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Toronto, The Naked City
PunWork writes "In an effort to promote wireless network security, Toronto consulting firm IpEverywhere (pun intended) has published a map of downtown Toronto, showing the location of both encrypted and unencrypted ('naked') wireless networks. Is this going to help spread awareness, or is this just going to encourage people to abuse the (apparently) ignorant? The Toronto Star has a story about the map and the consulting firm here."
People get viruses delivered the their computers via email, the net, etc...
What is to stop viruses now becoming "airborne" and people who use an open wireless network unwittingly picking them up or (knowingly or unknowingly) transmitting them into open wireless networks?
Surely most people who wardrive would be smart enough to avoid them through various means... but most people who use computers are fairly clueless about security and virus protection.
Any known cases of wifi virus infection?
42 - So long and thanks for all the fish.
Thats right, the scum of the network are taking advantage of open wireless networks, whether they are chalked or grabbed off online maps such as net stumbler dot com. The rise of drive-by hacking is a natural by-product of the wardriving/chalking community, and it would be naive to considering this a surprising development. Highjacking an open wireless network is only the smart thing to do for hackers whether they are after data or just a spamming platform.
This puts the pressure on network administrators to secure their wireless networks. It is far easier to drive by a NAP and jack in, and the proliferation of wireless networks could obsolete physical intrusion techniques such as connecting a Dreamcast or iPAQ to an internal network. Tools for wardriving are readily available, such as THC-warDrive. A lazy or incompetant network administrator makes it easy for a kid with the parents car, a pringles can, and a laptop.
perl -e 'print $i=pack(c5, (41*2), sqrt(7056), (unpack(c,H)-2), oct(115), 10)'
With all this on war driving and hacking into networks for fun or foul, we better start being careful of what we say and how we act. (be nice)
We should realize that right now we have a great oppertunity to use wireless.
If admins continue to leave networks that need to be secure open to the public they are going to get hacked -in one form or another, maybe just harmlessly syphoning bandwidth, maybe stealing private information - but something is going to happen regardless.
What I fear hear is government regulation. Right now it is the resposibility of the admin who sets up this network to make sure it is reasonably secure. If wireless hacking becomes enough of a problem, governments will be compelled to regulate wireless networks. Sure some regulation may even be good, but from my perspective what is more likely to happen is it will be regulated to death.
Whenever we are forced to regulate we get these types of results: People who want to use wireless won't be able to comply with impossible for the little guy to comply with standards - experimentation dies, soon so does innovation.
Why should admins secure their network when they can rely on a government wireless police force to go around picking up the kiddies breaking into their network? Sounds stupid? that's right it sure is, but crap like this could very well happen. -We're allowed to remail lazy.
I have a wireless lan and it's reasonably secure... It isn't hack proof - nothing is. but it is encrypted and secured and stuff and also it is on it's own network, not directly tied into my wired lan... plus there isn't information on the wireless that could be considered "secret" or personal. I want the thing to work around the house for getting that there interweb. The access point is in the basement -- a simple thing, limits the coverage of the unit a lot - just the house and parts of the yard.
I'm still looking at other ways to secure it. I found a good one the other day SHUT IT OFF WHEN NOT IN USE. (who'd a thunk it?) Why can't businesses figure this one out?? put the power cord to the thing on a timer!! not business hours? no wireless!
See the Pictures of the Flood of '08
the hackers will get the maps and start mucking with wireless nets in toronto. As the owners of the wireless nets notice that they're being abused, they'll call security firms hoping they will fix the problems.
Companies with weak security don't usually know they have weak security, and they don't read up on security news, so they won't know that ipeverywhere has "assisted" hackers in finding their insecure wireless network. But if they do find out, then they'll realize that the security firms and the hackers are working hand-in-hand to get $$$ from the companies. They may not be complicit, but they are symbiotic. This is just another case along the lines of what gweeds was talking about at HK2K
, but you knew that already..... right?
Remember, WEP is not the be all and end all of wireless security. Just because those networks don't have WEP doesn't mean they aren't secured in another, quite possibly better, way.
Of course, they could also be totally open. No way to know without taking your laptop on a walk I suppose... let us know what you find out if you do.
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