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What's the best and safest way to share an open wifi signal without trampling my bandwidth and LAN security?

I want to give out some chunk of my wifi signal for free, but don't want all my bandwidth taken up by torrenting neighbors. I also don't want my LAN visible to just anyone.
I use an Apple Airport Extreme base station/NAS. Can this be done?

Nathan Messer asked in Geek Week 10 months ago | Report
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  • 101835_photo_99_small
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    Not easily with non dual band Airport. Netgear routers have Guest Wifi, and you can allot X ammount of bandwidth. The newer Dual Band Airport's can do it too

    My company bought a netgear for 50 bucks, it works quite well.

    Here's an article on how to set up an airport for guest access

    http://www.maclife.com/article/howtos/create_guest_wifi_network

    It has directions for securing a non-dual band Airport, but its a real pain. I'd just pick up a cheap netgear, or if you have money, upgrade your Airport.

    Brandon Humphries answered in Geek Week 10 months ago | Report
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  • 41492_100000206702811_1293_n_small
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    Do what I do: Go into your router program, log on, and get to the page that allows you to either allow or block certain MAC addresses. Enter your MAC address and allow it to be on the network. Anyone looking at your router online would see it as unsecured...but they won't be able to log on to it. Any friends you don't mind on your network can just give you the MAC address of whatever device they intend to use and you can allow them in.

    Bob Holt answered in Geek Week 10 months ago | Report
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    For the Airport Express, you'll want to open Airport Admin Utility and enable Access Control lists.

    Get the MAC address from the people you want to allow access to your network and enter it in the Access Control List.

    open airport utility
    double click airport name in left column
    select Access tab
    select Timed Access in dropdown

    shit, just follow this guide: http://arfore.com/2009/04/03/configure-airport-extreme-mac-filter-acl/

    Tell your neighbors that you're monitoring their bandwidth usage and to be respectful. If necessary you can block the ports that torrents use.

    You can see who's connected and other stats in Airport Utility under Advanced / Logs and Statistics / Wireless Clients

    Brian Geoghagan answered in Geek Week 10 months ago | Report
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  • Bierce1_small
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    If you want a granularity of sharing options and security as a priority, you should upgrade your router. Most consumer devices aren't designed for mixed use like you're asking for. I assume that you want this extra bandwith available to the public?

    Black Beetles in Amber answered in Geek Week 10 months ago | Report
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