WEP stands for Wired Equivalent Privacy, a security standard for wireless Wi-Fi networks. A WEP key is a security code for Wi-Fi devices. WEP keys allow devices on a local network to exchange encrypted (mathematically coded) messages with each other, while the content of the messages remains hidden from outsiders.

Network administrators choose which WEP keys to use on a network. As part of the process of enabling WEP security, matching keys must be set on routers and each client device so they can communicate with each other over the Wi-Fi connection.

WEP keys are a series of hexadecimal values composed of the numbers 0 through 9 and the letters A through F. Some examples of WEP keys are:

The required length of a WEP key depends on which version of the WEP standard the network uses: