openSUSE 11.0 - Howto configure for non-broadcast ESSID

English Network/Internet
1

My wireless network functions great as long the ‘Broadcast ESSID’ is enabled on the AP. This is a great security risk for me.
There is no option in YAST2 → Network Settings nor do I know what option(s) to add to either ath0.conf or wpa_supplicant.conf files.
The network is functioning in WPA-PSK mode.
Any help is greatly appreciated.

Thanks,
EZputter

2

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Have you tried using Network Manager? It makes this all fairly easy.

Good luck.

EZputter wrote:
| My wireless network functions great as long the ‘Broadcast ESSID’ is
| enabled on the AP. This is a great security risk for me.
| There is no option in YAST2 → Network Settings nor do I know what
| option(s) to add to either ath0.conf or wpa_supplicant.conf files.
| The network is functioning in WPA-PSK mode.
| Any help is greatly appreciated.
|
| Thanks,
| EZputter
|
|
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3

I am very new to linux, so everything is eye opening for me.
I use gnome and the preferred network configuration method (?) is through Yast2 ‘network settings’. Unfortunately, I can’t find an option in Yast2 'network settings’to configure the wireless to find AP without the ESSID Broadcast, nor do I know what to add to ‘ath0.conf’ or ‘wpa_supplicant.conf’.

4

EZputter wrote:
> My wireless network functions great as long the ‘Broadcast ESSID’ is
> enabled on the AP. This is a great security risk for me.
> There is no option in YAST2 → Network Settings nor do I know what
> option(s) to add to either ath0.conf or wpa_supplicant.conf files.
> The network is functioning in WPA-PSK mode.
> Any help is greatly appreciated.

Hiding the ESSID is NOT a security feature. Anyone running wireshark will find
your network and its hidden ESSID in short order. As long as your WPA-PSK
passphrase is 20 characters or more, and is not in a dictionary, you are safe.
All you do with a hidden ESSID is make it harder for you to connect.

Larry

5

have you read the stickies at the start of this section ? especially the contribution from prhunt ? namely

Scenario: You need to use WPA security for your wireless connection, and the access point has a hidden SSID.

Problem: Your wlan won’t associate with the access point even though your passphrase and all other config details are correct.

Solution: As root, edit the wlan device configuration file and add the following two entries:

WIRELESS_HIDDEN_SSID=‘yes’
WIRELESS_AP_SCANMODE=‘2’

This configuration is located in /etc/sysconfig/network/ifcfg-wlan0
(or a similar file - it should be fairly obvious).

Sources: wpa_supplicant docs.
/etc/sysconfig/network/ifcfg.template

Andy

6

deltaflyer44 schrieb:
> have you read the stickies at the start of this section ? especially the
> contribution from prhunt ? namely

OT: I have read a couple of posts mentioning stickies. What are you
talking about? My newsreader displays post sorted by time (newest first).

Thanks
Klaus

Linux User #54760

7

Andy,
Thank you for the response.
Per your suggestion, this is what I did:

  1. Edited /etc/sysconfig/networks/ath0.conf (my wireless) & added:
    WIRELESS_HIDDEN_SSID=‘yes’
    WIRELESS_AP_SCANMODE=‘2’
  2. Disabled the AP’s ‘Broadcast ESSID’
  3. Restarted the AP (for safe measures)
  4. Restarted the laptop

Results: Network Manager trys to connect to AP & AP’s wireless light turns ON momentarily, but then Popup on the screen asks for passphrase. Supplying the passphrase results in the same cycle.

Other Windows based laptops connect with no issues.

Any other thoughts? My searching through the internet is taking me through the same scenarios.

Thanks …

8

Stickies are information posts which appear at the start of the section. It is the very first post for that section

Andy

9

deltaflyer44 wrote:

>
>
> Stickies are information posts which appear at the start of the
> section. It is the very first post for that section
>

Whatever “stickies” are, they are useless for the half of us who participate
in these discussions as nntp feeds. There are no “stickies” for us. If they
are general faqs, perhaps they can be posted periodically, so the posts
don’t expire.

bob@rsmits.ca (Robert Smits, Ladysmith BC)

“I’m not one of those who think Bill Gates is the devil. I simply suspect
that if Microsoft ever met up with the devil, it wouldn’t need an
interpreter.” - Nicholas Petreley

10

deltaflyer44 schrieb:
> Klaus Krtschil;1841903 Wrote:
>>
>> OT: I have read a couple of posts mentioning stickies. What are you
>> talking about? My newsreader displays post sorted by time (newest
>> first).
>
> Stickies are information posts which appear at the start of the
> section. It is the very first post for that section

The first post I see in this group is this:

> From: choukai <choukai@no-mx.forums.opensuse.org>
> Newsgroups: opensuse.org.help.network-internet.wireless
> Subject: openSUSE 11.0 & RT2500pci wireless problems
> Message-ID: <choukai.3bavw0@no-mx.forums.opensuse.org>
> Date: Fri, 20 Jun 2008 11:06:04 GMT

but I don’t think that is one of those “stickies” you are talking
about, and if I choose a different sort order for the group
another one will be first. So how would I find or recognize them
stickies in my newsreader?

Thanks,
Tilman

–
Tilman Schmidt
Phoenix Software GmbH
Bonn, Germany

11

good question, i’ll have to fire up my nntp suite & have a fiddle,i’ll also discuss this with the other admins/mods

Andy