http://www.engadget.com/2006/04/21/westchester-county-passes-wifi-security-law/ Engadget Comments for Westchester County passes WiFi security law http://www.engadget.com/media/feedlogo.gif http://www.engadget.com en-us Copyright 2012 Weblogs, Inc. The contents of this feed are available for non-commercial use only. Blogsmith http://www.blogsmith.com/http://www.engadget.com/2006/04/21/westchester-county-passes-wifi-security-law/http://www.engadget.com/2006/04/21/westchester-county-passes-wifi-security-law/Apr 21st 2006 4:27PMhttp://www.engadget.com/2006/04/21/westchester-county-passes-wifi-security-law/http://www.engadget.com/2006/04/21/westchester-county-passes-wifi-security-law/
I don't "wardrive" (And I don't know anyone who's still so awed by the concept of wireless internet that they indulge in such novelties) but I did happen to have my laptop on the ride home a few nights ago. Travelling a mile down a fairly built up stretch of road here in Ft Lauderdale, I found ~250 networks using NetStumbler. I didn't connect to any of them mind you, I zipped by too quickly even if I wanted to try - I did want to see, however, how many showed up with default SSIDs or without any encryption whatsoever. Startlingly enough, I found that about %75 of them were insecure, and likely easily exploited.

Granted, the security that is available is ultimately paltry and easily cracked, at least this might keep people from blindly setting up a network upon which secure information may be stored, and leave it wide open for any snot-nosed script kiddie who learned a new trick, reading 2600 at the book store. My only concern is this - just how are they going to determine who is violating this? Who will report it? Will the police actively search for open networks and then determine who the offending party is with a signal strength detector? Will they/should they obtain warrants to do this? Or will they just sniff packets until they find the relevant information?]]>Apr 21st 2006 4:30PMhttp://www.engadget.com/2006/04/21/westchester-county-passes-wifi-security-law/http://www.engadget.com/2006/04/21/westchester-county-passes-wifi-security-law/Apr 21st 2006 4:39PMhttp://www.engadget.com/2006/04/21/westchester-county-passes-wifi-security-law/http://www.engadget.com/2006/04/21/westchester-county-passes-wifi-security-law/Apr 21st 2006 4:44PMhttp://www.engadget.com/2006/04/21/westchester-county-passes-wifi-security-law/http://www.engadget.com/2006/04/21/westchester-county-passes-wifi-security-law/Apr 21st 2006 4:45PMhttp://www.engadget.com/2006/04/21/westchester-county-passes-wifi-security-law/http://www.engadget.com/2006/04/21/westchester-county-passes-wifi-security-law/Apr 21st 2006 4:49PMhttp://www.engadget.com/2006/04/21/westchester-county-passes-wifi-security-law/http://www.engadget.com/2006/04/21/westchester-county-passes-wifi-security-law/Apr 21st 2006 4:53PMhttp://www.engadget.com/2006/04/21/westchester-county-passes-wifi-security-law/http://www.engadget.com/2006/04/21/westchester-county-passes-wifi-security-law/

The law actually sounds like a good one. What is your problem with it?]]>Apr 21st 2006 5:07PMhttp://www.engadget.com/2006/04/21/westchester-county-passes-wifi-security-law/http://www.engadget.com/2006/04/21/westchester-county-passes-wifi-security-law/ It will indeed be quite problematic to 'enforce' this law. But, that may not be the point. Very few of the laws in this contry have anything to do with crime prevention and everything to do with prosocution. If a hacker/malcontent/terrorist/spammer jumps on someones unsecured wifi and does their dirty internet deeds, the owner/manager of the wifi network can just shrug their shoulders and say "I didn't want that person on my network. I'm just as much a victim in this as anyone else..."...this has happened before.

This law probably is designed to make that territory/situation a little less ambiguous in the courtroom. Now it's in writing that you ARE responsible for your network, and you ARE OBLIGATED to secure it (in the corporate sector anyway)...no more of this "I didn't know how to...". You are required to know, and to do. End of story.

Kinda sad that people (and since this is focussed on businesses, we're talking about PROFFESSIONALS) need to be threatened with a criminal record and monetary fines to take 10 minutes to read their user manual and do something that they should do for their own protection anyway...]]>Apr 21st 2006 9:47PMhttp://www.engadget.com/2006/04/21/westchester-county-passes-wifi-security-law/http://www.engadget.com/2006/04/21/westchester-county-passes-wifi-security-law/
If an company wished to put an open ethernet port outside of their building would this law prevent it? A company is a private entity that will have to answer to its customers (and ultimetly to the government) if confidential information is leaked, but honestly, you're more likely to have your identity stolen by the sales person who takes your CC info over the phone or from employees in a store that still uses that good ole carbon paper swipe method.

My next question is: So where is the law mandating that cookies be removed from the computer every minute to ensure that confidential user information is not stolen? ]]>Apr 22nd 2006 2:15PMhttp://www.engadget.com/2006/04/21/westchester-county-passes-wifi-security-law/http://www.engadget.com/2006/04/21/westchester-county-passes-wifi-security-law/
Meaning, I have a D-Link 802.11b wireless network in my condo that I leave open and it has a signal range to across the street to a park (not heavily populated, I live in a smaller town). I've always done this so that others in the neighborhood can use by bandwidth when I'm not using is because I pay for the DSL either way. Kind of a way to promote more WiFi coverage. A lot of my neighbors do the same, but, I guess, I've never really looked into what the dangers are. So, what are the dangers? I'm running Windows XP on a Dell and it is a personal computer - i.e. has some of my personal data on it, but not a repository for lots of highly sensitive info. Should I clamp down and shut off the open access?]]>Apr 22nd 2006 5:30PMhttp://www.engadget.com/2006/04/21/westchester-county-passes-wifi-security-law/http://www.engadget.com/2006/04/21/westchester-county-passes-wifi-security-law/I think it is good what you are doing and that you don't let scare tactics about hackers frighten you from sharing your internet access.

Honestly I think the chance of an experienced enough hacker happening to hop onto YOUR hotspot and begin to hack YOUR personal computer are a lot slimmer than an experienced hacker coming across your computer on the internet and doing the same.

As long as you take the same basic precautions you should be taking anyway just because you are on any network -- not having shared drives with no passwords, using a basic firewall, making sure extra uneeded ports aren't open) you are quite safe.

Anyone that thinks I am incorrect is free to post their opinion.]]>Apr 23rd 2006 2:37PMhttp://www.engadget.com/2006/04/21/westchester-county-passes-wifi-security-law/http://www.engadget.com/2006/04/21/westchester-county-passes-wifi-security-law/Apr 23rd 2006 7:24PMhttp://www.engadget.com/2006/04/21/westchester-county-passes-wifi-security-law/http://www.engadget.com/2006/04/21/westchester-county-passes-wifi-security-law/May 13th 2006 2:53AMhttp://www.engadget.com/2006/04/21/westchester-county-passes-wifi-security-law/http://www.engadget.com/2006/04/21/westchester-county-passes-wifi-security-law/
Regards,
John R.
http://www.pctechz.com]]>Aug 13th 2007 10:10AM