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Save $500 on a PDA; buy a $30 WiFi detector instead!

I'm in a position to report that if you want a WiFi detector, no less an expert than security consultant Bob Rudis has recommended the Smart ID card, over the Kingston equivalent.

There's apparently no limit to the trouble dedicated journalists will go to in their search for truth: and doing an 1,800 word side-by-side review of two devices that would cost $50 for the pair must be the ultimate in dedication. The two devices are WiFi signal detectors. That's all they do.

Why would anybody want a WiFi detector? Surely (you say) all you need is a computer which is capable of using the signal? And if you don't have a computer capable of logging onto the network, why would you want to know there was one? And anyway, the wretched thing doesn't even tell you if the network is open!

The answer, says Rudis, is that you may be a corporate snoop.

The controversy over which to buy started in July, when Smart released the catchily named "WFS-1" - a device which will not only light up its little LEDs when it spots an 802.11 wireless LAN, but has enough sense to ignore microwave ovens and "digital senders" which use the same frequency.

The announcement followed a similar release from Kingston, which is now shipping too.

Not a lot of people saw the point. Rudis did at once.

The point, he says, is that the Smart ID device is directional, and costs pennies. So it will show you where a WiFi access point is anywhere in the office building. So if you suspect that your staff have hidden an illicit access point under the Xerox or on top of the canteen fridge, this will find it.

Compared to the cost of a normal NetStumbler device - a PC notebook with wireless and software, or a PDA with software and WiFi added in - this will save you over $300 minimum, and more like $500 to $1,000. But even more specially attractive is the fact that a typical WiFi access device (a computer!) will have an omnidirectional antenna, and won't show you where the AP is.

The only casualty of Rudis's research, it seems, is the Kingston device which, it appears from his report, sucks. It gets triggered by microwave ovens and digital senders, it doesn't tell you where the AP is located, and it's hard to tell if it's actually on, in bright daylight. And it only works at all when people are sending lots of packets. If it's just an access point waiting for business, it misses it.

What about doing it the grown-up, long-trousered way? Centrally managed?

"Centrally-managed wireless detection systems do exist," Rudis acknowledges. "They incorporate the use of sensors which can be spread throughout multiple offices and buildings and tied together via the LAN/WAN. They can be configured to know the existing WLAN topology and integrated into most monitoring/alerting systems to raise the alarm when any new/unauthorised 802.11 devices make their way onto the premises."

But, he says, these systems are still relatively new and are more than relatively expensive for even the smallest deployments. "They also require a server and administrators to configure and operate the service and install the sensors."

You can't fault him! Nearly $2,000 worth of research, walking around coffee shops, corporate offices and other WiFi-infested premises, and all to save every one of you a few hundred bucks. He's a hero ...