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Neighborhood WiFi Security
Posted by
ScuttleMonkey
on Mon Mar 06, 2006 06:22 AM
from the put-out-an-electronic-welcome-mat dept.
from the put-out-an-electronic-welcome-mat dept.
picaro writes to tell us the New York Times has an interesting piece about the abundance of open wireless connections available due to the lack of the average user's knowledge. The article also takes a look at how the prevalent attitude is that tapping in to these connections does not equate to stealing and why still other may disagree. From the article: "Piggybacking, the usually unauthorized tapping into someone else's wireless Internet connection, is no longer the exclusive domain of pilfering computer geeks or shady hackers cruising for unguarded networks. Ordinarily upstanding people are tapping in. As they do, new sets of Internet behaviors are creeping into America's popular culture."
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RTFM (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:RTFM (Score:4, Insightful)
Of course this can be resolved by putting the access point on the right side of well configured firewall, just pointing out there is more to consider than just securing your machine.
Parent
What does your ISP have to say ? (Score:3, Interesting)
In the UK all the ISPs I have ever dealt with have stipulated no sharing, not even a home network with two plus computers.
Not something I keep to mind, but worth bearing in mind if things ever do get nasty.
Re:What does your ISP have to say ? (Score:4, Informative)
Many ISPs in the UK now actually give out free wireless routers with a new broadband connection - it is seen as an extra draw for new customers and a marketing advantage to get them to sign up for more expensive packages. And no, most are not encrypted by default.
BT Broadband [bt.com] give away a wireless modem with their more expensive connections and Wannadoo [wanadoo.co.uk] include a wireless router and claim that it is secure, although I haven't tried it.
Parent
Re:What does your ISP have to say ? (Score:3, Informative)
Re:RTFM (Score:4, Interesting)
If I could be sure everyone would only use it for browsing, email, IM and the odd bit of downloading then I'd be for it, other than that, I would rather not risk it.
As for being able to prove it wasn't you, should someone hop on and do some dastardly deed, I'd be interested to know how. Has anyone tested that theory? I'd hate to be the first person to go to court, try and prove it wasn't me, and find out the court wasn't having any of it!
Parent
Re:RTFM (Score:5, Insightful)
Have two HTB branches: one for yourself, one for good-neighbour sharing. You can set it up so the latter will be starved or almost-starved whenever you need the bandwidth. And then you can fine-tune the branches to care about TOS, etc.
Besides, traffic shaping is mandatory anyway if you want to even think about using ssh while you're downloading something.
Parent
Open Access Points (Score:5, Insightful)
At first I was thinking - whoa, you're very open minded. Then I realized you wrote wifi instead of wife. I need some coffee.
I understand what you're saying about the open access, and it's a nice thing to do - but there's no way in hell I'm going to go through the federal investigation process or even chance the possibility of going to prison, for my neighbors kiddie porn habit. Sorry. My life and the potential hassle is worth way more than him saving $39.95 on his cable bill. You're being nice, and that's applaudable, but if anything does happen - you're going to have a tough time proving it was not you.
You: but I have logs!
Them: How convenient. The accused has evidence pointing to someone else. Is it unaltered proof?
You: Of course! These are the raw server logs!
Them: Logs, from your firewall?
You: Yes!
Them: A firewall which you have administrative access to, and can change the logs at will?
You: Uh, yeah. But I didn't change them.
Them: So the logs very well could be altered. And it would be in your best interest for that to happen?
You: WTF man... I didn't do it.
Don't expect your freeloader neighbor to step up and take a federal sentence when it comes down to it, and don't put your life in a position where it depends on the justice system to "get it right". Ken Lay, OJ, and lots of others are walking around free men today..
Parent
Re:Open Access Points (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Open Access Points (Score:4, Insightful)
No, you're right, the government has to prove to the satisfaction of a jury that you did it.
To the satisfaction of 12 people who were too stupid to get out of jury duty. Using their effectively-unlimited resources.
But, I'm sure your esoteric technical arguments will convince a jury of non-technical people that you're right, in contrast to the government's arguments, which will consist of blown-up pictures of sex with barn animals that were accessed from your internet connection. Eventually.
There are many fights in life that I am quite confident I could win. I don't go around trying to get into them.
