Cable internet vs DSL

[k4kyv]

I have been using cable internet service for the last few years. I believe our nominal download speed is 5 mb/s, but most of the online connection speed meters I have tried read about 3.5 or so. The available options are 3, 5 or 10 mb/s.

The phone co. called my XYL to-day and gave her a sales pitch for DSL. The cost would be a little less than what we are now paying for cable, and the maximum nominal speed they offer is 6 mb/s, whereas the cable max is 10 mb/s.

I have been relatively satisfied with our cable service, even though like most cable companies, their tech support sucks, but we haven't had a lot of problems lately to cause us to need it.

When we first upgraded from dial-up, DSL wasn't available at this QTH and cable was the only alternative. The phone co. says that DSL now available, but their website indicates that they cannot guarantee a download speed until the installation techs come out and check the line, and capabilities may vary according to location.

My gut feeling is if it ain't broke, don't fix it. But just wonder if anyone else has had experience with both types of service, and any opinions about how one compares to the other?

One concern I have had about DSL is digital white noise trash causing radio interference, similar to the hash reportedly caused by Homeplug in-house BPL devices. However, my cable modem dumps spurs throughout the HF range, about every 30 kHz. It isn't really a nuisance on 160-75-40, but if I wanted to work the higher frequencies, I would probably shut off the modem before going on the air.

Our present cable service, and the DSL service the phone co. is offering are both in the $40/month range.

[k9kjm]

Overall, Cable internet is faster than DSL (And more expensive)
Cable is competing on speed, DSL is competing on low price.
Notice that BOTH DSL and cable ads always say "UP TO"
Whatever speed...............
The actual DSL speed depends on just how far you are from the central office, Or a fiber node if your phone company is activating them.
Around here, DSL is being advertised now for 14.95 per month (UP TO 1.5 Mbs) #for a six month period. After the 6 months are up it goes to 29.95 per month.

DSL does seem to be the better deal overall, If you are interested in price........

Many areas now offer wireless service, And all I have seen are somewhat more expensive than both cable and DSL, All other factors considered. #But a good deal if you cant get either cable or DSL......... #

The direct from the satellite service seems to be the one to really avoid unless it is about the only way you can get service. #HIGH price and other problems with it.

[n2ize]

I bypassed DSL and went straight to fiber here. I get 20 mbps down and 5 mbps up. However the speed test show 19-20 mbps down and 4 mbps up. Still not too bad.

If I had to chose between DSL and cable I'd probably go with DSL. But that's primarilly because I can;t stand the local cable company.

[KC0VWU]

Quote[/b] (k4kyv @ April 06 2007,21:41)]My gut feeling is if it ain't broke, don't fix it.
Yup. I've had cable and DSL and cable wins by a mile.

[WF7A]

We did the cost comparisons and have had both DSL and cable for years now; at first we were delighted with the speed cable had over DSL, but with the addition of new subscribers "on the line" we've noticed a marked decrease in cable speed.

I guess it depends on what you're looking for: if you're looking for a lot of high-broadband use (downloading/streaming video) go with cable; if not, go with DSL.

[ka5piu]

Hello.

In Houston I do cable, it is faster than DSL by far.
In San Antonio the "new" AT&T has cable beat.
The u-verse service is the fastest thing out there, bar none.
Even the "slow" DSL is on a par with the basic cable offering.
But, the cable will improve at some point, that is a given.

[n6hcm]

Quote[/b] (n2ize @ April 07 2007,21:27)]I bypassed DSL and went straight to fiber here. I get 20 mbps down and 5 mbps up. However the speed test show 19-20 mbps down and 4 mbps up. Still not too bad.
tease! that's not going to come here for quite some time. i'd buy it in a second.

instead i have dsl (a package that at&t/sbc/pac*bell/... doesn't offer anymore) with a pile of fixed IP addresses for a good price ... and since it ain't broke i'm not going to make a change anytime soon.

comcast (the local cableco) offers more bandwidth at a higher cost, and their business product is pretty solid. i'm not sure i'd buy their residential service, tho.

[KG4CGC]

I don't like Charter Communications but I use their cable Internet connection. We don't have a choice of DSL.
5mb/s.

[n6yg]

The main draw back to Cable is it's crackability, It's extremely insecure. Anyone with a little bit of networking knowledge can easily monitor your connection. They can capture all your banking info, passwords, they can read your email all using simple packet sniffing software.

Cable just makes it way to easy for someone located on your node to crack your system. Thankfully most computer users are windows users with very limited computer networking knowledge so it's not very common for a neighbor to be doing this. Unfortunately the hacker does not have to be a cable subscriber on you node. All he needs is access to your group. Hackers search out insecure wireless connection's in neighborhoods that have cable Internet. All they need to do is find an insecure wireless access point. Once they find an insecure wireless connection they have access to all the computers on that cable's group. The main problem with cable is your own security is to depended on all the subscribers in your group.

