Open Park Project Gives Free Wi-Fi to Capitol Hill

mindless4210 writes "The Open Park Project has made free Wi-Fi internet access available to anyone around the Supreme Court, Library of Congress, and Capitol Visitor's Center. "It's a hotspot for democracy," said Greg Staple, Open Park's co-founder. The non-profit organization has also received a significant donation of Wi-Fi equipment from Tropos Networks, which it plans to use to establish a mesh of free hotspots across the National Mall."

How much you wanna bet...

[JessLeah]

...it's being monitored by the gummint? ;)

Re:ahh I can see it now

[tcgwebs]

And the senators that know nothing about computer security won't even know what hit them once we get the geek types trying to hack into government computers. When the tech people do find out though, they haven't got a huge radius to search to deliver a subpoena for the geeks' laptops. Anyone read Digital Fortress by Dan Brown? I can only imagine what the government could do about these hacker types operating on the government home turf.

Re:Yea!

[nizo]

Or surf pr0n sites, hey this way congresscritters can surf safely outside the firewall during lunch hour!

Pervasiveness

[bih]

One of the arguments for government censorship of broadcast television and radio is 'pervasiveness'. That is, since radio and television broadcast signals can come into the home 'uninvited' and received into the eyes and ears of children, the government must provide a filter. As free Wi-Fi access points like this become more ubiquitous, giving internet access a similar pervasiveness, it will be interesting to see if internet censorship gains more support.

Security courses

[AndroidCat]

With all the free WiFi access on the hill, I hope someone makes sure that all members of government, their staff and government employees are given a good course on security? (Hopefully given by nuns with rulers.)

They've been pretty dangerous with LANs, I don't want to think about open/poorly encrypted WiFi.

The Walls Have Ears

[BrownDwarf]

Lots of folks besides the USG will have their ears perked right up. Israel, China, and the Soviets come to mind.

Oh Yeah

[ONOIML8]

Like the terrorists and our other enemies won't be sifting through that network data looking for gold.

Sorry, maybe I read too much bad sci-fi. It just seems to me that this free stuff, while it might be a wonderful thing, could be used against someone pretty easily.

Keep Working on It

[Fortress]

This is good, but I can't wait until WiFi coverage is as ubiquitous as, say, cell phone coverage. I wouldn't mind paying a per-packet fee for near universal wireless access. Who will fund this project? My guess would be wireless providers, they already have their foot in the door.

That said, some issues must be solved first. WiFi security is still too lax, and uneducated users only make it worse. We need a truly idiot-proof security protocol - the problem is that idiots are so ingenious ;-P