Open Wireless

[Mad Dr Jeffe]

So, my Cable Modem fritzed out today, and I decided to check out a few of the other wireless connections available from my couch.. People need to password protect their connections I tell you.. 3 of the 5 wireless accounts were hackable, without any effort... (No password, no anything,... lame)

[stacer]

So, if we don't password protect our connection, are people able to hack our computers, or just use the connection? Ours isn't password protected, because we weren't able to figure it out when we set it up.

[Mad Dr Jeffe]

both, If I can get into your connection I can most assuredly get into your computer.

[Oldie Black Witch]

I read the title of this thread as "Open Weirdness."
Er, yeah.

[The Holy Saint, Grand High Poobah, Master of Monkeys, Ehlers]

well, you can still defend your computer itself. Firewalls and password protecting the resources. Just as if you were on a dial-up connection.
Except that it's more likely you'll get targeted, because your wireless network is much smaller than the Internet.

But yes, you should at least put a password on your wireless network. If nothing else, someone using your connection will be eating up your bandwidth, making connection performance slower. And even if they aren't going for your computer, what if they're downloading kiddie porn? Or hacking somewhere else? Guess what? That's YOUR internet connection and it's where they will trace illegal activity.

[JP Dogberry]

And of course, now all the search engines find us in a search for "kiddie porn." Because SE mentioned it. (Of course, we don't have pictures of Jessica Alba nude, so we won't mention them [though, that said, it doesn't mean the non-mormon members of the board don't really, really want them{The Jessica Alba, not the kiddie porn. I have a blue card to keep}])

[Spriggan]

42 just bought a wireless router and surpiseing enough I could not find a way to set a password for connecting.  So I set it up where the router will only allow his laptop to connect and refuse all others.  Kind of a pain to do it that way since any time someone else who has a laptop wants to connect, we'll have to access the router and manualy add them.

[The Holy Saint, Grand High Poobah, Master of Monkeys, Ehlers]

man, that's lame, Sprig. I wonder if there's an easy way to research that capability.

Jam, at least I didn't mention snuff films or animal porn.

[stacer]

Well, that's a pain. Now we're going to have to figure out this router. I'm almost of the opinion that I'm only going to be here for a month and a half more, so why worry about it, but they still need to figure it out.

[The Jade Knight]

I've got wireless, and I set an encryption key.  Anyone who knows the key (which is like 12 figures long and in hex) can log in.  I can't well remember it myself.  I always have to plug into the router and look it up.

My router and card are both Linksys, though.  I guess that helps?

[Mistress of Darkness]

Does it help if your network login has a password?

[The Jade Knight]

I would assume so, but I'm no expert on the field.  Also make sure you've got a firewall.