ITPEC IP April 2026 Question 43

WPA2 — the wireless LAN security standard that replaced WEP, whose keys can be recovered from captured traffic in a short time.

WEP uses the RC4 cipher with a short initialisation vector and a static shared key, so an attacker who collects enough packets can compute the key. WPA2 (IEEE 802.11i) authenticates the terminals and encrypts wireless LAN frames with AES (CCMP), deriving fresh keys for each session. It protects the radio link between the terminals and the access point.

Answer (d)

Why not others:

• •(a) Cookie — a small piece of data a web server has the browser store, such as a session ID; it is not a security standard and has nothing to do with the wireless link
• •(b) ESSID — the name that identifies a wireless LAN; it selects the network but encrypts nothing, and even hiding it gives little protection
• •(c) MIME — the format for sending non-text content such as attachments in e-mail; its secure extension S/MIME protects e-mail messages, not a wireless LAN

Key rule: Wireless LAN encryption evolved from WEP to WPA, WPA2 and WPA3; an ESSID only names the network and gives no protection.

Security · AI-written, may contain errors