Authentication and encryption- Page 23

Configuring the wireless network settings (For HL-2170W)

16

3

„

Channels
Wireless networks use channels. Each wireless channel is on a different frequency. There are up to 14 
different channels that can be used when using a wireless network. However, in many countries the 
number of channels available are restricted. For further information, see 

Ethernet wireless network

on page 127.

Authentication and encryption

3

Most wireless networks use some kind of security settings. These security settings define the authentication 
(how the device identifies itself to the network) and encryption (how the data is encrypted as it is sent on the 
network). If you do not correctly specify these options when you are configuring your Brother wireless device, 
it will not be able to connect to the wireless network. Therefore care must be taken when configuring these 
options. Please refer to the information below to see which authentication and encryption methods your 
Brother wireless device supports.

„

Authentication methods
The Brother printer supports the following methods:

• Open system

Wireless devices are allowed access the network without any authentication.

• Shared key

A secret pre-determined key is shared by all devices that will access the wireless network.
The Brother printer uses the WEP keys as the pre-determined key.

• WPA-PSK/WPA2-PSK

Enables a Wi-Fi

®

 Protected Access Pre-shared key (WPA-PSK/WPA2-PSK), which enables the 

Brother wireless printer to associate with access points using TKIP for WPA-PSK or AES for WPA-PSK 
and WPA2-PSK (WPA-Personal).

• LEAP

Cisco

®

LEAP (Light Extensible Authentication Protocol) has been developed by Cisco Systems, Inc. 

which uses user ID and password for authentication.

„

Encryption methods
Encryption is used to secure the data that is sent over the wireless network. The Brother printer supports 
the following encryption methods:

• None

No encryption method is used.

• WEP

By using WEP (Wired Equivalent Privacy), the data is transmitted and received with a secure key.

• TKIP

TKIP (Temporal Key Integrity Protocol) provides per-packet key mixing a message integrity check and 
rekeying mechanism.

• AES

AES (Advanced Encryption Standard) is Wi-Fi

®

 authorized strong encryption standard.