Unsecured broadband..

[sarahsarah14]

Hi, we have an unsecured broadband connection at home, how can I make it secure? I think our neighbours are using it as sometimes my internet is really slow in the middle of the day when no-one else is home! I've checked for virus' ect!

Cheers x

[CheekyChops]

Are you using wireless? If not, you don't need to make it secure as no-one else can use it anyway.

If it is wireless, check the manual that came with your router, it should tell you how to set it up.

[CushtyFred]

Your neighbours are probably using your connection to file share. I know I would if I was your neighbour.

[Ethel]

Oh yes, cushty - and how would you 'file share' exactly?

It is easy to hook up to an unsecured wireless network to access the internet - not so easy to file share.

Sarah - if you are wireless, follow the tips here to make it secure:

http://compnetworking.about.com/od/wirelesssec urity/tp/wifisecurity.htm

If you are not wireless, it is secure.

[BreenM]

If you are not wireless then what will be happening is most likely that you are using your broadband at the sametime your neighbourghs are using their own broadband along with potentially several others in your street perhaps. That's why Broadband providers only offer you 'up to' 4Mb, 8Mb, 16Mb etc. Depending on how many are sharing then this is speed is not always possible.

If you are wireless then you want to go into your settings and at the very least add a 5-digit WEP code. This is the most basic form of internet setting for the wirelless routers.

There will probably also be a setting that will actually show who is all connected to that router so if your neighbour for instance have named their PC with something you might recognise and have been using your wireless connection then that name would show up.

Hope this helps

[Neilzulu1]

The reason is more than likely that in the middle of the day more people are on line.