ZyXEL Communications P-870HW-51a v2 User Manual

Chapter 7 Wireless LAN

P-870HW-51a v2 User’s Guide

The types of encryption you can choose depend on the type of authentication. 
(See 

 for information about this.)

For example, if the wireless network has a RADIUS server, you can choose WPA 
or WPA2. If users do not log in to the wireless network, you can choose no 
encryption, Static WEP, WPA-PSK, or WPA2-PSK.

Usually, you should set up the strongest encryption that every device in the 
wireless network supports. For example, suppose you have a wireless network 
with the ZyXEL Device and you do not have a RADIUS server. Therefore, there is 
no authentication. Suppose the wireless network has two devices. Device A only 
supports WEP, and device B supports WEP and WPA. Therefore, you should set up 
Static WEP in the wireless network.

Note: It is recommended that wireless networks use WPA-PSK, WPA, or stronger 

encryption. The other types of encryption are better than none at all, but it is still 
possible for unauthorized wireless devices to figure out the original information 
pretty quickly.

When you select WPA2 or WPA2-PSK in your ZyXEL Device, you can also select 
an option (WPA compatible) to support WPA as well. In this case, if some of the 
devices support WPA and some support WPA2, you should set up WPA2-PSK or 
WPA2 (depending on the type of wireless network login) and select the WPA 
compatible option in the ZyXEL Device.

Many types of encryption use a key to protect the information in the wireless 
network. The longer the key, the stronger the encryption. Every device in the 
wireless network must have the same key.

Your ZyXEL Device supports WiFi Protected Setup (WPS), which is an easy way to 
set up a secure wireless network. WPS is an industry standard specification, 
defined by the WiFi Alliance.

WPS allows you to quickly set up a wireless network with strong security, without 
having to configure security settings manually. Each WPS connection works 

Table 27   Types of Encryption for Each Type of Authentication

No Security

WPA

Static WEP
WPA-PSK

WPA2-PSK

WPA2