Parent
Re:Open Access Points (Score:3, Insightful)
If you tried a couple of wrongfully convicted people who has later been cleared your case would be stronger. "Guilty beyond reasonable doubt" means we're letting people that are probably guilty go free. At times that can be very offensive because the victim was certainly killed / raped / beaten / defrauded / whatever, and noone got convicted. We could
Re:Open Access Points (Score:3, Insightful)
works great and shuts up the cops fast.
if you do not have the technical know how to share your wifi correctly with nocatauth then you deserve to reap the results of
Take a bike, leave a bike (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:Take a bike, leave a bike (Score:2)
Re:Take a bike, leave a bike (Score:2, Interesting)
Re:Take a bike, leave a bike (Score:3, Insightful)
Oh dear. My mode of transportation has gone. Taxi time...
Cheers,
Ian
Re:Take a bike, leave a bike (Score:4, Informative)
It didn't work out in Turku, Finland. They all eventually ended up in the river.
Parent
Re:Take a bike, leave a bike (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Take a bike, leave a bike (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:Take a bike, leave a bike (Score:3, Insightful)
Not if it's unsecured - a trivial thing to do. Say someone had really bright outside lights, like my neighbor. Should I not be allowed to read a book sitting on my back deck in the evening using the radiation coming from his property, or should I make arrangements to reimburse him for leaving his lights on all the time? I bet the power company has some rule about the sharing of electrical power -
New occurences in American culture... (Score:5, Insightful)
Yeah, like computer users getting sued by the RIAA when they have never used any P2P software on their machine, for example...
I have WiFi access! (Score:5, Interesting)
Old joke, I know. But so true. And why? Because without fault, ALL APs are configured to accept any and all connections by default. And why? Because otherwise, clueless people would swarm the manufacturer's call center asking how to connect.
When it's configured in nymphomaniac mode (i.e. do it with everyone you can get), people can connect, they're happy and won't even bother thinking about securing their 'net. At least until the feds knock at their door, asking a few dumb questions about movies and pron.
But that's no problem either, because in our legislative, being clueless on the net is appearantly an excuse for committing any crime. You participated in a DDoS because your computer contains more malware than other programs? No worries, you didn't know, you're not to blame. Your connection was used to run an illegal server? No worries, it wasn't your fault, your computer was abused as a server.
Usually not knowing it's a crime is no get outta jail card. When it comes to the 'net, it is. Maybe 'cause legislators and judges are predominantly clueless in respect to the net as well.
Hey, self interest!
But as long as it's an excuse to shrug your shoulders and claim you didn't know what you're doing, people won't get wiser.
Re:I have WiFi access! (Score:5, Interesting)
Usually not knowing that what you are doing is not a crime is no defence, true. Generally though, not knowing that you're not doing something is, unless the prosecution can prove negligence.
Until and unless there's a crime of failing to take reasonable steps to secure a PC or similar, people are going to "get away" with it.
Note that if you claim that it wasn't you, it was someone else using your connection without your knowledge, but the prosecution can demonstrate that actually it most likely was you and that you left your connection unsecured in order to provide yourself with that excuse, you'll likely not be believed.
Parent
Re:I have WiFi access! (Score:4, Insightful)
And is it not negligence when I see my computer slow to a crawl (because it's filled with trojans that hook every single API in the system) and ignore it? Is it not negligence when I see sexpages pop up even if I surf towards Disney (because my machine is filled with adware bombers)? Is it not negligence when my connection is noticably slowing to a crawl (when my computer is spewing out torrents of spam)?
When I leave my door unlocked (just closed, but unlocked), I'm considered negligent when someone breaks into my house and steals my possessions, my insurance will brush it off and I'll sit here alone in my empty home. Worse, when I leave my car keys in the car and someone steals it, committing a crime in the process far worse than stealing my car (like, say, withdraw some money from the local bank using his iron mastercard...), I'm probably guilty of aiding a criminal.
Why is that different when it comes to computers and computer criminality?
Parent
Ric - that you? (Score:3, Funny)
Can we borrow an 'obvious' tag from our friends at Fark.com?
*gasp* (Score:5, Funny)
you mean "SHARING" something?
Semi-related story (Score:5, Funny)
During the minute or so that he was going on about this stuff, I found about 3 open wireless networks in range. I connected to one of them, logged into MSN Messenger and laughed as he saw a little notification pop up on his PC screen that indicated that I had just come online.
