this post was submitted on 09 Nov 2023
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Security considerations of WiFi vs Zigbee for self-hosted IoT (self.selfhosted)
submitted 1 year ago by MigratingtoLemmy to c/selfhosted
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Hi everyone. Before anything else, I would like to mention that I do not plan to expose absolutely anything to the internet other than using a VPN, and that's if necessary.

Now, if I understand it correctly, ZigBee compatible devices need a controller attached to the computer to decipher messages? Since we are talking about security, it seems that the ZigBee network has its own encryption technology.

Coming to WiFi which was my original plan, we have established protocols like WPA2. I had intended for all of my IoT devices to be locked in a separate VLAN with no external access.

Which one of them do you think is better for privacy and longevity? I am going to use the basics such as lights, temperature/motion sensors (would like to flash with custom firmware like Tasmota if possible) - alongside some custom devices, which would also be programmed from scratch (ESP32 based). The problem I have with the devices from the latter proposition is that I have to keep on top of security trends myself, but I suppose that's the trade-off one makes with custom devices.

Please tell me what you use at home and why, between Zigbee and WiFi?

Thanks

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[–] [email protected] 6 points 1 year ago (2 children)

Lots of people instantly think of security when they look at WiFi-connected IoT devices, but oftentimes they never think of the WiFi signal itself - what with all the added communication noise and send time limitations of having lots of small devices.
Especially with regular consumer equipment, it doesn't actually require that many devices to fully saturate a regular home router or AP.

[–] [email protected] 4 points 1 year ago (1 children)

That's a good point. Another one I have is sort of failure tolerance. I used to have a really unreliable router which would often crash and could only be reset using a full power reset. While it was in this state, wifi obviously stopped working but my zigbee devices where still available. I used to have a zigbee button linked to a smart plug for toggling my router off and on again.

This shouldn't be a concern for most people obviously but I wanted to share my experience.

Another point I want to mention is that zigbee works at 2.4Ghz just like basic wifi so they can still interfere with each other.

Zwave on the other hand uses another frequency (I think it was around 860MHz) but is more expensive.

[–] MigratingtoLemmy 1 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (1 children)

Do you think I'll be able to use 915Mhz (I'm in the US) for ZigBee devices using the Sonoff controller and IKEA devices/custom devices? Or is it reserved for specific purposes?

[–] [email protected] 2 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Isn't Zigbee always on 2.4GHz regardless of country? Trying to shift the frequency to 915MHz for all devices sounds like a lot of work with questionable benefit

[–] MigratingtoLemmy 2 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Won't it interfere with 2.4Ghz WiFi?

[–] [email protected] 2 points 1 year ago

Well, theoretically yes but it doesn't continuously send data and both WiFi and Zigbee also allow for operation on various channels. Does your neighbors WiFi interfere with yours?

Also, most WiFi devices now support 5GHz WiFi anyway so it's even less of an issue anymore. The bigger problem would probably be WiFi interfering with ZigBee. But again, that can be resolved by changing the channels.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 1 year ago

Especially with regular consumer equipment, it doesn't actually require that many devices to fully saturate a regular home router or AP.

Absolutely! If you have devices that still only support b/g, they are going to eat up your air time really quick.