Now I know your saying I don't have anything on my computer worth stealing. Probably so, don't worry the hackers can care less about those nude pictures of your wife, they want your money and here's how they can get it.

Once they have access to the cable group they can spoof the system and force all your data to go through their computer. Say they have been monitoring your connection and know you bank with Bank of America. Most people are creatures of habit, so they watch you for a while and learn that every Friday you log into your bank account. Well come Friday they are parked down the street with a laptop setup as a web server. They have already setup DNS spoofing so when you try to log into your bank you actually connect to their laptop and their server sends you a page that looks just like your banks. AT that point you put in your account number and password. Once you enter your sensitive information you get a page that says "sorry the system won't be available for 24 hours due to maintenance" Or "we are upgrading our servers, our online systems will be down until Monday" Now the thieves have from 24 hours to 2 days to drain your account, But don't worry your account will have been drained within minutes and long before you ever log off.. It's a simple hack. I performed a demo of this exact scenario at a network security conference over 10 years ago. Funny thing is it's simpler to do today then it was back then.

By the way, when the authority's finally investigate, the trail will end with the computer that has the weak wireless security that allowed the hacker's access to the system. You better hope it's not your system with the weak wireless security. It won't mater if you are the perpetrator or not. All your computers will be confiscated and you will have a lot of explaining to do. As far as the investigators are concerned all the evidence points to the attack coming from within your system. And it did! It's going to be hard to explain why the overseas funds transfer originated with your IP.

Just food for thought.

[k7kwh]

I have no choice.... at my location it is cable or no internet. Qworst has been promising that I will be able to get DSL at my house for 7 years so far..... but it's still not here...and Qworst has been paying for a lot of cable internet around here because of their false promises and false advertising. 2 months ago I finally told Qworst to go $#%& themselves and I got Vonage....now my phone is more reliable!!!!!

K7KWH



l

[W4MAJ]

Since DSL, cable and fiber is NOT available at my QTH, my choices are dial-up or satellite. We switched to satellite two years ago and it seems to work fine. There are a couple times each day where the system bogs down, but it's still faster than dial-up.

At my old QTH, a representative at Charter cable told me they "weren't investing in that Internet thingy, because they didn't think it was going to catch on". That was in 1999.

[N2RJ]

To me both are about the same, frankly, because most cable ISP's cap you at a lower speed than what is available anyway.

However, independence from the telco is why I've always chosen cable over DSL. I use VoIP for my home phone and doing that over DSL would be redundant. I'd have to pay for a home phone line anyway, because very few telcos offer DSL on a dry pair without phone service.

So here is how you choose. Just choose what is faster for the best price overall at your location.

In some areas that will be cable. In others that will be DSL.

Both have their trade offs.

Cable is shared bandwidth.

DSL degrades as you get further from the central office and is unavailable after a certain distance, especially if your line has loading coils on it.

Modern cable systems are mostly fiber and coax is used only for the "last mile." It's called HFC or Hybrid Fiber Coaxial. Therefore there wouldn't really be that many people sharing local bandwidth.

DSL uses an old copper network. However, their bandwidth isn't shared except higher up the chain.

Just to note how much variation between cable systems and DSL, here is what I've had:

2001 - 2002 - Time Warner cable NYC 2Mbps down/256k up
2002 - 2003 - Verizon DSL 1.5Mbps down/128k up
2003 - 2004 - RCN cable 8Mbps down/800k up
2004 - 2006 - Time Warner cable NYC 5Mbps down/512k up
2006 - 2007 - Cablevision Optimum Online 30Mbps down/5Mbps up
2007 - present - Service Electric Cable 10MBps down/512kbps up

Some of my friends on DSL have 7M/1M connections.

Others have speeds as low as 768k.

Hope this helps.

[K3XR]

I went with cable because DSL is not available in this rural area. #Comcast cable internet is as good, as their cable tv is bad, they are like two different companies. #Folks who I know, in this area, who have had both, seem to prefer cable.

[W1GUH]

Here's another vote for cable. I've had both cable and DSL, and I'm one of those who think it beats the pants off of DSL. I've got RoadRunner on Time Warner, and don't have any complaints at all. I came right up, and hasn't broken. Plus, I didn't load any roadrunner software, I just plugged in and took off. There are certain times when the speed dips...notably on Sun. Eve. when everybody's getting back to the city and going on the 'net. But it's still speedy, just not as speedy as usual. I remember noticing once that when I download big files, the speed appears to be throttled back by the ISP. It starts out speedy, then smoothly throttles back to something slower. It's not like the speed varies because of changing numbers of users. I know I saw this on DSL, can't remember if I've seen it on cable. But cable's fast enough that it wouldn't have been so noticeable.

