Re: A Technical Question

On Tue, 19 May 2009 11:49:04 +0100, Cynic <cynic_999@xxxxxxxxxxx>
wrote:

On Mon, 18 May 2009 22:42:01 +0100, Alex Heney <me8@xxxxxxxxxxx>
wrote:

It would be very foolish for such people to have an open WiFi
connection. I also used to have a capped Internet connection, and for
that reason I did *not* have an open WiFi connection at that time.

But most of them do, because most people simply don't realise that
they should secure it, or don't know how to.

That excuse is wearing a bit thin. IIUC WiFi access points have not
been supplied with their default state set to an open network for at
least 5 years.

You don't (understand correctly, that is).

I have bought three in that time, two new (Belkin and Netgear), one
second hand (Vigor). None had any WAP password set by default,
although the Vigor one may have had when the original owner bought it.
Admittedly, that was close to 5 years ago, and things may have changed
more recently than that.


Most people who have an open network must thus have
known enough to change the default setting from a secure to an open
network - which means that they have sufficient knowlege to know the
difference.

I do not for one moment believe that most people who have an open
network have deliberately chosen to leave it open for anybody to use.

And I don't believe the proportion of new routers supplied with
security set is 100%, even now, although I agree all the better
manufacturers do so now.


The percentage of domestic users with WiFi access points older than 5
years is almost certainly very small. Therefore almost all open
networks that you come across have been *deliberately configured* that
way by their owners, who in the process of finding out how to change
the setting would have been made fully aware of the consequences of
doing so.

Many of the *most* recent will probably have unset security, agreed.
Many of those will of course, have only read as much of the manual as
they needed to get the system running, and will only have unset
security in order to allow themselves to connect in the first place,
either forgetting to set it afterwards, or (due to not reading all the
manual), not realising they should.
--
Alex Heney, Global Villager
Beware of barking dogs that bite.
To reply by email, my address is alexATheneyDOTplusDOTcom
.

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