How To Secure Your Home Network Devices

How To Secure Your Home Network Devices

By Jerry Matson, 12/10/2019

I saw an article in my Google News feed recently about the FBI recommending that you separate your computers from your Internet devices in your home network. Those devices are commonly referred to as IoT or the “Internet of Things.”

Put another way, your computers with all your personal information should be on a separate network from your smart TV, Internet-connected security cameras, WiFi switches, home control hubs (Google Assistant, Alexa, Siri), etc. Those devices are commonly hacked because they have security flaws or, more commonly, they come with default passwords (like "admin" or "12345") and people never change them. So hackers get in.

Here is a link to the article I saw. FBI Recommends Securing Your Smart TVs and IoT Devices

"Unsecured devices can allow hackers a path into your router, giving the bad guy access to everything else on your home network that you thought was secure," the FBI Portland Office says.

"59.7% of routers have weak credentials or some vulnerabilities" and "59.1% of users worldwide have never logged into their router or have never updated its firmware," said Avast in its 2019 Smart Home Security Report published in February."

"Your fridge and your laptop should not be on the same network," the FBI says. "Keep your most private, sensitive data on a separate system from your other IoT devices."

The easiest way to protect your data from a hacker that manages to compromise one of your IoT devices is to secure your home network by segregating them on a separate network.

Secure Your Devices By Separating Them

That got me to thinking about how to do that. So I Googled around a little bit and found a reference on how to create a "guest" network on your home router. That would allow guests to log in with a simple password and not interfere with your main network.

But a "guest" network could be the answer to how to separate the various devices.

So I logged into our AT&T router and saw that I had created a guest network sometime in the past. The primary network had both a 2.4 GHz and 5 GHz radios but the guest network only had a 2.4 GHz radio.

I know from experience that most IoT devices are only capable of 2.4 GHz. The instructions usually say that. But I also know that most modern laptops and cell phones are capable of using the faster and more powerful 5 GHz frequency.

So I thought of how to separate my devices. If I disabled the 2.4 GHz radio on my primary network then only 5 GHz devices could log into it (like our laptops and cell phones). The guest network only has 2.4 GHz so bingo - two separate networks on two separate radios and frequencies!

But once I did that I realized I wasn't done yet. Some of my devices were configured to use the 2.4 GHz band on my primary network - which was now disabled. So I had to go around to each and every device, reset it, and reconfigure it for the 'new' 2.4 GHz "guest" network. That’s a bit of a chore if you don’t keep your instruction manuals and have to Google around or search on the various vendors’ websites. 

And that's how I did it! I hope this makes sense to you. The biggest problem is that most people are not very technical and don't even know where to find or how to log into their home router. If this is you then look at your router and see what model it is, the IP address and password is usually written on the back or the bottom of the router. Or Google for a manual or instructions. Or search on your Internet provider's website (Comcast, AT&T, who else?). Or maybe call their customer service and make them earn their payments from you.

I hope you find this useful!