I had a bad experience with AT&T DSL. They fixed what wasn't broken, and broke it. They "improved it", but they screwed up the job, to the point where I lost dial tone for a couple of day until they finally got it right.

PLUS...

At the time I did most of my internet in the wee hours, and everyday they'd take it down for maintenance. I finally got rid of it over that.

Question about security to 'PYF. That's an important concern, one I hadn't heard about. Can you supply a/some link/s about this? Is cable not as secure as DSL because we're all interconnected on the cable whereas with DSL there's individual wires? But it's kind of moot with me, I don't have a landline, only a cell phone.

And 'ize....how'd you get fiber into your home?

[W2ILP]

I use cable and it now works fairly well. I did the installation myself, which required a long run of 75 ohm coax through my house to a splitter where the cable enters for my TV sets.

After doing this work I don't want to switch now. I don't want to deal with the phone company's DSL. Direct fiber is not available in my area yet... but when it is I might consider it.

I don't think that there is any difference in security when you go from any system to any other. It may be possible to tap any system if there is enough incentive to do so. I could be wrong about this...but I don't worry about security when I select an ISP because I'm probably not worth the trouble to be tapped or monitored.

w2ilp (Internet Lipservice Provider)

[kn4ds]

Quote[/b] (n2ize @ April 07 2007,23:27)]I bypassed DSL and went straight to fiber here. I get 20 mbps down and 5 mbps up. However the speed test show 19-20 mbps down and 4 mbps up. Still not too bad.

If I had to chose between DSL and cable I'd probably go with DSL. But that's primarilly because I can;t stand the local cable company.
Unfortunately, in my particular area, we have Bob's Cable and BubbaComm is the phone company.

We're fortunate to have any Internet availability here, and the only "fiber" these guys know anything about is in their Metamucil.

So I settle for my satellite dish for TV and I do have DSL at a whopping 3 mb/sec.

[KA8NCR]

Quote[/b] (KF6PYF @ April 08 2007,03:04)]The main draw back to Cable is it's crackability, It's extremely insecure. Anyone with a little bit of networking knowledge can easily monitor your connection. They can capture all your banking info, passwords, they can read your email all using simple packet sniffing software.

Cable just makes it way to easy for someone located on your node to crack your system. Thankfully most computer users are windows users with very limited computer networking knowledge so it's not very common for a neighbor to be doing this. Unfortunately the hacker does not have to be a cable subscriber on you node. All he needs is access to your group. Hackers search out insecure wireless connection's in neighborhoods that have cable Internet. All they need to do is find an insecure wireless access point. Once they find an insecure wireless connection they have access to all the computers on that cable's group. The main problem with cable is your own security is to depended on all the subscribers in your group.

Now I know your saying I don't have anything on my computer worth stealing. Probably so, don't worry the hackers can care less about those nude pictures of your wife, they want your money and here's how they can get it.

Once they have access to the cable group they can spoof the system and force all your data to go through their computer. Say they have been monitoring your connection and know you bank with Bank of America. Most people are creatures of habit, so they watch you for a while and learn that every Friday you log into your bank account. Well come Friday they are parked down the street with a laptop setup as a web server. They have already setup DNS spoofing so when you try to log into your bank you actually connect to their laptop and their server sends you a page that looks just like your banks. AT that point you put in your account number and password. Once you enter your sensitive information you get a page that says "sorry the system won't be available for 24 hours due to maintenance" Or "we are upgrading our servers, our online systems will be down until Monday" Now the thieves have from 24 hours to 2 days to drain your account, But don't worry your account will have been drained within minutes and long before you ever log off.. It's a simple hack. I performed a demo of this exact scenario at a network security conference over 10 years ago. Funny thing is it's simpler to do today then it was back then.

By the way, when the authority's finally investigate, the trail will end with the computer that has the weak wireless security that allowed the hacker's access to the system. You better hope it's not your system with the weak wireless security. It won't mater if you are the perpetrator or not. All your computers will be confiscated and you will have a lot of explaining to do. As far as the investigators are concerned all the evidence points to the attack coming from within your system. And it did! It's going to be hard to explain why the overseas funds transfer originated with your IP.

Just food for thought.
Nonsense.

Ten years ago, this might have been true on an experimental cable system where the network was one giant shared ethernet segment. But since cable systems went hybrid fiber-coax, it's a switched ethernet connection and you're not going to monitor your neighbor's connection. Well, unless you call watching "who-has" ARP packets coming in from the system's DHCP server monitoring your neighbor.

