Are Pringles Can Cantennas Illegal?

A Sacramento California teenager was recently arrested for hacking into his schools computer systems and changing his grades. Sacramento police searched the teen’s home and found several Pringles can cantennas and other electronic equipment they presumed to be illegal.

“While these devices are un-sophisticated there are still very powerful.” said Lt. Bob Lozito of the Sacramento Valley Hi-Tech Crimes Task Force. These antennas are sometimes used as a device to access wireless networks from a distance. Many wireless networks are not secured using the common 128 bit WEP and WAP protection methods. Even though some may have the encryption implemented many networks have a misconception about network security. There is still a chance for anyone from a distance to access your data through a wireless network. There is a program available for Linux called Airsnort which allows a person to simply monitor a networks traffic and capture data packets. Once enough packets have been gathered the wireless encryption key can then be reconstructed. This can sometimes take six hours or more to do depending on the volume of traffic on your network. Even so if you are using a wireless network it is still very likely that your data could be at risk. Using other security features such as SSL (secure Socket Layer) 128 bit and getting PGP encryption software are still a good idea. If you still can’t sleep convert your network to a wired LAN and store all your sensitive data on a USB external hard drive. When the network is not in use you can simply power off the external hard drive preventing access to the data.

I personally have built one of these antennas to work with a PCMIA wireless notebook card to obtain a better signal. As far as I know it is not illegal to use a cantenna, yagi antenna or any other type of wireless Hi-Gain antenna. However it is against FCC regulations to amplify a wi-fi signal. There are many resources on the internet that provide instructions on how to construct one of these devices. The Pringles Can Antenna on The Cheap is a good one. I don’t believe it is illegal to possess a Pringles can nor is it illegal