The Wi-Fi Brand

While working on my February column for the Manila Times, I had learned that the word "wi-fi" is actually a brand name like Cisco, Nokia or Globe. All along, I thought that the word "wi-fi" was a generic term for wireless technology. I was wrong.

"Wi-Fi" is actually a wireless technology brand owned by the Wi-Fi Alliance, which is a consortium of companies, which specifies methods and techniques of wireless local area network (WLAN) operations. This Alliance includes some popular brands we now like Cisco, Lucent and Nokia.

The Wi-Fi Alliance agrees on a set of interoperable products based on the family of IEEE 802.11 standards. These numbers are the set of standards for WLAN developed by the Institute of Electrical and Electronic Engineers (IEEE) based in New York. According to its website at www.ieee.org, the organization has more than 370,000 members in 180 countries. The IEEE is also the leading authority in other areas like aerospace systems, biomedical engineering and consumer electronics.

For my complete story entitled, "Are You Secured?", please visit the Manila Times website.