The man-in-the-middle attack you describe can happen at any point along the internet. It's extremely unlikely to happen there though because the security is extremely GOOD at the network layer and because of technical issues that make a MITM attack there impractical. Gaining control of a router is one thing, but being able to reroute its SSL traffic to a destination implies that the destination has enough bandwidth to support the redirection, and the MITM application is fast enough to keep up with the entire SSL/TLS transaction in order to get meaningful data, and then reply back quickly enough in order to be undetected. Is it possible? Absolutely. It's far more likely to happen at a single destination as opposed to some spot on a backbone connection.

That single point is the client computer sitting somewhere on the internet and not backbone or bank router.

There's a new MITM attack involving Windows and Internet Explorer where malware monitors the communications between IE and the SSL libraries. Apparently IE doesn't natively speak SSL/TLS and instead relies upon Windows to do the work for it and the malware taps into the unencrypted internal communication. Brilliant piece of work that Internet Explorer is. Your fears there are not, unfortunately unfounded.

[KA8NCR]

Cable internet became available out where I live about six years ago and it was fairly good. But Charter has been having some corporate difficulties and while increasing prices, they've been slow to increase service. 3 megabits downlink and 256 kilobits uplink is anemic in the world of cable. And although they offer a 5 and 10 megabit service, the upload speeds still suck and there's constant complaints on dslreports.com that people have yet to achieve the speeds promised under 5 and 10 megabit.

Verizon offered 3 megabit DSL with 768 k upload about 18 months ago and it's been as solid as cable for half the price. I'm extremely happy with it, and Verizon doesn't port filter anything. Makes it nice for getting into the IRLP link and fixing problems remotely.

[N2RJ]

Quote[/b] (W1GUH @ April 08 2007,09:50)]Question about security to 'PYF. That's an important concern, one I hadn't heard about. Can you supply a/some link/s about this? Is cable not as secure as DSL because we're all interconnected on the cable whereas with DSL there's individual wires? But it's kind of moot with me, I don't have a landline, only a cell phone.
That used to be the case, but modern cable systems are pretty secure.

You used to be able to click network neighborhood and browse your neighbors PC's because everyone was on the same segment.

That's no longer true, fortunately, and additionally everyone seems to be behind a firewall or NAT device (router) of some sort, adding an additional layer of protection.

Quote[/b] ]
And 'ize....how'd you get fiber into your home?

Verizon has a fiber to the home service called FiOS. (http://www22.verizon.com/Content/ConsumerFiOS/)

The fiber goes directly to your house, and you can get phone, internet and TV delivered directly over fiber straight to your house. The TV portion uses a converter box with fiber on one end and coax on the other. It's fantastic if you can get it.

The cable companies are howling of course, because they are no longer a monopoly.

Cablevision in NJ has been showing propaganda ads talking about "Verizon's cable tax" which basically has to deal with Verizon lobbying the state to change franchise fees.

[w3mv]

You guys are lucky. I live close to two large metropolitan centers and I cannot get cable, DSL, or IEEE 802.16 (a.k.a. WiMax). Satellite is also a bust because it does not support IPSEC very well due to the propagation delay.

[KD6NIG]

The other issue that CAN present itself with cable (depending on your area) is that if you get a lot of people hooked into your node, eventually you won't see the peak speed during peak hours. Though supposedly some companies have imposed caps on 'heavy users' to bring the speed back up, until people hit these caps, they can be downloading-and bringing everyone else's shared speed down.

DSL, on the other hand, will limit to whatever the cap speed is. So you usually don't get the slowdowns at 7pm. People can heavily download all they like-it will just stop at the stated speed.

People like cable because it will go above the speed when its available. But when it first came out, that would often degrade others.

Take a look at the forums at Broadband reports (http://www.broadbandreports.com) and check out your company as well as the one you're thinking about switching to. You may find out they cap, or not.

Of course, I don't worry about caps as I'm not a bit torrent user or a heavy gamer, but you have to be careful because that doesn't mean other people on your same node may do so. If they cap your speed will probably be fine. If they don't, then you may have issues with cable, if they haven't instituted bandwidth capping. Most people hate it if they are heavy downloaders. But if you aren't, a capping policy means there won't be one person always using the bandwidth. Caps can be good or bad depending on what you actually do on the internet.

I've always liked DSL because the speed is always there, no matter what. It sometimes will spike a little higher, but if its a busy time, everyone gets capped out at the same speed so no one user is taking up the line. They also tend to add bandwidth a lot quicker. Cable has more local nodes, so you're likely sharing with less people, but usually the only solution to fix a overloaded node issue is to split the node users in half. That works if the abusive user winds up on the half you're not on.

Most people I know use cable without issues, though.

One other thing I like about DSL now (AT&T) is they now have a no-contract option. Most cable deals I have seen still require a one year commitment. So far, I have a feeling that may change.

