Airport Extreme Routers How secure?

I just had to comment on the interesting forum post opened by Paul; PGB1 about finding a mysterious IP address in his router. It was quite a detective story. I was impressed with the patience and level of knowledge and reasoning the senior members of the forum had. Hat’s off to all of you.
It seemed to me from reading comments in forum posts years past that the senior members don’t use or have much respect for Airport Extreme routers. I'm probably wrong about that. Just wondering. Mine is the previous model 5th gen. Is there any reason concern on my part? Today everything seem hackable. And according to Equifax my critical info is already been lost. So why worry now.
Anyway Thanks for an opinion. And this is a great Mac Forum
another Paul

I have the Apple Extreme router and and like any router, you need to ensure that your WiFi password is secure enough (and something you change routinely) to avoid people getting onto your network. Physical access to the router obviously is a security breach, but then that device/person is on your premises.

A combination of a routine password change and short DHCP lease will ensure that any potential unknown devices will be kicked off and unable to reconnect.

Pick WPA2 personal (or enterprise if you have the option) and use a high entropy pswd (like 40 characters). The AirPort Extreme is rock solid, and Apple pushed about 1 week ago a firmware update to nail the vulnerability there was then, in theory. You may trust Apple for caring about security. No one will ever break through unto an Airport router.

Yes that is the go combining both alphabetical, numerical, and capitals and whilst 40 may be a tad long, of at least 15 characters. As I sit here, I can see no less than seven users have found my wifi but I am the only one logged in to both channels.

As I sit here, I can see no less than seven users have found my wifi but I am the only one logged in to both channels.

Click to expand...

Gee harry, I would have thought that everyone knows that you keep all your millions and valuables in old wool socks and one of the spare mattresses they wouldn't dare want to touch and nobody wants to bother using any slow max 5Mbps wi-fi they heard you have to use.

I'd say you're pretty safe and secure. :Blushing:




- Patrick
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