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Wi-Fi Direct Bypasses Your Router On Its Way To Kill Bluetooth
New P2P standard makes an AP out of any hardware...

The Wi-Fi Alliance (a 300 member group including heavyweights like Apple, Intel and Cisco) has announced Wi-Fi Direct, a new peer-to-peer wireless networking approach that aims to simplify the way consumer devices connect. According to the Alliance's press release, the new specification will allow Wi-Fi devices to connect to one another without joining a traditional home, office, or hotspot network. Turning gadgets into mini access points will certainly help the technically challenged, and the standard will be built into a bevy of consumer products. Most hardware, meanwhile, should be upgradeable with a simply software update.

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"Wi-Fi Direct represents a leap forward for our industry," proclaims Wi-Fi Alliance executive director Edward Figueroa. "Wi-Fi users worldwide will benefit from a single-technology solution to transfer content and share applications quickly and easily among devices, even when a Wi-Fi access point isn't available." "The impact is that Wi-Fi will become even more pervasive and useful for consumers and across the enterprise."

There's of course a slew of possible chained repercussions here, including what specifically such a product does to home Wi-Fi (or 3G or Wi-Fi) router sales, Bluetooth (some of that functionality appears mirrored here), or a variety of growing home networking standards. It's an interesting and more efficient evolution of the standard formerly just codenamed "Wi-Fi peer-to-peer."

The Wi-Fi Alliance says they'll be publishing their peer-to-peer specification soon, and will begin certifying devices for the Wi-Fi Direct designation in 2010. Expect a growing cacophony of PR for the standard in the coming months.
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DarkLogix
Texan and Proud
Premium Member
join:2008-10-23
Baytown, TX

DarkLogix

Premium Member

Sounds cool

so it'll convert a wifi network into a mesh instead of a hub and spoke setup

sounds more efficient

koitsu
MVM
join:2002-07-16
Mountain View, CA
Humax BGW320-500

koitsu

MVM

Isn't this just ad hoc?

This sounds nothing more like what we've had since 802.11b. Such technology isn't new.

Someone please clue me in.

knightmb
Everybody Lies
join:2003-12-01
Franklin, TN

knightmb

Member

Re: Isn't this just ad hoc?

said by koitsu:

This sounds nothing more like what we've had since 802.11b. Such technology isn't new.

Someone please clue me in.
Basically, from what I read, it's rebranding Adhoc to "Automated Adhoc" which is basically what it is. I would have to agree with you.

DarkLogix
Texan and Proud
Premium Member
join:2008-10-23
Baytown, TX

DarkLogix

Premium Member

Re: Isn't this just ad hoc?

My thought would be its a combined adhoc/AP setup

so that when connected to an ap everyone on the wifi can talk to each other directly and the ap for comms to non-wifi and if the ap stops then they still talk to each other
Kearnstd
Space Elf
Premium Member
join:2002-01-22
Mullica Hill, NJ

Kearnstd to koitsu

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to koitsu
i thought this too, but Hybrid is the likely target. and its a smart idea when you think about it, two laptops right next to eachother should be able to send data directly. would also improve multimedia over wireless.

my question is will devices also serve as transfer stations so any device that is on and has its wireless in this mode also acts as a simple range booster for others.

koitsu
MVM
join:2002-07-16
Mountain View, CA
Humax BGW320-500

koitsu

MVM

Re: Isn't this just ad hoc?

said by Kearnstd:

my question is will devices also serve as transfer stations so any device that is on and has its wireless in this mode also acts as a simple range booster for others.
Are you referring to a setup like the following? System #1 wants to send data to system #3 (or an AP), and range/signal-wise the best way to reach that is through system #2.

If so, the security implications of such are humongous. I really hope that's not what they plan on doing.
axiomatic
join:2006-08-23
Tomball, TX

axiomatic

Member

Corporate IT monkeys

This should fly well (exactly the way bricks don't) with the corporate IT security monkeys.

Nothing like breaking security rules by letting a bunch of CE devices access the corporate intranet while bypassing all device connection rules.

But hey lets look at the bright side, at least your iphone will actually be useful on the corporate network now.

