you’re able to keep an eye on what everyone using your router is doing online if you enable the correct settings. Routers do much more than split internet traffic between devices and generate a wireless signal. They give you control over your entire network, including prioritizing traffic to particular devices or shutting down others at specific times.
How Does Traffic Monitoring Work?
Your router takes each request to visit a site, download a file, or make a connection away from your home and helps put the appropriate content on your screen. To do this, it notes what each request is, which device submitted it, and other information about the request.
However, it doesn’t necessarily store this information automatically. There’s no need for most routers to compile and keep the data since most people don’t need to see it. Instead, it’s an optional feature that many routers offer. While not all offer it, most newer ones do as long as you may access router administration features.
Should I Monitor My Internet Traffic?
There are a few reasons why you might want to considermonitoring your internet traffic.
The more information you have about what is happening on your network, the better your chances of staying safe online.
How to Use a Router to Monitor Network Traffic?
Not all routers can monitor network traffic, so make sure yours can before you enter the settings and start looking for the options.
On my router, I log in and go to Advanced, Advanced Setup, and Traffic Meter. Your router may have different labels on each option, but you should be able to find the exact options in your manual. Almost all manuals can be found online in PDF format if you don’t have them anymore.
If you haven’t logged into your router before, the default username and password may be on a sticker on the back of your router. If not, you’re able to usually search online for the router log-in address, the default username, and the default password. You should always change the sign-in credentials as soon as you set up your router; it’s essential that other people can’t access it.
How Do I View the Traffic Logs?
Once you’ve got a monitoring setup, you need a way to see the data it captures. Again, the exact steps will vary depending on your router. However, it should all work basically the same way.
Check the router’s manual if you can’t find the logs in a similar location.
What Information Is in My Router’s Traffic Logs?
Expect to find the following information in your logs.
You won’t necessarily be able to tell what happened once the person was on the site they visited. For example, someone could open Discord in their browser and have conversations without you being able to see the content. You will only know that they tried to access Discord and were successful at a specific time.
What Can I Do With My Traffic Logs?
When you’ve found the logs, you have a few options for using them.
What Other Options Can I Change in the Traffic Monitoring Settings?
you’re able to also make specific changes that give you more power over how much data is used.
Is a Router the Best Way to Monitor Internal Traffic?
Yes, a router is probably the best and simplest way for most users to monitor their internet.
While you may get other programs or devices, those are best for network administrators with many different users to manage. For most home users, the router functions should be sufficient.
Frequently Asked Questions
Can You See What Websites Are Visited on Your Wi-Fi Router?
Yes, you can. Even if a person connects with wifi, the traffic is still sent through the router. Anything someone does whenconnected to the networkcan be logged and reported if you’ve set things up correctly. The websites a user visits are one of the most critical pieces of data people expect to get when logging.
Can a Router Owner See the History?
A router owner can see the sites you’ve visited as long as they’ve selected logging and it was active when you accessed their connection. When you connect to their network, your traffic is monitored and can be viewed as they please. If you’re worried about someone viewing your web activity, you may want to avoid using their network.
Will a VPN Bypass Router Logging?
In most cases, it should. The router will still log that an IP address made a request to a VPN server and that it was successful or unsuccessful. However, it’s unlikely the log will record what you actually viewed. If you’re logging traffic on your router and see a VPN connection, then there is no way to know what they looked at without access to their device.