But check out that website. You can speed test and do all kinds of stuff. Often they can tell if an area is having a problem by the speed tests before the provider even knows.

[W3MIV]

I own two houses. One is equipped with DSL and the other with cable. In my experience, both are very workable and good systems. Cable seems faster, but not by a whole lot. My DSL is commercial, BTW.

Where I am most of the time, I use DSL and I have no trouble with it. I have no idea of the actual speed, but I very often upload and download very large graphics files (hundreds of megabytes) without hassle, so it is fast enough.

In the other house (in Virginia) I originally had Adelphia cable internet, and I was able to contract for internet only with them. Alas, Adelphia was bought out by Comcast, and I am not sure when the usual Comcast "No TV, No internet" policy will come into effect there. I do not have access at that location to DSL.

The trouble with Comcast cable is that you often have to take both internet AND TV via the cable -- Comcast in this area will not let you have internet without TV. I have DirecTV satelite and I am not interested in chucking out all the satelite gear and changing over to Comcast cable TV. I had my experiences with them twenty years ago when I first bought the house. Never again.

Verizon put fibre in the street and is calling me every other day to switch everything over to FIOS, but I am not sanguine of happiness with that system as yet.

[n2ize]

Quote[/b] (W1GUH @ April 08 2007,07:50)]Here's another vote for cable. #I've had both cable and DSL, and I'm one of those who think it beats the pants off of DSL. #I've got RoadRunner on Time Warner, and don't have any complaints at all. #I came right up, and hasn't broken. #Plus, I didn't load any roadrunner software, I just plugged in and took off. #There are certain times when the speed dips...notably on Sun. Eve. when everybody's getting back to the city and going on the 'net. #But it's still speedy, just not as speedy as usual. #I remember noticing once that when I download big files, the speed appears to be throttled back by the ISP. #It starts out speedy, then smoothly throttles back to something slower. #It's not like the speed varies because of changing numbers of users. #I know I saw this on DSL, can't remember if I've seen it on cable. #But cable's fast enough that it wouldn't have been so noticeable.

I had a bad experience with AT&T DSL. #They fixed what wasn't broken, and broke it. #They "improved it", but they screwed up the job, to the point where I lost dial tone for a couple of day until they finally got it right. #

PLUS...

At the time I did most of my internet in the wee hours, and everyday they'd take it down for maintenance. #I finally got rid of it over that.

Question about security to 'PYF. #That's an important concern, one I hadn't heard about. #Can you supply a/some link/s about this? #Is cable not as secure as DSL because we're all interconnected on the cable whereas with DSL there's individual wires? #But it's kind of moot with me, I don't have a landline, only a cell phone.

And 'ize....how'd you get fiber into your home?
Quote[/b] ]
And 'ize....how'd you get fiber into your home?


In my neighborhood Verizon runs fiber optic clable right to the house through which they run both your phone and Internet connection. They market it as FIOS. I installed it this past fall and I have been quite satisfied. It's been fast and thus far reliable with no downtime (knock on wood). Speeds are pretty darned fast 10 - 20 mbps down and 5 mbps up depending on the package. Unfortunately it isn't available everywhere. I was lucky. If I were to move it would be hit or miss as to whether or not it would be available. However, they have been expanding.

[n2ize]

Quote[/b] (W3MIV @ April 08 2007,09:51)]I own two houses. One is equipped with DSL and the other with cable. In my experience, both are very workable and good systems. Cable seems faster, but not by a whole lot. My DSL is commercial, BTW.

Where I am most of the time, I use DSL and I have no trouble with it. I have no idea of the actual speed, but I very often upload and download very large graphics files (hundreds of megabytes) without hassle, so it is fast enough.

In the other house (in Virginia) I originally had Adelphia cable internet, and I was able to contract for internet only with them. Alas, Adelphia was bought out by Comcast, and I am not sure when the usual Comcast "No TV, No internet" policy will come into effect there. I do not have access at that location to DSL.

The trouble with Comcast cable is that you often have to take both internet AND TV via the cable -- Comcast in this area will not let you have internet without TV. I have DirecTV satelite and I am not interested in chucking out all the satelite gear and changing over to Comcast cable TV. I had my experiences with them twenty years ago when I first bought the house. Never again.

Verizon put fibre in the street and is calling me every other day to switch everything over to FIOS, but I am not sanguine of happiness with that system as yet.
Quote[/b] ]
Verizon put fibre in the street and is calling me every other day to switch everything over to FIOS, but I am not sanguine of happiness with that system as yet.


I've had it installed here. Works fine. Extremely fast. Costs a bit more than DSL but worth it IMHO.

[n6yg]

Quote[/b] (ka8ncr @ April 08 2007,08:52)]nonsense.

