Fix “Shared Key is Invalid” Error on a Bell 6520 Modem/Router.
WPA-PSK Wireless Network Error on Speedstrem 6520 Modem/Router.
I went to set up a wifi network today on my Speedsream 6520 Router/Modem. I chose the WPA-PSK encryption option because WEP is stupidly easy to crack. It seemed that whatever I entered for the shared key gave me this “Shared Key is invalid” error. This was a problem. I immediately started cursing the developers of the web interface for not making it clear what the length or format should be.
After trying a few times I was getting ready for a night of frustration.
I looked a little closer at the page that prompts for the shared key for the WPA-PSK Shared Key.
The page has a fair amount of text on it describing the different encryption schemes and right under that there is a bullet labeled Shared Key.
The third sentence tells us that the password be a minimum of 10 characters.
This got me thinking because every key I used for the TKIP network was as many characters as the text box would allow, so I tried a Key that was 8 characters in length. This got rid of the error but left the WPA-PSK hackable due the the lack of strength of the Key. I put another 4 characters onto the WPA-PSK Shared Key and tried again.This also works. Not really sure why they would make the text box hold more characters than the firmware would allow but it happens. Anyway with a WPA-PSK wireless network encrypted with a Shared Key of 12 characters my network should be secure enough for now.
