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When you hear broadband providers or your colleagues and friends talking about "wireless" they could actually be talking about two separate things:

Wireless Networking, having a wire free computer in the house connected to a broadband connection.
Wireless Broadband, this is a special kind of broadband package where you can use it at home, but also in certain places when you are away from home.

Let's take a look at each in turn.

Wireless networking is basically a way of linking all the computers at home or work together and letting them share an internet connection without the need to trail wires all over the place. Wireless Networks are also known as "Wi-Fi" networks.

If the only place in the house that you use the internet is a desktop PC and it's next to a phone socket then you probably shouldn't be interested in wireless networking. Everyone else should be! The typical family nowadays has more than one computer, some will be desktops and some laptops. Wireless networking makes it easy for all these computers to share your broadband connection.

Also there are other devices that can use a wireless connection that you might not have realised such as games consoles and some mobile phones.

Yes it's very secure, you set a password for your wireless network that only the computers on your network know. This stops other computers from connecting to the network and getting access. There are two types of security for wireless networks; WiFi Protected Access (WPA) and Wired Equipment Privacy (WEP). Of these WPA is the newer and more robust. We would recommend that you choose wireless equipment that can use WPA. The great thing about most wireless routers is that they come with a built in firewall that adds an extra layer of protection to all your computers. We wouldn't suggest you remove firewall software from your computers. This extra level of security is always worth having. If you don't password protect your network you may find that people with computers close to your house can connect to your broadband connection wirelessly. This can lead to you paying for bandwidth that they use, or even to the more serious issue of them downloading illegal content that could be associated with your connection! All this is easily solved by simply implementing the security we described.