Advice from Middle Aged Female Tech
Hollyecho Montgomery - 812-779-6088
Women's Computer Consulting
https://hollyecho.com
I have been in the industry with my own company since 1994. The entire time I have worked in this field there have been very few times any two techs ever agree completely. The advice I give here is based on my experiences, testing, and what I know works.
Today’s Subject: Who is also using your WiFi or network connection…
Checking who is using your bandwidth…
Most people are unaware that when someone is using your bandwidth or WiFi connection, they are also using your internet provider that YOU are paying for.
For example -- What if they are looking up porn, child porn, bomb making supplies, spreading hate mail? This directly impacts YOU. Why? Because it is YOUR IP address that is assigned to you by the ISP (internet service provider), and that is traced right back to you and your family. There has been SEVERAL cases where people that search for that kind of things, and they know if they use their own ISP or home router they could and would be caught and prosecuted.
Other reasons, not as much illegal, but bothersome, is the more devices using WiFi connection, the slower it gets, where if you are in an area that ONLY has Frontier DSL, and the ISP is already slower than dirt, this makes it 10x worse. Or what if you have Satelite provider (such as HugesNet), they are using your bandwidth usage allowance. I think you get the picture.
What can you do about it? Be aware of who, and what is using your WiFi or internet connection.
1.Go to your wireless router and check for the indicator lights. Your wireless router will have indicator lights for hardwired network connections. So, to check if others are using your WiFi connection, you have to shut down all devices that access Internet. If any of the indicator lights are still blinking, then it means that outsiders are stealing your WiFi connection. This is the easiest and quickest method to ensure whether others are using your WiFi connection. But, you have to make sure that each and every WiFi device is shut down or unplugged before checking the indicator lights.
2.You can check the details of devices connected to your WiFi using network admin method. To access the network administrative console, you should log into the console using your router’s IP address.
3.If you do not know the router’s IP address, go to Start -> Run and enter “cmd” to get a window as given below. The value corresponding to “Default Gateway” is your router’s IP address. Here are some other ways to find your router IP address.
4.You need to type your router’s IP address in any browser window (chrome, internet explorer or any browser) to login to the network administrative console. This console helps you get details about your wireless network actions. Once you type the router’s IP address in a browser window, you will get a login screen as given below.
5.Enter the username and password to get a screen as given below (The interface of the network administrative console varies from router to router. This screen is of D-Link router. If you are using a different router such as Netgear or Linksys, the screen will also be different. In short, it is not necessary that you will get the same screen as given below.)
6.Find the section which gives details of connected devices and related information. The information would be available under different menus in case of different routers. You might have to visit different links to get the correction section. There you could find details such as MAC address, IP address and signal strength and so on of each and every device connected to your router as of now.
7.Check whether there are other IP addresses that do not belong to your systems in the list.
If you do not know the IP addresses of all of your computers, then go to Start -> Run and enter “cmd” and in the black window enter “ipconfig /all”. That is one of the networking commands. Now you will get the list of IP addresses, which are connected to your router. So, check this list against the list shown in the network admin console. The MAC address is the physical address of the computer and it is a unique hexadecimal code to identify different systems in the network.
Other Ways To See Who is on MY WIFI
If you are not confident or experienced enough using network admin console, then you can go for easy-to-use third party software applications, which will help you do the same check. You can try software applications such as “Who Is on My WiFi” http://www.whoisonmywifi.com/ to identify intruders on your network. I
bought this product, but you can use the free trial first to see if it works for you. Example of what it reads out is:
Of Course this is off my network, and this is sample of a slow day! :)
Again, if you have ANY questions, don’t hesitate to email me! I answer all questions to the best of my ability. I am always about saving money and not spending it on things you don't need to.
Remember ANY questions, Email me at: Montgomery@Hollyecho.com.