Bandwidth-based pricing would stop this, and other (Score:4, Interesting)
Does anyone know why it is that companies don't just charge for bandwidth, the way they do with a colo? Is it really so complicated?
That would be nice to for mom-and-pop -- they wouldn't have big fixed-fees due to heavy users like myself.
Re:Bandwidth-based pricing would stop this, and ot (Score:3, Informative)
They can make an unbelievable amount of money because while the ISP might pay for their connection by bandwidth used, their users (you and I) are paying a flat-rate (and probably artificially large) monthly fee regardless of bandwidth usage.
What I'm trying to get across i
Re:Bandwidth-based pricing would stop this, and ot (Score:3, Informative)
Those plans tend to be a little cheaper than the uncapped ones, but not by as much as you might expect. For example, I have an uncapped plan, which is only a couple of pounds more per month than my parents' cap
I love open wifi.. (Score:5, Funny)
Re:I love open wifi.. (Score:3, Interesting)
Anybody working on an 802.11 tipping extension? I've seen this situation before and I'd love to have paypal'ed the guy a buck for bailing me out of a sticky situation.
Trajedy of the Commons (Score:5, Interesting)
With regard to securing access points, I've thought of a better way of setting things up properly (someone may already have thought of it). You plug your computer in to the AP for the first time via an Ethernet cable. You go into the settings, and click an option to setup the AP. The AP creates a secure WPA key using random characters. It then spits out a small script for you to download. You execute the script as Administrator or root, and it automatically configures your OS for the AP, with the right key and everything. After this you can use the AP wirelessly.
There would be some problems though, mostly checking the OS type and having to write scripts for Windows, OS X and Linux. But I reckon it could be done.
Bandwidth shaping with Linux (Score:5, Informative)
Use a UNIX-like machine as a router/firewall for your network, and you suddenly have amazingly detailed networking possibilities within your reach. I strongly suggest reading the Linux Network Administrator's Guide [faqs.org]. Even though it's getting a little outdated it has some downright cool-ass information within.
Of course, few users are technically adept enough to actually set up a router like this, but I'm sure it has been used a lot for people who want to keep their wifi access "open", but safely limited.
On a related note there are pre-built linux firewall packages out there [google.ca] which will surprisingly easily allow you to do what I was just talking about.
Also, here is the Linux Advanced Routing & Traffic Control HOWTO [lartc.org]
Parent
Re:Trajedy of the Commons (Score:4, Insightful)
I actually run an open network for a number of reasons
-I cant be bothered to set up access for overnight guests and other visitors
-I explicitly allow a neighbour to share
-I dont think classic WEP, that some of my hardware is, is at all secure.
-Knowing the net is open forces me to lock down the boxes better. All firewalled, no SMB connectivity (SSH/SCP to the server only).
And finally: I like it when I get free networks when I travel, and want to share the joy. Saturday: father in law's house, public network "linksys". Last summer -stuck at my mother's house for a few days. Public network from a neighbour. I dont care whether these people did it on purpose or through ignorance, I benefit, and their cost is minimal.
I believe that you can get firmware for the linksys WRT54G boxes that let you throttle guests...
-steve
Parent
Personally, (Score:3, Funny)
Bizarre attitudes (Score:5, Insightful)
All I got was "That shouldn't be allowed".
Under my own initiative, I then put a fairly long encryption key on their network and password protected the router config. I know it's weak security, but it's better than none at all.
That is how much people care about security. I explained to my uncle the other day about how spyware can log your key presses and report them back to a server. He was shocked and outraged, for about 1 second. Once his computer was clean enough to be usable, he was satisfied (this is a home & business computer, used for EBAY).
Nobody gives a shit about anything to do with computers. It seems that the current parent generation was lead to believe that technology would make life easier and do all the work for them, when the reality is that it's actually replaced much of the work. God knows what long term effects this will have on computing.
Wardriving not for the 'geek' anymore (Score:3, Interesting)
I was on my way to Toronto, stopped in a Tim Horton's, and because I was working on something rather important and there was a heavy wind/snowstorm going on I whipped out my laptop. I couple sitting at the table over from me wanted to check their email, but was unsure of how I was getting internet. I explained that I was getting internet from some generous local person, they tried to get wireless working, though their laptop's card wasn't powerful enough. So I gave them Netstumbeler and taught them how to use it. I'll bet they're going to be wardriving alot more now ;P
The thing was, these guys had an open mind about security, they didn't mind trotting into other people's wireless network any more than I did. It is because of the generosity of the people who left the access points open.
