# Shielded Twisted Pair vs Unshielded Twisted Pair



## xmountainxlionx (Jul 18, 2010)

I would be willing to bet that most people use Unshielded Twisted pair(UTP) for their Networking Media, and for most users it is all that is needed.  Now, when we say Shielded or Unshielded what exactly are we talking about?  Here are the two standard versions of UTP and Unshields Twisted Pair(STP):


















As you can see the STP has a layer of metal around each twisted pair (the most common type of STP) which main benefit includes reducing electromagnetic interference, and also reducing the amount of electromagnetic emission. The shielding can also act as a ground for the cable.  I believe its important to mention that whether UTP or STP, if its cat5e, its still going to be 250mhz, and one not faster than the other.  Obviously a good application for STP over UTP would be where every type of security is taken into consideration.  If you don't know what I mean by emissions, take a look at this video.

Compromising emanations

If someone, gets physically close enough to a UTP or STP cable, shielding isn't going to help against this.  But, STP cabling should help against the distance required to read read emissions.  Also if you have a lot of cables run together, that would make it almost impossible for someone to read the emission they want, almost like an encryption...sorta.


More posts at The Spanning Tree


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## Hybrid_theory (Jul 19, 2010)

Im told STP has valuable uses in places where there is high interference from equipment, such as a factory of sorts. But like you said if someone wants to steal data from a cable and they have access to that cable, its a done deal.


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