdoor AP (shown in our representation below) to your installation and extend the same unified wireless network into your backyard. 

UniFi APs allow you to have up to four networks (SSIDs) broadcasted from the same access points so you can create one for your phones, your kids, your guests – anything you wish. You can then use the power of the EdgeMax router product (additional cost as low as $150.00) to manage security, bandwidth and the Internet without any other products.

All you need is the 3 pack of wireless APs, an edgemax router and an internet connection and for under $500.00 you can have full speed wireless all over your home or office for up to 100 concurrent clients (YMMV).

But wait, there is more. When you install the software on a beefy PC (either dedicated or shared as your primary PC) you can have reporting (Insights)! Imagine monitoring your usage, usage for your kids, your guests and even those drive-by hackers who might be trying to break in and steal your bandwidth – long passphrases make good neighbours :-). You can setup alerts to send you emails whenever some device fails authentication or goes over a bandwidth cap.

The Unify controller uses Java so please be sure to install it and keep it up to date to avoid issues with your Java runtime. After you open the Controller application you will get a link like this.

Once the application has loaded you can click on the link inside the splash screen to open the management console (you can also launch it by typing https://localhost:8443/). I selected the existing AP I had and it indicated that there was an upgrade so I clicked on Upgrade to apply the newest firmware to my existing access point. This helps make it easy to keep them safe and secure.

The management controller software comes with it’s own hotspot feature so home office and small business can deploy this quickly and give guests a onetime Internet Voucher that can last a minimum of 8 hours and up to a user configurable period. This helps control access to Internet resources by reception or other staff and can help avoid reuse later once the office are closed. Personally I feel this is a great way to get access to network resources after visiting a site. Most home/companies seldom change passphrases on their own networks and rarely use guest networks.

I think this is a great medium range product line that can help most home owners and small business users deploy wireless safely and effectively without exposing their systems to hackers.