Ten years ago, this might have been true on an experimental cable system where the network was one giant shared ethernet segment. But since cable systems went hybrid fiber-coax, it's a switched ethernet connection and you're not going to monitor your neighbor's connection. Well, unless you call watching "who-has" ARP packets coming in from the system's DHCP server monitoring your neighbor.

The man-in-the-middle attack you describe can happen at any point along the internet. It's extremely unlikely to happen there though because the security is extremely GOOD at the network layer and because of technical issues that make a MITM attack there impractical. Gaining control of a router is one thing, but being able to reroute its SSL traffic to a destination implies that the destination has enough bandwidth to support the redirection, and the MITM application is fast enough to keep up with the entire SSL/TLS transaction in order to get meaningful data, and then reply back quickly enough in order to be undetected. Is it possible? Absolutely. It's far more likely to happen at a single destination as opposed to some spot on a backbone connection.

That single point is the client computer sitting somewhere on the internet and not backbone or bank router.

There's a new MITM attack involving Windows and Internet Explorer where malware monitors the communications between IE and the SSL libraries. Apparently IE doesn't natively speak SSL/TLS and instead relies upon Windows to do the work for it and the malware taps into the unencrypted internal communication. Brilliant piece of work that Internet Explorer is. Your fears there are not, unfortunately unfounded.
Let see Hmmm No you are wrong.. I can perform this attack easier today then 10 years ago. One of the things that makes it easier is all the high speed wireless access points. So few of them are secured and even when they are secured most are using such simple passwords that most of the time it's trivial.

I have been working with computers since I was 13. When I retired my Capt's hat 10 years ago I opened up a network security firm. Network security is my job, among other things we specialize in network intrusion audits & detection. What this means is I get paid to hack into corporate intranets. There isn't a day that goes by where I don't get to shame some Microsoft certified network engineer by cracking their system an downloading customers credit card information. I really enjoy my job! I love the looks on a CEO's face when I hand them a CD with all his corporate and customer financial records on it. With more and more company's switching to Microsoft server products cracking network security has become easier then ever. There was a time when it was challenging. As Microsoft's operating systems become more bloated they become easier to crack. I'm at the point of being able to crack a Microsoft server in about 10 min. The quickest I have been able to crack one is 4 min the longest is about 20. Cable networks are trivial to crack. The only saving grace is so few Americans today are network savvy. What this means is most attacks come from outside the country. Attacking a cable subscriber from the Internet is just as complex or easy as a DSL customer. Where Cable costumers suffer is from local attacks. I can drive down any street in a neighborhood that offers cable Internet and be logged in watching network traffic in minutes!


By the way If you cant get fiber, I vote for DSL.

[KD6NIG]

Quote[/b] (W3MIV @ April 08 2007,09:51)]I own two houses. One is equipped with DSL and the other with cable. In my experience, both are very workable and good systems. Cable seems faster, but not by a whole lot. My DSL is commercial, BTW.

Where I am most of the time, I use DSL and I have no trouble with it. I have no idea of the actual speed, but I very often upload and download very large graphics files (hundreds of megabytes) without hassle, so it is fast enough.

In the other house (in Virginia) I originally had Adelphia cable internet, and I was able to contract for internet only with them. Alas, Adelphia was bought out by Comcast, and I am not sure when the usual Comcast "No TV, No internet" policy will come into effect there. I do not have access at that location to DSL.

The trouble with Comcast cable is that you often have to take both internet AND TV via the cable -- Comcast in this area will not let you have internet without TV. I have DirecTV satelite and I am not interested in chucking out all the satelite gear and changing over to Comcast cable TV. I had my experiences with them twenty years ago when I first bought the house. Never again.

Verizon put fibre in the street and is calling me every other day to switch everything over to FIOS, but I am not sanguine of happiness with that system as yet.
The "No TV-No internet" policy, at least for Comcast here, is an additonal $8 a month for internet only. So basically, you pay them $8 for nothing, or you can get "basic basic" for $14ish.

I don't know any people without the TV part, but it IS still an option.

The highest tier DSL (6M/1.5M) around here on the T is $34.99 a month plus other "fees, taxes, etc," so its closer to $40. Comcast's lowest tier is $45 (well, 29 for 3 months then 49 thereafter).

I'm on the second level right now, if it works well, I may move it up a notch. The funny thing was, you could order the first 2 levels online, but if you wanted the faster ones, you had to call. I'm thinking they send someone to test, or they want someone in the office to verify you're close enough. I go to the website now and I could upgrade it to the highest level with a few clicks....

[KA8NCR]

Quote[/b] (KF6PYF @ April 08 2007,15:10)]
Quote[/b] ]
Let see Hmmm No you are wrong.. I can perform this attack easier today then 10 years ago. One of the things that makes it easier is all the high speed wireless access points. So few of them are secured and even when they are secured most are using such simple passwords that most of the time it's trivial.