Transmaster
Don't Blame Me I Voted For Bill and Opus
join:2001-06-20
Cheyenne, WY

Transmaster

Member

Re: Corporate IT monkeys

I was just thinking the same thing, a hacker or corporate spy could target a specific device instead of trying to hack into an entire network with all of the safety build into it. The Russian Mofia has to be licking their chops on this one.
ISurfTooMuch
join:2007-04-23
Tuscaloosa, AL

ISurfTooMuch

Member

Re: Corporate IT monkeys

And that's why I'll be turning this off in any hardware I set up at work. If it's going to touch our network in any way, it's going to have this disabled.

DarkLogix
Texan and Proud
Premium Member
join:2008-10-23
Baytown, TX

DarkLogix to Transmaster

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to Transmaster
its being worked on by cisco so I'm sure that there will be plenty of managment methods

Uncle Paul
join:2003-02-04
USA

Uncle Paul to axiomatic

Member

to axiomatic
Well it couldn't have much less security than bluetooth.

jester121
Premium Member
join:2003-08-09
Lake Zurich, IL

jester121

Premium Member

Re: Corporate IT monkeys

Sure it could. It could be uPNP.
Kearnstd
Space Elf
Premium Member
join:2002-01-22
Mullica Hill, NJ

Kearnstd to axiomatic

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to axiomatic
unless it still depends on the company network and radius server to get an IP.
chimera4
join:2009-06-09
Washington, DC

chimera4

Member

Re: Corporate IT monkeys

At which point you run the risk of running out of IPs really fast. It doesn't make sense for a device like a mouse to have an IP which comes from the network. This entire setup makes no sense for a routable protocol. A device goes into a single computer, no routing required.

skyward
@sprint.com

skyward

Anon

Re: Corporate IT monkeys

That is where IPv6 come into play.
chimera4
join:2009-06-09
Washington, DC

chimera4

Member

Re: Corporate IT monkeys

It still adds an extra and completely unrequired layer. Why do you need a routing layer when dealing with a device that doesn't have any of its traffic routed? It's a waste of processing power.
patcat88
join:2002-04-05
Jamaica, NY

patcat88

Member

Re: Corporate IT monkeys

said by chimera4:

It still adds an extra and completely unrequired layer. Why do you need a routing layer when dealing with a device that doesn't have any of its traffic routed? It's a waste of processing power.
And Broadcom and Texas Instruments laugh all the way to the bank. If it acts fast, then the software its running is "obsolete" and not "advanced enough" and must be bloated improved.

Programmers and chip makers need a living. If everyone could use a M68000, many people would be out of a job.

FFH5
Premium Member
join:2002-03-03
Tavistock NJ

FFH5 to axiomatic

Premium Member

to axiomatic
said by axiomatic:

This should fly well (exactly the way bricks don't) with the corporate IT security monkeys.

Nothing like breaking security rules by letting a bunch of CE devices access the corporate intranet while bypassing all device connection rules.

But hey lets look at the bright side, at least your iphone will actually be useful on the corporate network now.
Yes, this is a security problem that will stop almost all corps from going anywhere near it.
ricklg
Premium Member
join:2004-03-07
Laurel, MD

ricklg

Premium Member

Firewalls

Would I really want something that bypasses my router? My router is my friend helping to keep out the bad guys. I would be concerned that if someone got to one computer on my network, then everything may be at risk.

Of course technical details in a press release are a bit scarce
chimera4
join:2009-06-09
Washington, DC

chimera4

Member

Re: Firewalls

Don't forget the risk of extra noise of your WiFi network harming performance. Blutooth's limited range and rapid channel shifting technology is designed to prevent this, but unless this does something really interesting WiFi has nothing like this. It just seems like a round-peg in square-hole kind of technology.
ISurfTooMuch
join:2007-04-23
Tuscaloosa, AL

1 recommendation

ISurfTooMuch

Member

Some devices are better off without wireless

This is great and all, but I hope it doesn't spawn wireless in every conceivable device, especially those that are better off without it. IMHO, we're already in a situation like that, where many devices that rightfully should be on a wired network come with wireless when it's an inferior solution.

