INTRODUCTION
Until just recently, it would have been unimaginable for medical institutions to exchange high resolution digital imagery over wireless networks. Why, you may ask? Not only were the early wireless systems incapable of transmitting detailed medical images over their seemingly small pipes — originally designed to carry voice conversations — but securing this sensitive data from vulnerabilities such eavesdropping, session hijacking, data alteration and manipulation (among others) and ultimately protecting the privacy of the patient seemed an insurmountable challenge.
Over the last 10 years, Motorola has been investigating the use of fixed wireless broadband systems and has brought to the marketplace a product that is capable of not only handling these incredibly large digital medical images with lightning fast speeds but has integrated advanced security measures into the product that transparently, efficiently and effectively safeguard the precious information that is transmitted over Motorola’s Canopy™ wireless broadband system. Today, medical institutions have moved far beyond simply imagining the use of wireless broadband systems to actually applying the technology to collaborate and often times performing life saving diagnostics.
This paper Security and the Motorola Canopy Broadband Wireless Platform offers a snapshot of some of the security issues being faced by the wireless broadband industry as well as the safeguards that Motorola is employing in the Canopy platform to ensure the security and integrity of this advanced system for our customers.
WHY ARE SECURITY MEASURES NECESSARY?
When the Internet was first introduced, there was little concern about security measures. The specifications for the Internet Protocol (IP) did not take into account the fact that operators may actually need to protect the data that they were transmitting. Obviously a great deal has changed since that time. Seemingly harmless attacks have wreaked havoc on computer networks with wireless adding a new dimension of vulnerability. The first step in understanding how these attacks can be prevented is in analyzing the basic weaknesses in a typical IP system.
CLEAR TEXT TRANSMISSIONS
When data is transmitted over an IP network, all information is relayed as clear text. That is to say, the data is not scrambled or rearranged and is transmitted purely in its raw form. This information includes both the data and authentication streams of information and is referred to as transmitting in the clear. When transmitting clear text transmissions, login name, user identifications, passwords, electronic mail (from a POP3 mail client), websites visited, downloaded information — everything — is open to the prying eyes of anyone with a network analyzer.
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