Wi-Fi Has Grown Up

For the last 4 years, I have been very happy with my Linksys Wi-Fi enabled router at home. But when the kids knocked it off the shelf, I was suddenly in the market for a new router. This prompted me to dive deeply into the Wi-Fi world, which has changed drastically in the last few years. Many of our smaller clients would use these home routers for their Wi-Fi needs and they worked pretty well. If you had to do some serious data crunching though, you always plugged in.

Well, things have changed now. Wi-Fi networks, though not as fast as wired, have substantially decreased the gap. Without breaking the bank you can have multiple Wi-Fi hotspots, all using the same SSID (the name you connect to) and will happily pass you from one access point to the next as you travel from your office to the conference room. Now you can securely wander the office with great speeds without having to cross your fingers each time you give a presentation.

While the above sounds fantastic, the icing on top is that many of these access points update themselves automatically. As we become more and more dependent on these devices to access the Internet, they become prime targets for hackers. The older Wi-Fi hot spots were never updated and frequently sat for years on the same firmware, creating a security hole. Many of the better systems will automatically update their software, so you are always on the latest version and always protected.

If you are running a home router or older access points, give us a call at Thrive so we can explain how running newer equipment can help you stay better protected and realize that wire-free dream.