For example, I have a Samsung Blu-ray player with Netflix, Pandora, YouTube, and Blockbuster. It has an Ethernet port, but Samsung also pushes their wireless dongle for it, which is going to have a harder time streaming HD video than wired. And the Roku player has wireless built right in. And the Wii is the worst. It has wireless but no wired. You have to buy a dongle to get that.

My beef here is that these are all devices that, more often than not, remain stationary most of the time, and they actually work better on wired connections. I understand that wireless can be simpler to set up because there are no wires, but HPNA is extremely easy to set up, a connection is as close as the nearest AC outlet, and it doesn't use up wireless spectrum, which is getting more and more crowded. An even better solution would be to simply wire new homes and apartments with Ethernet. It's common practice in offices, and with all these new networked devices, it ought to be just as common in homes.

Use wired for stationary devices, and leave wireless for mobile devices.
deadzoned
Premium Member
join:2005-04-13
Cypress, TX

deadzoned

Premium Member

Re: Some devices are better off without wireless

Man I totally agree with you 100%! I use a wired connection for everything I can and a wireless connection as a last resort or for convenience on my laptop.

My ROKU, Wii, etc... all use wired connections and I would venture to say that everything is faster and more stable than anything I do wirelessly.
ISurfTooMuch
join:2007-04-23
Tuscaloosa, AL

ISurfTooMuch

Member

Re: Some devices are better off without wireless

Definitely more stable on wired. Often times, you don't notice that when you're surfing, since data only flows when you're getting a page, so you don't see the occasional dropped packets, but I guarantee you notice tham when you're doing any kind of real-time stuff, such as streaming audio or video, especially in bi-directional apps like distance education classes, where you may be having a voice discussion while the professor is pushing PowerPoint slides to you.

I can't count the number of times I've had a DE student ask me to troubleshoot a malfunctioning client where it turned out they were on wireless. They'd think that, just because their connection was fast, it would work. Had them switch to wired, and their problems went away. After a while, I started to ask them about their connection as soon as they told me they had a problem. That saved me tons of troubleshooting.

nixen
Rockin' the Boxen
Premium Member
join:2002-10-04
Alexandria, VA

nixen to ISurfTooMuch

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to ISurfTooMuch
said by ISurfTooMuch:

An even better solution would be to simply wire new homes and apartments with Ethernet. It's common practice in offices, and with all these new networked devices, it ought to be just as common in homes.
Couple problems with this:

  • fails to account for existing construction
  • fails to account for longevity of physical plant

You might say "tough" on existing housing. Whatever: I'll buy that.

The real problem comes in with longevity of physical plant. It wasn't too many years ago that I wired my house for 100Mbps Ethernet. Now, I would need to rewire everything to 1Gbps. In a few years, I'd need to rerewire everything as 10Gbps (etc.). With wireless, I just pop in the next generation of WiFi and my network is running at a higher speed - no rewiring necessary. It's likely to be in this area that wifi will prove a far better consumer solution.
patcat88
join:2002-04-05
Jamaica, NY

patcat88

Member

Re: Some devices are better off without wireless

said by nixen:

The real problem comes in with longevity of physical plant. It wasn't too many years ago that I wired my house for 100Mbps Ethernet. Now, I would need to rewire everything to 1Gbps. In a few years, I'd need to rerewire everything as 10Gbps (etc.). With wireless, I just pop in the next generation of WiFi and my network is running at a higher speed - no rewiring necessary. It's likely to be in this area that wifi will prove a far better consumer solution.
"next generation" of wifi is the last generation of wired. New products will always be developed on a 2 CPU Quad core Xeon machine with a 10 gigabit PCIE ethernet card. Its fast on that so execs greenlight it, but its crap when you take into the real world.
It took 7 years to get 100mbit ethernet over wireless. How many years will it take to reach 1 gigabit? By then all desktops will have 10 gigabit. Gotta stream Quad Digital Cinema.

nixen
Rockin' the Boxen
Premium Member
join:2002-10-04
Alexandria, VA

nixen

Premium Member

Re: Some devices are better off without wireless

said by patcat88:

"next generation" of wifi is the last generation of wired. New products will always be developed on a 2 CPU Quad core Xeon machine with a 10 gigabit PCIE ethernet card. Its fast on that so execs greenlight it, but its crap when you take into the real world.
It took 7 years to get 100mbit ethernet over wireless. How many years will it take to reach 1 gigabit? By then all desktops will have 10 gigabit. Gotta stream Quad Digital Cinema.
And that's fine for the people that own their homes and want to rewire things every X years as a DIY project. Most homeowners, however, aren't going to want to do it - especially if they have to pay for labor on top of the physical media. And for apartment dwellers (a large segment of the population), rewiring is simply out of the question. So, regardless how far WiFi lags wired, WiFi is going to be the more popular solution.

Noah Vail
Oh God please no.
Premium Member
join:2004-12-10
SouthAmerica

Noah Vail to ISurfTooMuch

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to ISurfTooMuch
said by ISurfTooMuch:

I understand that wireless can be simpler to set up because there are no wires, but HPNA is extremely easy to set up, a connection is as close as the nearest AC outlet,
I was under the impression that the HomePNA standard relied on existing phone lines and coax cables. I haven't read where it used AC wiring.

If so, it doesn't eliminate the need for home WiFi as most homes aren't going to have a telco or Coax jack, everyplace the owner needs network access.

NV
ISurfTooMuch
join:2007-04-23
Tuscaloosa, AL

ISurfTooMuch

Member

Re: Some devices are better off without wireless

OOps, you got me. I was actually referring to the Ethernet over powerline adapters, which use your electrical wiring to distribute your network traffic. Guess that's what I get for rapidly typing away at work.

exocet_cm
Writing
Premium Member
join:2003-03-23
Brooklyn, NY

exocet_cm

Premium Member

Viruses and other crap

quote:
"Wi-Fi Direct represents a leap forward for our industry," proclaims Wi-Fi Alliance executive director Edward Figueroa. "Wi-Fi users worldwide will benefit suffer from a single-technology solution to transfer content viruses and trojans and share applications personal and corporate data quickly and easily among devices, even when a Wi-Fi access point isn't available." "The impact is that Wi-Fi will become even more pervasive intrusive and useful detrimental for consumers and across the enterprise."
I corrected their statement and removed Enterprise because any half-intelligent IT manager will turn this "new technology" off.

I can see it benefiting home users but on an enterprise network? nada

Harddrive
Proud American and Infidel since 1968.
Premium Member
join:2000-09-20
Fort Worth, TX

Harddrive

Premium Member

Wi-Fi Direct. lol

a pseudo mini-mesh P2P network.
and they actually got a patent for this 'new' technology i bet. i can here it now on the conference call..
"lets just make Adhoc run in the background and automatically connect to any device that it sees. we'll call it something new, patent it, release some shitty application to update existing 802.11x platforms and make a ton of money."

Thran
join:2002-01-05
Hibbing, MN

Thran

Member

How long

How long before the RIAA bans for file sharing lol

•••

IIIBradIII
Comm M-E-L Instr
join:2000-09-28
Greer, SC

1 edit

IIIBradIII

Member

bad news for batteries!

Hmm, this is horrible news for battery life if they really do kill off bluetooth. The bluetooth radios use much less battery power than wifi radios.
patcat88
join:2002-04-05
Jamaica, NY

patcat88

Member

Re: bad news for batteries!

ditto

NyQuil Kid
8f The Nyquil Kid
join:2001-01-06
Brick, NJ

NyQuil Kid

Member

This could work, but....

The hardware should have drivers built-in on a memory chip and the various operating systems should autoinstall and configure the devices (and these units can periodically download updates on its own for future deployment).....otherwise you still have a situation where the technologically challenged will still have issues.

[8F] The NyQuil Kid

KrK
Heavy Artillery For The Little Guy
Premium Member
join:2000-01-17
Tulsa, OK
Netgear WNDR3700v2
Zoom 5341J

KrK

Premium Member

Wouldn't this make it easy for malware pushers etc

... For miscreants to try to connect to people's PDA's, Phones, Laptops, Netbooks, Smartphones etc etc

Imagine one crook and a crowded public place (like a Metro train) and I think he'd be able to "hook up" with people's devices.

There has to be some kind of security or the uninitiated will be like lambs to the slaughter.
rahvin112
join:2002-05-24
Sandy, UT

rahvin112

Member

This has nothing to do with bluetooth.

