WLAN Design
Encryption

There are three encryption options available for WLANs . WLANs can be installed with no encryption, 40-bit WEP encryption, or 128-bit WEP encryption. Cisco has hardware-based encryption processing, so there is only a very small effect on performance when encryption is enabled on the product. Other WLAN vendors have software-based encryption, which significantly decreases the throughput of the LAN.

WEP encryption is known to be weak. The IEEE is enhancing WEP with TKIP and providing robust authentication options with 802.1x to make 802.11-based WLANs secure. At the same time, the IEEE is researching stronger encryption mechanisms. The IEEE has adopted the use of the Advanced Encryption Standard (AES) in the data-privacy section of the proposed 802.11i standard.