WARDRIVING

Before studying about the wardriving lets know how it all started. Wardriving and war dialing words are known and inspired by movie “war games” . War games movie in which wardialer is used to dial thousands numbers to find Computers connected through modems.

Wardialing is the act of using software that automatically finds computers tied with the modems.

Before the large-scale adoption of Internet, attackers use automated scripts to dial large blocks of Phone numbers in an effort to find modems. If the script found a modem, it would log various information about it (the number dialed, any prompt that was given, etc.), then move on to the next number. After the script was completed, the attacker could examine the output and determine numbers that may warrant further investigation. This practice of dialing in bulk became known as war dialing

Today it is not for the computers that connected through modems but networks connected through wireless networks and the act to find a wifi networks while driving is known as wardriving

Wardriving in which a user armed with a laptop or handheld devices installed with the software applications like nestumbler/kismet drives a vehicle to scan the wireless networks with in reach and grab all the details like ssid , channel , make etc.,

There are number of software’s available on net for Linux and windows and Macintosh operating systems.

Further this software’s (Applications) can be used in association with GPS to make maps which shows the longitude, latitude and configurations.

Even it can be benefited by using PCMCIA WLAN card with external antenna to scan a wireless networks which are in long distance.

Requirements

Laptop

WI-FI Lan card

PCMCIA WI-FI LAN Card

External Antenna (Optional)

GPS (Optional)

Maps (optional)

Application: Netstumbler (Windows), Macstumbler (mac os), Kismet (Linux)

In Windows the most popular application used for wardriving is NETSTUMBLER.

Netstumbler is an active scanner which broadcasts probe requests which makes WI-FI AP’s (Access points) to respond. Wireless access points configured by default to respond to these probe requests.

Netstumbler can be able to find details like ssid, channel, pwr, security (encryption type), vendor and etc. Netstumbler wouldn’t be able to get the details from a wi-fi networks which disables the SSID broadcasting.

The following screen shot shows the networks detected in stumbler.

Above figure shows the signal/noise

In Linux whole lot of applications available on internet, we discuss about Kismet & airosnot

Kismet is more effective then stumbler as it is a passive scanner, which reads the signal transmitting on air by AP, this application can get the details of the wi-fi network which disabled SSID broadcasting. Instead of broadcasting the probe requests kismet works passively listening all the traffic and get the details of the wi-fi networks present with in the range,

The following diagram shows the airsnort

The typical configuration for a wardriving is to place the laptop in the side seat/back seat place the GPS unit on the dashboard and to magnetically-mount the external antenna to the top of the car. In netstumbler we have an option to configure so that it can give a beep when it founds a new network.

A lot of options can be employed to maximize the number of wireless access points detected. One common option is to avoid backtracking down streets that you have already driven through. It helps to keep in mind the range of your external antenna so that you may be able to skip driving down side streets

As far as the speed of your driving is concerned, take note that you’re average GPS device will only update every second and it takes Kismet about 4 seconds to hop through all of the channels. NetStumbler will quickly detect wireless access points because it is actively seeking access points

Once a wardriving session has been completed, it is time to present the data in a visual form that is easy to und understand. The De-facto standard for doing this is to plot all of the wireless access points on a map and to color the markers red for encrypted and green for no encryption.

This process can be completed by uploading your data to a web site that serves as a global repository for discovered access points or to use readily available software on your computer to generate your own maps.

For detailed figures please go to following link

http://wi-fiwardriving.blogspot.com/