Unsecured wireless networks are a different problem than being able to monitor your neighbors connectivity through the cable modem. Let's try to keep this on topic; the original problem described the problems of a shared ethernet segment, not sniffing your neighbors wireless connection.

WPA and WPA2 are not trivial because the key roll is usually set to about 3600 seconds. By the time you brute-force your way into decrypting anything, the key has rolled again. And that password? Only starts the temporal key exchange and is never used again.

Quote[/b] ]
Cable networks are trivial to crack. The only saving grace is so few Americans today are network savvy. What this means is most attacks come from outside the country. Attacking a cable subscriber from the Internet is just as complex or easy as a DSL customer. Where Cable costumers suffer is from local attacks. I can drive down any street in a neighborhood that offers cable Internet and be logged in watching network traffic in minutes!


As I said in my previous post, the security on the client side is usually very poor and that's why residential users are targets.

My network resides at irlp.rudn.com. I await your post on QRZ the contents of the "dropbox" directory. There's two VPN services running, ssh, smtp and of course the IRLP system. Or if you want to drive by my QTH, the Airport Extreme is dutifully sending out "Airport" as its SSID. Have at it.

Extra bonus points if you can tell me the cute LPR spool name for the Brother laser printer.

[n6yg]

Quote[/b] ]Unsecured wireless networks are a different problem than being able to monitor your neighbors connectivity through the cable modem. Let's try to keep this on topic; the original problem described the problems of a shared ethernet segment, not sniffing your neighbors wireless connection.

You still don't understand... once you find an unsecured wireless network connected to a Cable provider you will have access to all the computers on that node, not just the computer attached to the wireless system..

True Cable is a type of pseudo switched network. But only switched between different distributions blocks. All the computers connected to the same distribution block are visible to all the other computers on the same distributions box. Mind you there are measures taken in the Cable modems themselves to prevent the average user from snooping. Most of the time you can not just click network neighborhood and see your neighbors computer.

Quote[/b] ]WPA and WPA2 are not trivial because the key roll is usually set to about 3600 seconds. By the time you brute-force your way into decrypting anything, the key has rolled again. And that password? Only starts the temporal key exchange and is never used again.

True WPA and WPA2 are far more robust then WEP, unfortunately to many people use simple passphrase's. When and if EVERYONE starts using WPA and more robust passwords then attacks such as the one I described will become much more difficult.

Personally we have setup an in house radius server and hotspot. This gives us the ability to let friends and guests log into the network and gain access to the Internet without compromising the network by disclosing the WPA passphrase. Of course for added security the wireless system is firewalled from the local intranet.

Quote[/b] ]My network resides at irlp.rudn.com. I await your post on QRZ the contents of the "dropbox" directory. There's two VPN services running, ssh, smtp and of course the IRLP system. Or if you want to drive by my QTH, the Airport Extreme is dutifully sending out "Airport" as its SSID. Have at it.

Don't fool yourself, we charge between $250 and $500 an hour for standard network audits, your not going to get a free audit. Besides there are many legal issues to contend with. I just can't go off and start hacking into someones system. How do I know you have the authority to authorize an audit on that system. There are wavers and contracts that need to be read and signed. Your ISP needs to be informed of the the date and time and the nature of work to be performed. Your ISP must also consent in writing too the work being performed.

Now if you are interested in a network security audit we can surly accommodate you. Even though this is my company I don't normally deal with sales or the legal aspects, that's what attorneys and sales staff are for. Never the less I will do my best to describe the process for you.

Here is the basic information.
We require a $250 setup fee and the first hour in advance. Billing is 1 hour minimum with additional time billed in 1/2 hour increments. If you send me a private message with your physical address. I will have my girl send off the contracts and wavers. Simply sign them and return them with a company check for $750. We will contact your ISP for you. After your ISP has returned the necessary consent form's we can schedule your audit. Keep in mind this is our busy time of year. There is approximately a 90 day waiting list. If you have an emergency situation and need an immediate audit we can bump you to the top of the list but there is an additional fee and hourly rates are higher for emergency service. If you would like a WIFI security audit the fee's are the same plus travel expenses and travel time billed at $150 an hour.

Since it sounds like you are running a mac system. A network audit is probably not necessary. Further more it would most likely be cost prohibitive as Mac systems are much more robust and the time needed to fully test them is substantially higher then Microsoft server products.

