Wireless LANs Booming In Dublin

Tax-News.com, London

20 August 2002

Irish technology consultancy Enigma and the Communications Network Research Institute (part of the Dublin Institute of Technology) have been collecting data on the rapid growth of wireless LANs in the city, reports ElectricNews.Net.

Take-up of 802.11b is occurring at a rapid pace in Dublin, researchers told the news service, with better than expected security measures. The researchers were able to detect 378 access points for 802.11b in just one section of Dublin.

"We found that on some of the routes, between three and four new access points were popping up each week, which really shows how popular the technology is becoming," said Niall Murphy, founder and senior research consultant of Enigma.

"We are doing better than the Americans in terms of security," Murphy added. He said that of the nodes detected in the research, 39% had WEP (Wired Equivalent Privacy) installed as a first layer of security.

The WEP system is a part of a wireless network which encrypts data as it is transmitted and is generally considered the minimum level of security Wi-Fi networks should have, says the report.

The Communications Network Research Institute (CNRI) is an institute of the Dublin Institute of Technology (DIT). It was founded in July 2001 to perform pure and applied research in all aspects of communications networks and is currently the home of a Science Foundation Ireland research project into resource allocation.

Enigma Consulting, is a Dublin based firm specialising in Internet and telecommunications solutions. The firm's main business is designing and implementing Internet services.

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