Key Points
- WPA3-Enterprise provides increased security with stronger encryption and requires Server Certificate Validation.
- Device and infrastructure compatibility remains a significant barrier, making WPA3 deployment difficult for many organizations.
- Before upgrading, evaluate your requirements and do extensive testing. SecureW2 can help you deploy passwordless security for WPA2 or WPA3 Enterprise.
WPA (Wi-Fi Protected Access) was created in the early 2000s when IT professionals quickly realized that WEP (Wired Equivalency Protocol) had terrible security vulnerabilities. WPA2 was ratified in 2004 as a more secure iteration of the protocol and is what the majority of network connections use today. It defines how devices should initiate communication with network infrastructure, and ensure that the Wi-Fi we take for granted today is incredibly fast and secure.
As most IT professionals know, WPA2 comes in two forms; WPA-PSK and WPA2-Enterprise. PSK stands for pre-shared key and is the Wi-Fi we use at home. It uses one single shared key, the Wi-Fi password you use for all the devices on your network. WPA2-Enterprise is what is commonly found in corporate and university networks. It is more secure than WPA2-PSK for a variety of reasons, but the most significant difference is that it enables devices to have their own unique key for the network, rather than sharing one like we do at home.
Despite WPA2 being introduced in 2004, many organizations still struggle to implement WPA2-Enterprise to this day. It requires servers that are complicated to set up and manage. They can get quite costly for large organizations as well. In addition, configuring end-user devices for WPA2-Enterprise can also be quite difficult. There are considerably more settings that need to be configured, which would be fine if the misconfiguration of some (Server Certificate Validation) didn’t cause serious security vulnerabilities for your network. Fortunately, there are now modern solutions for the problems outlined above, but it took a lot of trial and error to get to where we are today.
What is WPA3-Enterprise?
WPA3 was announced in 2018 but has only recently begun to be supported by a significant amount of devices and network infrastructure. Much of the changes that were created were made to improve PSK networks. Simultaneous Authentication of Equals (SAE) was introduced to prevent dictionary attacks from brute-forcing their way into the network. WPA3 also includes forward secrecy, which prevents the decryption of old data traffic even if the network password is compromised in the future.
With WPA3-Enterprise, the changes are less impactful. A 192-bit encryption mode is available, which improves authentication security over the 128-bit WPA2-Enterprise. However, the use of 128-bit encryption was never a serious issue. However, what is a notable improvement is the requirement of Server Certificate Validation. This setting enables devices to verify the network they are connecting to isn’t malicious. It’s not easy for the average user to configure, which is why it’s often omitted, but it’s incredibly important in ensuring credentials are not stolen over the air.
Wi-Fi 7 Along With WPA3-Enterprise
For many organizations, the decision of whether to adopt WPA3-Enterprise is no longer a matter of preference or timing. With the arrival of Wi-Fi 6E and the ratification of Wi-Fi 7 (IEEE 802.11be), the latest wireless standards have effectively made WPA3-Enterprise a requirement for enterprises deploying modern wireless infrastructure.
The shift began with Wi-Fi 6E, which introduced operation in the 6 GHz spectrum. The Wi-Fi Alliance requires all devices operating in this band to support WPA3 security, and Wi-Fi 7 continues that requirement.
For enterprise environments, this means WPA3-Enterprise with 802.1X authentication is mandatory on the 6 GHz band. There is no option to deploy WPA2 on 6 GHz networks. Organizations deploying Wi-Fi 7 access points to take advantage of features such as Multi-Link Operation (MLO), increased throughput, and reduced latency are, therefore, also deploying WPA3-Enterprise by default.
This creates important operational considerations for organizations managing a mix of older and newer devices. Legacy clients that only support WPA2 can continue connecting over the 2.4 GHz and 5 GHz bands, but they cannot access the 6 GHz spectrum or benefit from many of Wi-Fi 7’s performance improvements.
As organizations refresh their wireless infrastructure, they are also making a long-term commitment to WPA3-Enterprise for any devices they expect to fully support on next-generation networks.
The authentication requirements become even more significant for organizations pursuing the highest levels of wireless security. WPA3-Enterprise requires 802.1X authentication, and the strongest security profile, WPA3-Enterprise 192-bit mode as defined in IEEE 802.11-2020, mandates EAP-TLS as the only supported authentication method.
This profile also requires Commercial National Security Algorithm (CNSA)-compliant cryptographic suites and stronger encryption standards than previous Wi-Fi generations.
For organizations that have postponed migrating from password-based authentication methods such as PEAP to certificate-based EAP-TLS, the move to Wi-Fi 7 may accelerate that timeline considerably. Deploying new wireless hardware increasingly means deploying new authentication requirements as well.
As a result, PKI readiness is becoming a critical part of wireless infrastructure planning. Organizations rolling out Wi-Fi 7 in 2026 should ensure that certificate issuance, enrollment, and lifecycle management processes are already in place before enabling 6 GHz networks.
Automated certificate provisioning through technologies such as SCEP, ACME, EST, or MDM-based enrollment is quickly becoming a prerequisite for delivering a seamless and secure WPA3-Enterprise experience across modern enterprise wireless environments.
WPA3-Enterprise Support is Complicated… Test Thoroughly!
If you are an organization that is interested in adopting WPA3-Enterprise, there are a few things that you need to consider.
- Not all operating systems support WPA3-Enterprise, even if it might seem like they do.
- Not all network infrastructure support WPA3-Enterprise, and even if they do, they might not support all operating systems.
Should You Move to WPA3-Enterprise?
If you do decide to move from WPA2-Enterprise to WPA3, first make sure to thoroughly test out the devices and infrastructure in the environment before turning on WPA3. The lack of ubiquitous support requires a thorough understanding of how your devices will react to this change, before you can even consider making this decision.
We suspect that organizations that are not currently leveraging an 802.1x Onboarding solution, will stand to benefit from the switch. Onboarding solutions, like JoinNow MultiOS, make sure that WPA2/3 Enterprise settings are properly configured. They are great for reducing support tickets and improving user experience, but they also ensure important settings are configured like Server Certificate Validation. WPA3-Enterprise mandates Server Certificate Validation, so if you are an organization relying on manual instructions it will ensure that this critical security setting isn’t omitted. However, we still strongly recommend organizations use onboarding solutions, as configuring these types of settings is next to impossible for the average user.
In conclusion, WPA3-Enterprise looks to be another iterative improvement for network authentication security. However, many organizations will find the vendor and infrastructure support may be too immature to make the migration. We still have hundreds of organizations that reach out to us for help adopting WPA2-Enterprise, despite being available for two decades, so industry-wide support may take some time and that’s ok. If you are interested in adopting either WPA2 or WPA3-Enterprise, reach out to us today and we would be happy to help!