73
KF6PYF

[n6yg]

Quote[/b] (ka8ncr @ April 08 2007,21:23)]Quote[/b] (KF6PYF @ April 08 2007,15:10)]
Quote[/b] ]
Let see Hmmm No you are wrong.. I can perform this attack easier today then 10 years ago. One of the things that makes it easier is all the high speed wireless access points. So few of them are secured and even when they are secured most are using such simple passwords that most of the time it's trivial.


Unsecured wireless networks are a different problem than being able to monitor your neighbors connectivity through the cable modem. Let's try to keep this on topic; the original problem described the problems of a shared ethernet segment, not sniffing your neighbors wireless connection.

WPA and WPA2 are not trivial because the key roll is usually set to about 3600 seconds. By the time you brute-force your way into decrypting anything, the key has rolled again. And that password? Only starts the temporal key exchange and is never used again.

Quote[/b] ]
Cable networks are trivial to crack. The only saving grace is so few Americans today are network savvy. What this means is most attacks come from outside the country. Attacking a cable subscriber from the Internet is just as complex or easy as a DSL customer. Where Cable costumers suffer is from local attacks. I can drive down any street in a neighborhood that offers cable Internet and be logged in watching network traffic in minutes!


As I said in my previous post, the security on the client side is usually very poor and that's why residential users are targets.

My network resides at irlp.rudn.com. I await your post on QRZ the contents of the "dropbox" directory. There's two VPN services running, ssh, smtp and of course the IRLP system. Or if you want to drive by my QTH, the Airport Extreme is dutifully sending out "Airport" as its SSID. Have at it.

Extra bonus points if you can tell me the cute LPR spool name for the Brother laser printer.

I hope you have patched your Airport extreme ! As this was still an unpatched vulnerability I did not want to say anything yesterday but there is a exploitable vulnerability "Ipv6" in the Airport extreme 802.11n* that would have allowed me to see files on your system. Talk about irony, Apple just released a patch for it today.. As you can see I might just have been able to read your files or More...

You better patch your wireless access point !

Link (http://docs.info.apple.com/article.html?artnum=305366)

[KA8NCR]

Quote[/b] (KF6PYF @ April 09 2007,16:55)]
Quote[/b] ]
You still don't understand... once you find an unsecured wireless network connected to a Cable provider you will have access to all the computers on that node, not just the computer attached to the wireless system..


No, I do understand; completely. At this point, it doesn't matter WHERE you are on the internet, the target client machine is unprotected. Ergo, it has NOTHING to do with the network infrastructure. Again, the OP said that cable networks were insecure because they were on a shared ethernet segment and that isn't the case. Period.

You see them not because cable network is insecure, you see them because they do not have any form of firewall. Difference is that isn't a fault of the network infrastructure, it's the fault of the client.

Quote[/b] ]
True Cable is a type of pseudo switched network. But only switched between different distributions blocks. All the computers connected to the same distribution block are visible to all the other computers on the same distributions box. Mind you there are measures taken in the Cable modems themselves to prevent the average user from snooping. Most of the time you can not just click network neighborhood and see your neighbors computer.




Okay, run tcpdump or go get Ethereal, sniff your cable modem and let me know what you find.

Quote ]
Don't fool yourself, we charge between $250 and $500 an hour for standard network audits, your not going to get a free audit.


Darn.


Quote[/b] ]
Besides there are many legal issues to contend with. I just can't go off and start hacking into someones system. How do I know you have the authority to authorize an audit on that system. There are wavers and contracts that need to be read and signed. Your ISP needs to be informed of the the date and time and the nature of work to be performed. Your ISP must also consent in writing too the work being performed.


Yeah, I wouldn't want you being confused with all the Russian kids trying to get into my network on a daily basis.

Quote[/b] ]
Now if you are interested in a network security audit we can surly accommodate you. Even though this is my company I don't normally deal with sales or the legal aspects, that's what attorneys and sales staff are for. Never the less I will do my best to describe the process for you.


I really don't need any surly accommodations; I have a wife.

Quote[/b] ]
73
KF6PYF


Best 73 and good luck in the contest.

[KA8NCR]

Quote[/b] (KF6PYF @ April 10 2007,11:25)]I hope you have patched your Airport extreme ! As this was still an unpatched vulnerability I did not want to say anything yesterday but there is a exploitable vulnerability "Ipv6" in the Airport extreme 802.11n* that would have allowed me to see files on your system. Talk about irony, Apple just released a patch for it today.. As you can see I might just have been able to read your files or More...

You better patch your wireless access point !

Link (http://docs.info.apple.com/article.html?artnum=305366)
And your going to talk to it IPV6, how?

Yes, that'll need to get fixed at some point.

[KI4LZK]

I hate Charter Communications. When I lived in Clarksville TN the cable went out every 2 or 3 days. Everytime I called they told me their power supply had died. Here at Ft. Riley we had Charter and then their contract was bought out by another company.

73 de KI4LZK