Discussing SMB on Windows 10
Discussing SMB on Windows 10
Creating a folder in Windows 10 and sharing it typically uses SMB version 3 or later. The connection and login details are encrypted, usually with AES encryption. If a hacker intercepted your WiFi and used Wireshark to examine the SMB traffic, they would see encrypted data packets, not the plain text credentials or file transfers.
Windows 10 consistently relies on SMB V3 as its standard protocol, though it does offer encryption capabilities. Whether it defaults to this version isn't clear, but it will automatically switch to SMB V2 when connecting to older Windows versions if needed. It never reverts to SMB V1; in fact, SMB V1 is completely disabled across all Windows starting from version 7 and higher by default. If you need support for V1, you must enable the service manually. Refer to Wannacry/BlueCrypt for details on the security concerns. If your network is compromised via Wi-Fi, the real risks lie beyond just stolen SMB credentials.
I link to my share using an iPad Air from the first generation. Can you check if encryption is active? Is there a way to make sure it’s enabled? Are there alternative methods besides setting up an SSH tunnel on your local WiFi if SMB encryption isn’t supported in Windows 10?