# WPA2 Enterprise

Related articles

- Wireless configuration
- Network configuration
- Software access point
- Ad-hoc networking

WPA2 Enterprise is a mode of Wi-Fi Protected Access. It provides better security and key management than WPA2 Personal, and supports other enterprise-type functionality, such as VLANs and NAP. However, it requires an external authentication server, called RADIUS server to handle the authentication of users. This is in contrast to Personal mode which does not require anything beyond the wireless router or access points (APs), and uses a single passphrase or password for all users.

The Enterprise mode enables users to log onto the Wi-Fi network with a username and password and/or a digital certificate. Since each user has a dynamic and unique encryption key, it also helps to prevent user-to-user snooping on the wireless network, and improves encryption strength.

## Configuration

This section describes the configuration of network clients to connect to a wireless access point with WPA2 Enterprise mode. See Software access point#RADIUS for information on setting up an access point itself.

Enterprise mode requires a more complex client configuration, whereas Personal mode only requires entering a passphrase when prompted. Clients likely need to install the server’s CA certificate (plus per-user certificates if using EAP-TLS), and then manually configure the wireless security and 802.1X authentication settings.

For a comparison of protocols see the following table.

Warning: It is possible to use WPA2 Enterprise without the client checking the server CA certificate. However, you should always seek to do so, because without authenticating the access point the connection can be subject to a man-in-the-middle attack. This may happen because while the connection handshake itself may be encrypted, the most widely used setups transmit the password itself either in plain text or the easily breakable #MS-CHAPv2. Hence, the client might send the password to a malicious access point which then proxies the connection.

### eduroam

eduroam (education roaming) is an international roaming service for users in research, higher education and further education, based on WPA2 Enterprise.

Warning:

- Check connection details first with your institution before applying any profiles listed in this section. Example profiles are not guaranteed to work or match any security requirements.
- When storing connection profiles unencrypted, restrict read access to the root account by specifying `chmod 600 profile` as root.

Tip: Configuration for NetworkManager and #wpa_supplicant can be generated with the eduroam Configuration Assistant Tool.

### wpa_supplicant

WPA supplicant can be configured directly and used in combination with a dhcp client or with systemd. See the examples in `/etc/wpa_supplicant/wpa_supplicant.conf` for configuring the connection details.

Once the connection configuration is complete, you can use the dhcp client to test them. For example:

    # dhcpcd interface

will automatically invoke WPA supplicant to establish the connection before proceeding to acquire an IP address.

### NetworkManager

NetworkManager can generate WPA2 Enterprise profiles with graphical front ends. nmcli and nmtui do not support this, but may use existing profiles.

### connman

connman needs a separate configuration file before connecting to the network. For examples and explanations on different settings, see connman-service.config(5).

Note:

- Create the `/var/lib/connman` directory if it does not exist.
- Options are case-sensitive. [1]

Restart `wpa_supplicant.service` and `connman.service` to connect to the new network.

### netctl

netctl supports #wpa_supplicant configuration through blocks included with `WPAConfigSection=`. See netctl.profile(5) for details.

Warning: Special quoting rules apply: see the `SPECIAL QUOTING RULES` section in netctl.profile(5).
Tip: Custom certificates can be specified by adding the line `'ca_cert="/path/to/special/certificate.cer"'` in `WPAConfigSection`.

## Troubleshooting

### MS-CHAPv2

WPA2-Enterprise wireless networks demanding MSCHAPv2 type-2 authentication with PEAP sometimes require pptpclient in addition to the stock ppp package. netctl seems to work out of the box without ppp-mppe, however. In either case, usage of MSCHAPv2 is discouraged as it is highly vulnerable, although using another method is usually not an option. See also [2] and [3].

Categories:

- Wireless networking
- Network configuration