Wireless holes - protecting retailers from themselves

Interesting article in Network World on some of the holes many retailers have in their wireless infrastructure. Apparently, wireless security company AirDefense walked around New York City and ran their analyzer against many small retailers. They found that over a third did not have even basic and easily hacked WEP protection!

According to the article:

"..access to the unprotected access points and unencrypted traffic -- spilled well beyond the walls of the store. Attackers could set up shop outside, snoop on the WLAN traffic, and collect MAC addresses and other data that could be used to hack deeper into the store’s net, servers and data. "

Apparently the TJX scenario has not yet put feet to the fire for smaller retailers! Now, I agree that some technology solutions can be expensive - but surely, using inbuilt protection all wireless products come with can't be that hard?