Swap Your Firmware

Archive record. casahacker.org/troqueseufirmware — Squarespace, 2019-2021. 4 section(s), 1 image.

Casa Hacker and the Laboratório Hacker de Campinas present

LIVE ONLINE COURSE

Getting to Know OpenWRT

A Free, Secure and Private Router

with Caio Volpato and Douglas Esteves

#TroqueSeuFirmware

Maximise the security and privacy of your connection.

Not using other people’s or public Wi-Fi is part of healthy online privacy and security habits. In the last edition of Data Detox we covered these and other hot tips, free and open on our YouTube channel.

Now let’s question our routers. The internet travels a long way to reach our homes, and it is usually distributed by a router whose mission is to bring it to our devices, via Ethernet cable or wirelessly over Wi-Fi. It turns out the most common routers on the market, or those supplied by internet providers, ship with firmware that has limited settings and potential surveillance software, carries security flaws, lacks regular maintenance and firmware updates, and offers no way to use extensions and add-ons that could give the router new features and uses.

In this course you learn to swap your router’s firmware for a modern, customisable, secure, stable, open-source solution: OpenWrt.

The course is free, online and interactive.

Why OpenWrt?

There are many reasons — these are just a few:

• Created by experienced computer-networking professionals and other people who care about network performance.

• Incorporates many modern algorithms from recent research that perform far better than the firmware shipped by major router vendors.

• No hidden backdoors of the kind usually planted by hardware vendors.

• Resistant to common vulnerabilities thanks to its free, open-source Linux operating system, unaffected by the main threats.

• Updated regularly, so vulnerabilities are fixed soon after being discovered.

• Conservative default configuration: full internet connectivity without exposing your router or connected devices to attack.

• Extends your router’s useful life thanks to long support for all compatible models.

• 3,000+ add-ons (packages) available to install, bringing new features, utilities and tools to your router.

• Community support from developers, volunteers and users.

• Full control over every function of your router.

• Free of charge, under the GNU General Public License.

OpenWrt in 8 steps: from problem to solution

1. Introduction and the problem
   1. Router troubles: configuration, updates and the like.
2. OpenWRT
   1. A free, open project
   2. Features
   3. Advantages
   4. Challenges
   5. Minimum requirements
   6. Hardware support
3. Installing the firmware
4. Configuration
   1. Admin user
   2. System
   3. Network
   4. Firewall
   5. DHCP
   6. DNS
   7. WiFi
5. Tips and tricks
   1. Updating
   2. Ad and tracker blocking
6. Troubleshooting
   1. Project documentation
   2. Community support
   3. The Laboratório Hacker de Campinas forum
7. Contributing to the project
8. Frequently asked questions

Take action for your security.

#TroqueSeuFirmware

Watch now on YouTube

OpenWrt information

Free

The course is free, but consider supporting the development of our courses and activities with a donation of any amount.

Audience

Recommended for people with:

• solid experience and technical skills using a computer;

• solid experience and technical skills with their operating system;

• solid experience and technical skills in computer networking;

• an OpenWrt-compatible router.

Certificates

Completion certificates are issued to participants who watch the live or recorded classes and answer the course evaluation within 3 calendar days of the classes.

Forum

Discussions, questions and ideas about the course topic can be posted openly on the Laboratório Hacker de Campinas forum.

In company

This course can be offered to your collective, group, organisation or company. To ask about the in company options and their benefits, fill in the form and we will get in touch.

Disclaimer

Associação Casa Hacker and the Laboratório Hacker de Campinas offer the live online course Getting to Know OpenWRT: A Free, Secure and Private Router (“course”) with the purpose of encouraging, instructing and educating participants duly registered through the appropriate form at https://casahacker.org (“participant”) to improve the security and privacy of their home network by adopting OpenWrt, a Linux operating system for embedded devices aligned with our institutional principles and values. We do not, however, take responsibility for warranties of any kind, the operation of any system, support for any hardware or software, backups, damage to hardware or software, or the like — these remain the participant’s right, property and responsibility, for the educational purposes of the course.

The #TroqueSeuFirmware project is an initiative in partnership with the Laboratório Hacker de Campinas.