WPA

WPA stands for Wi-Fi Protected Access, a family of security protocols for wireless networks defined by the Wi‑Fi Alliance. Introduced in 2003 as an interim improvement over the original WEP, WPA aimed to provide stronger data protection and better authentication for 802.11 networks while the industry moved toward theIEEE 802.11i standard.

Technically, WPA reintroduces TKIP (Temporal Key Integrity Protocol) to generate per-packet encryption keys and to include integrity protection, along with the standard 802.11i four-way handshake for key establishment. It supports both personal mode, using a pre-shared key (PSK), and enterprise mode, using 802.1X authentication with EAP.

WPA2, the successor standardized in the IEEE 802.11i amendment, replaced TKIP with the AES-based CCMP for encryption and strengthened key management and authentication. WPA2 supports PSK and 802.1X EAP and became the dominant Wi‑Fi security standard for many years. It also introduced stronger protections for data integrity and confidentiality.

WPA3 was introduced in 2018 to address evolving threats. It brings stronger password-based authentication via Simultaneous Key Establishment (SAE), provides forward secrecy, and improves security for open networks by encrypting data even without a password. WPA3 also includes stronger protection for management frames (PMF) and is increasingly adopted in modern devices.

Security considerations: While WPA provided significant improvements over WEP, older WPA configurations with TKIP have vulnerabilities, and systems require patching and updates. WPA2 remains widely deployed but was shown vulnerable to the KRACK attacks in 2017, necessitating vendor patches and, where possible, migration to WPA3. Open networks benefit from WPA3’s enhanced protections, while WPS has its own known weaknesses.