Adhoc Wifi isn't going to replace Bluetooth. Do you all forget what Bluetooth is and why it was created? Wifi uses a LOT of power. If I enable Wifi on my Phone/PDA my battery will be dead in 4 hours. I enable Bluetooth on my phone and I get about 1 and a half days. Bluetooth was invented to be a short distance LOW power wireless transmission protocol. Bluetooth doesn't have much security because after about 5' the signal is so weak it's worthless, to hack someone with Bluetooth you almost need to be sitting in their lap or have a power boosting directional antenna (and I'm not even sure that would work because you can probably boost your signal to the device but the device isn't going to be boosting it's return signal, so you can talk to it from a distance but you can't hear a response).

Making Adhoc automatic doesn't make wifi competitive with Bluetooth because of the power issue. Until you can provide a protocol that uses less power than Bluetooth (less than 5 milliwatts) you aren't going to replace it. (as an aside, this lack of distance is about 90% of the Bluetooth complaints you will hear, I've seen devices that didn't work if it was more than 1' from the receiving device)
patcat88
join:2002-04-05
Jamaica, NY

patcat88 to KrK

Member

to KrK

Re: Wouldn't this make it easy for malware pushers etc

said by KrK:

There has to be some kind of security or the uninitiated will be like lambs to the slaughter.
They already are. They need barcodes on their forehead to authenticate themselves to their CE.

yolarry
join:2007-12-29
Creston, WV

1 edit

yolarry

Member

Already know that

Hell my HP printer I brought 7 years ago had wireless b where I can stick a wireless card on my computer today and print from it wireless.

The only issue is I have now is no ink. damn it!

Edit: oh I forgot. SD cards can act as a wifi on your digital camera thats been out for 3 years.

So this is old news to me.
DufiefData
join:2006-06-13
Gaithersburg, MD

DufiefData

Member

Can the security problem be solved???

The security implications of this are already giving me a headache.

Can you imagine what's going to happen when new Wifi devices start shipping..... with Wi-Fi Direct on by default?! It feels like a debacle waiting to happen.

I see images of endless freight trains filled with "security patches" to deal with these issues.

SSidlov
Other Things On My Mind
Premium Member
join:2000-03-03
Pompton Lakes, NJ

1 edit

SSidlov

Premium Member

Isn't this just Intel's MyWifi PAN standardized?

My daughter's got this in her laptop. (Lenovo with a Intel 5300 wifi card) From what I read on the laptop, it creates a wifi based PAN (personal area network) that Intel called "My WiFi" »www.intel.com/support/wi ··· an/mywf/ Reduces the amount of cables needed though as pointed out earlier, chargers may be needed instead.

It can but not necessarily allows a shared pass through connection to the web. So assuming you have access at starbucks for 30 min you could use it on the laptop, and allow your iPhone web access since it would already be configured for the laptop connection.

Also, one thing over bluetooth, is "immediate accessibility" that
means that you have access to the material as it is available on the other device. So a camera doesn't actually have to do a transfer, you can see it in the laptop right after it's taken. See:

»www.youtube.com/watch?v= ··· BFrPBNc8


It's a PAN so that you don't have to constantly reconfigure ALL of your devices to connect to your laptop (assumed) all the time that is independent of the configuration being used to connect the laptop to the web (wireless or wire). It supports up to WPA2-PSK but all the devices (up to 8) have to have the same security so the lowest level wins if you have older devices but not unlike your router. It's unlikely that your camera, sd card or phone's or printer's wifi can connect to two wifi networks at the same time.

Intel offers both an auto PIN (like bluetooth but not only 4 digits) configuration and a automatic configuration where the device has a configuration button that needs to be set. Legacy devices can be configured in the standard manner. However, you have to allow any device to connect, specifically, there is no totally, automatic configure and accept whatever's in range setting.

Bluetooth is very variable between devices, some have better profiles and capabilities than other devices which only appear when you try to interconnect, e.g, stereo profiles vary greatly between mfgr. WiFi is more 'standard' and backward compatible, IMHO having used mixed devices. Both of these technologies are certainly hackable given computing power and time.