I leave mine open on a another network, just on principle. I limit the bandwidth to un-filtered addresses, just due to the generosity I've received in connecting to others.
Re:Wardriving not for the 'geek' anymore (Score:3, Interesting)
Wi-Fi is now a part of most of our daily lives. Some folks have their peeves, convictions, and styles, which give shape to a localized wireless space. In densely populated areas, if one of your neighbors has their AP encrypted, there will be at least 2 APs which are completely unconfigured, and two APs that are obviously configured for use by whomever (with
Wi-Fi Honeypots? (Score:4, Interesting)
Of course if you're too clueless (or too lazy) to take any steps to secure your wireless network then you probably shouldn't be complaining when someone else takes it upon themselves to utilize the resources that you've basically left laying around in public, I mean it's akin to putting a wad of money out on the sidewalk in front of your house and expecting it to be there next week.
Securing your WAP isn't any great task, the OEM's producing these devices for home/small business networks have made it very easy to do, have for the most part documented it well and there are a plethora of resources on-line to supplement the OEM documentation. No excuse not to do it, unless of course you really don't care that any Tom, Dick or Harry can connect to your home LAN and basically do whatever they want with that connection, including poking around on every machine you have connected to it as well utilize your Internet connection for whatever they feel like doing with it.
Re:Wi-Fi Honeypots? (Score:3, Interesting)
Tor (Score:3, Interesting)
Using open APs to route the whole network (Score:3, Interesting)
One is connected to my cable modem, and is linked to the second one through a vlan. The second one's wifi card is in client mode, and connects itself to the AP of a little shop under my flat, using it as its default gateway. Add a little script on the first one which will change the routing tables to use the second router as gateway if my cable provider's gateway is unaccessible, and there you have it: totally transparent, free redundant connection for the whole network. Even the machines without wifi since their gateway is still the first router...
I'm going to shape the traffic on the second one to limit p2p use on that connection since the purpose is not to suck their bandwith to death though...
Open Wireless connections? No way! (Score:4, Insightful)
The things is, people have attempted to get in and disable my equipment. People can and will use the wireless connection to do mischievous things. They get no access from me.
Open access is fine if you have an agreement with your neighbohrs and/or you have a common wifi provider (many new housing development are now including wifi from the get go). Otherwise, is just asking for trouble.
Oh no! Kiddie porn!!! (Score:3, Insightful)
But at least they didn't play the TERRORIST card.
Oh Yeah... (Score:3, Interesting)
I don't do it to torment my neighbors though, I just happen to trust the swan guys a whole lot more than the WEP guys to design a network encryption setup that doesn't suck.
People don't understand yet (Score:4, Interesting)
I don't open my AP, and here's why: People still don't understand enough about how their computers and the networks that connect them work to be trusted in my environment. Having recently left college, I was around when my fraternity put in wired ethernet and later wireless APs. We told everyone when we put everything in, "We all share this $N k/sec. line. Do not hog bandwidth. Limit your downloads. This network is intended to allow brothers to do schoolwork in-house, rather than haul to campus." I must say that all of my fraternity brothers were pretty level-headed. None of them would have actively screwed over another brother. But, invariably, once a week or more the net would stop dead because one of them had Kazaa up, downloading seven seasons of anime and leaving their uploads unlimited. They weren't trying to be jerks, they just didn't understand how the network worked and how much bandwidth they were using.
So, I keep my AP closed. If I knew that my neighbors were knowledgeable, I'd open it to them. I open the network to anyone who visits me in my home - where I can click them off if they do something stupid. Unknowns - never on my network.
The Doonesbury cartoon (Score:3, Informative)
Considered stealing in Florida (Score:3, Informative)
Remember the Slashdot article [slashdot.org] about the man arrested in St Petersburg, Florida [sptimes.com] for stealing wireless internet access from another man?
Re:What there needs to be... (Score:3, Informative)
Well, give 'em some time. It is easy enough with an industrial grade (IE: Cisco) router. The Linksys stuff will get there eventually. Actually, there is a DMZ option on my Linksys. It should be easy enough to set up a second router on its own subnet and plug the AP into it. But