Hey, basically i have the old ds with pokemon white and i want to play online but it needs a wep key but my bt homehub 2.0 has a wpa key (the more modern key), so to play online i either have to buy one of their overpriced cables (£20) or i can change my internet to a wep key. Does this have any consequences with my internet? Will people be able to hack my internet easily? I know the steps to change it because i found a link to it but is it worth it or should i buy the cable?

WEP keys are quite easy to hack AFAIK, although I'm not sure that people care enough to bother. Your average Joe isn't going to know that they can be hacked, let alone how. WEP should be fine.

I'd buy the cable. WEP is signficiantly weaker than WPA. That said, it's up to you - it's not likely someone would try to break into your router anyway.

Will it muck up my internet in anyway or m ake it slower because i dont want to risk unless i 100% sure it wont break my internet?

No, it shouldn't have any effect on your internet.

It shouldn't mess it up at all. I doubt anyone really wants to hack into your internet. That said, it is easier to hack and less secure. I think you'd be fine either way. The wire may get annoying with you having to sit next to the router when you play (I assume that's how it works). It is of course all up to you, that's just my opinion.

I am a bit put off with the £20 price tag and the item is discontinued so would have to get a second hand one which could be unreliable. Is there anyway to change the wep back to the wpa if it was originally wpa?

Yes of course, it's all in the options for the BT HomeHub. I'd explain how but I'm not currently at home.. instructions will be in the internet somewhere. It'll be under the security tab, either in options or in advanced options - I'm not sure.

WEP works fine, it's enough to stop almost every single person that actually would see your network, since almost every single person will see it is locked and not even bother with it. If you are worried about it though your router might have MAC filtering capabilities. But really you don't need to worry at all.

WEP is vulnerable to a determined hack, by exploiting the known flaws, so if forced to used WEP for compatibility, you need to secure against possible intruders in other ways.

MAC address filtering is overrated, anyone smart enough to use a wep crack tool, will be smart enough to spoof a MAC address, but any extra deterrent is worth a go.

 

Key point, is to use a decent software firewall to protect the PC from an attacker, and to check router logs & stats.

 

Also, it seems the more useage, the easier it is to attack, so if you have to use WEP for a DS, it would be better if nothing else was on wireless.

 

Another possibilty would be to use a second router to provide WEP, and turn off when not needed, but then you may as well go for the cable option

Is it possible to keep changing back and forth from wep to wpa, so i can change it back when i stop playing pokemon online?

Yes, but I'd imagine that you'd need to keep signing on to the network each time you change security on each computer, so it would be a pain. It can be done though.

Sorry to be a nuisance again, if i changed to wep key and my phone is bt as well would it then be disconnected? If so when i changed it back to wpa key and i used the same wpa key would the phone automatically reconnect?

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It depends on what phone you're talking about. The normal phones that just plug into the phone lines would be fine. The BT Homehub phones that connect to your homehub and use a different number to your normal 'landline' phone.. I assume they would work 100%, although I couldn't vouch for that.

Um my phone is bt so same as the internet, but is connected by cable but you can take it out like the holder thing and walk around the house with it, so would it muck up the phone line?

Yeah all the phones should be fine. You can always revert it if they don't - but they will. My concerns are about the broadband phones but those are bt too (and plug and play) so they'll be fine too.

Thanks everyone for the help, it works and i am now playing online :D