Will my network show up on somebody else's laptop?

When I log onto my laptop, I can access a list of all (ok, all two of) the networks in my neighborhood that are up and running, with name

eg: "Linksys" unprotected network (and then signal strength)

My network is secured, but I'm still wondering if, when neighbors log on, they can see my network name in their list of networks. Even though it's secured, I'm not crazy about the thought of teenage geeks deciding to try the challenge of getting in, and I keep forgetting to turn the modem/router off when I'm not home for extended periods.

 

Clare,
Some where in the settings menus for your wireless router is a 'check box' that lets you enable/disable 'broadcast ssid'. Set this to disable and then your router won't announce its name for all windows users to see.

Keep in mind that there are easy to get programs that will let people find your wireless network anyway, if they want to look for it. So, as long as you selected WPA encryption you really have little to worry about. Hacking WPA is pretty difficult from what I have read about it. The casual/curious hacker won't be up to it, unlike WEP cracking which any script kiddy can do.

 

Right, you can turn off SSID, but this also means you have to do a little more manual work to connect from other machines for the first time.

 

Clare
There is no need to worry if you have WPA enabled. I live 700Ft from a verizon wireless base were laptops and other devices have wireless meaning they have routers and i can see there suprisingly one router. I have WPA enabled, and i dont need to worry.