Know about your College WiFi and how it works...

KIIT-WIFI-NET.

                                                                                          

By-Abhishek Saran

The modern education system aims to form students’ ability to work with information not only limited to books but from a much wider source of information, ‘Internet’. Educational Institutions provide full Wi-Fi campuses to facilitate students to access the web.

KIIT-WIFI-NET. is a Campus Area Network (CAN) which is an interconnection of multiple LANs running across different hostels, department buildings and libraries with prime purpose of accessing the Internet. Before connecting to the internet students are redirected to a user login window known as Captive Portal. A captive portal is used to authenticate an existing user in Cyberoam through a web browser interface before granting access to the internet.

Now the bigger question. What exactly is Cyberoam?

Cyberoam is a Network Firewall running across the campus over client computers. A firewall is a network security system that monitors and controls the incoming and outgoing network traffic based on predetermined security rules. It typically establishes a barrier between a trusted, secure internal network and another outside network, such as the Internet, that is assumed not to be secure or trusted. Cyberoam Firewall uses identity-based security. To log in successfully the user is redirected to an IP address which is ‘192.168.100.1’ or ‘192.168.101.1’ depending upon the area of access. This opens a captive portal. This acts as a gateway to access the outside network providing security from DoS, DDoS, and IP Spoofing attacks.

Understanding the Mystery of 192.168.100.1

The entire KIIT-WIFI-NET has been mapped into different categories based on the geographic locations.

The IPv4 addressing system is a Class Full Addressing which creates 5 different classes namely A,B,C,D,E. Different Classes have different uses and 192.168.. falls in the Class C Private Network. Now the routers installed in the hostels and department have been given a common Private IP by our Network Administrator viz. ICT Cell.

Apart from the Internet, our Wi-Fi also consists of Local Area Networks(LANs). These LANs are wirelessly connected which is provided by Aruba Networks. Aruba, a Hewlett-Packard Enterprise company, is a networking vendor selling enterprise wireless LAN and edge access networking equipment.

The process of connecting to the internet through Wi-Fi is as follows:

The computer is connected to the nearest access point which is connected to switches. These can be found in cases at some regular distances for example on every floor of a building, in computer labs etc. These switches make up the Local area networks which are further connected together using a router which provides administration facilities along with access to the internet. The Information and Communication Technology(ICT) Department acts as Network Administrator and defines all the access rights.

Wi-fi has become a requirement for every student and we surely miss it while we are in our home during vacations.