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Wi-Fi, Wireless Broadband, Sensor & Personal Area Networks

• 802.11– Standards

– Applications

• Broadband Wireless Access– WiMAX

– Adapting 3G for WBA: UMTS TDD

• Personal Area Networks: Bluetooth, RFID, UWB

• Sensor Networks - Zigbee

• Comparisons of Technologies & Applications

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What is Wi-Fi?

• A wireless Ethernet standard– Wi-Fi - (wireless fidelity) IEEE 802.11b, 802.11a & 802.11g

• Why standards matter

• The downside of standards

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802.11 Standards

Standard Top Speed AchievableSpeed

No. ofChannels

FrequencyBand

802.11b 11 megabitsper second

5 megabits persecond

3 2.4 gigahertz

802.11a 54 megabitsper second

32 megabitsper second

12 5 gigahertz

802.11g 54 megabitsper second

14.4 megabitsper second

3 2.4 gigahertz

• 802.11n• Range• Capacity• Data Rate• Why these matter

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Portability in Enterprises

Laptops & handheld computers Cabling Need for computers in common areas Reliance on GroupWare Applications in vertical industries

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802.11 Components

• Access points

• The user interface

• Switches

• Controllers

Wireless accesspoint

Modem to the Internet

Each computer has a Wi-Fi compatible card or chip & antenna

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Workgroup switches (which are on individual floors), access points, and a core switch in an enterprise network.

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Wi-Fi in Hot Spots

•Speed

•Convenience

•Benefits to providers

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A Clearinghouse for Single Sign on & Billing

Clearinghouse passes billing data to WISP who bills user & pays clearing house a fee

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A secure virtual private network (VPN) connection between hotspots and enterprises using tunneling

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WISPs & Aggregators

• WISPs– Wayport– T-Mobile

• Aggregators– Boingo - billing “uber-aggregator”– GoRemote– iPass– Fiberlink

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Mesh networks

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Hot Spot Remote Access

Lost PDAs & laptops

Eavesdropping

Stolen data

Log in to WISP authenticated but data not secured

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Wi-Fi in Homes

• Why did residential customers use Wi-Fi earlier than business & commercial customers?

• How will future residential applications differ from initial applications?

• Is there a downside to Wi-Fi in homes?

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Voice over IP on corporate 802.11 wireless networks

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Security

• Security on wireless services compared to that of wireline

• Software on access points or devices connected to corporate networks

• Software on clients

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What can go wrong?

• Unauthorized access

• Snooping

• Competitive information compromised

• Rogue access points

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Security Tools

• WEP - Wired Equivalent Privacy– Easy to “crack”– Shared passwords

• WPA (Wi-Fi Protected Access) 802.11i subset– 128 bit level of encryption - more scrambled– “Keys” between user & access point changed more

frequently

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Implications for the CIO

Complexity Vs. ease of administration

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Compared to cellular

•13% of the cost of cellular data to provision*

•Stationary

•Speed

•Coverage

* Craig Mathias, the Farpoint Group

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What about WiMAX?

• 802.16d - fixed

• 802.16e - mobile

• Longer distances

• MMDS - Multipoint Microwave Distribution System

• Will these go the way of WinStar & Teligent?

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WiMAX service with overlapping wireless coverage between towers for redundancy

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WiMAX to Extend Wireline Networks

Provider’s TowerFiber

ISPISP

Customers’ antennas

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Bluetooth• Short distances

• 2.4 GHz

• Standards

• Version 1 vs. Version 2

Bluetooth wireless links

Palm

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RFID service in hospitals to manage assets

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Ultra-wideband (UWB) low-power signals

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A ZigBee partial mesh network

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Summary

• Wi-Fi use in enterprises will increase when:___

• Hot spots compared to Cellular?– Will wane as 3G grows– Will outpace 3G

• Explain the differences & similarities between fixed & mobile WiMAX

• Compare: bluetooth, RFID, Ultra-Wideband & Zigbee