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Nokia calls Wireless Warchalkers 'Thieves'
Mr]-[at writes "Nokie "has condemned as theft the placing of chalk symbols on walls and pavements at places where people can use wireless net access."" Ok I guess if you wanna be technical about it ;)
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...in related news, primary schools have called for the banning of the underground childrens activity known as 'hopscotch', arguing that such wanton chalking of pavements could lead on to a life of bandwidth theft.
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You know that guy who stole your girlfriend away from you in the summer of '95? He's going to die.
Does not sound like warchalking cleanly fits the definition of theft to me.
- Don't anthropomorphize computers, they don't like it.
No, warchalking is technically *not* theft. You may argue that the act of mooching the bandwidth of the wireless access is theft, but the warchalking is, at worst, vandalism (graffitti). It is no more theft than someone selling a "guide to the stars' homes" (since a burgler could deduce that there may be things of worth in their houses and rob them)
Its like Microsoft declaring OSS & Free software "un-American", or the RIAA and MPAA complaining about P2P networks. It is a threat to their business models.
Think about it; people have started to use Warchalking as a means to advertise and propogate open wireless networks. Geeks are setting up their own networks and chalking the area themselves, allowing people to use their nodes freely. Nokia is afraid that if warchalking becomes popular, it could threaten the uptake of the forthcoming 3G mobile networks.
If Nokia made WAN gear, I'm sure they wouldn't be quite as vocal about it...
Take an analogy, and call me in the morning. If TV signals leak (Videocrypt Pay-TV goes out unencrypted, for example), they don't call the people who turn on their TV and see "Oooh, unencrypted Sky" and watch it, theives - they fix the problem. A leak is a bug, something to be fixed.
Why don't Nokia put more time and effort into convincing people to secure their wireless networks? It's my airspace too! As a citizen of {insert friendly first-world nation) I would like to think that I have some right to the cancer-causing radiation that is travelling through my head. If I choose to pick it, that's up to me. If it can go through walls, it's going through my head, goddammit!
It's my airspace. These people are sending signals through our bodies. Even assuming it's 100% healthy (no trolls with stories about studies into cancer causes required), I don't have the right to attempt to listen to this signal?
Perhaps the issue is transmitting back onto these networks should be illegal, but snooping shouldn't be. Turn on the encryption, smarten up and stop bitching at (white-hat) hackers for using technology in ways it wasn't originally intended to be used. That's how development works.
Not entirely, but it would help get the freeloaders off.
If you're going to be a wireless 'hippy', submit your location to an online database or something.
I know places where I can plug into CAT5 or RJ45 phone lines, but I don't walk in to companies, pluggin' in.
IANAL, but I believe that if I left a few cases of beer on the sidewalk for a few days (discounting the skunk factor) and some or all of it disappeared, it would be regarded as "Shame on me" for not securing my property, and I would have no case.
How is this different?
-JPJFeh.
Should be useful to security auditors. Get out and take a stroll around your site, and be alarmed at any chalk-up you find.
And of course, do something about it.
Sheesh, evil *and* a jerk. -- Jade
I would imagine this poll will rate very similar to the file sharing poll...should Napster have been illegal? Most would say no, sharing files in itself isn't illegal, the downloading of copyrighted material without having paid for it is the illegal part. This is similar, the chalking in itself isn't illegal but the usage is.
One thing to remember is that it may be illegal to chalk in some places. On many college campuses they have made it illegal to chalk the sidewalks advertising parties, concerts, etc. Stupid, but laws are still laws.
--trb
Because at the stop light, you don't get to pick which CD they're playing. When connecting to someone's wireless network, at some point you're going to be making use of their resources (DHCP server, intranet, bandwidth, firewall...whatever).
Not saying I agree with Nokia's description, but there is a difference between your stop-light analogy and warchalking.
Cheers,
Ian
...but if I watch TV, I am not provide less TV signal for other people to watch. Not the right analogy for bandwidth!
LETS DECOMPOSE & ENJOY ASSEMBLING
The equivalent would be if you were listening and as a result they heard less of their own music.
Are these peoples bandwidth thieves? Perhaps. But if companies are so angered by the idea of war chalking then maybe they need to spread the world to secure wireless connections. Company needs to secure their connections wireless or otherwise or quit there bitching. plane and simple.
Most consumers will look for days attempting to get the correct piece of hardware for the cheapest possible price. Yet these same people won't even crack open the manual about the default security settings.
So if your not going to get off your dead ass and secure your wireless connection.... suffer
Unless the company owns the land and airspace where the wireless network reaches, people should be free to stand on public ground and use their computers. If there's a hilltop in a public park from which you can see and hear a concert, or athletic event, is it 'stealing' to sit on that hill and enjoy the entertainment? Any network administrator that allows an insecure wireless signal to be accessible from a sidewalk should know better.
Companies can't just say, 'we're going to leave this [money, confidential documents, unprotected wireless AP] right where any chump on the sidewalk can get at them, but you can't touch them cause Nokia says it's stealing' and call it a security plan.
It used to be OK; things were too technical for most people to understand. Similarly, locking mechanisms on bank safes used to be simple; now they're as complex as any sci-fi fan could dream of. And in the computer world, there's no excuse for any security-by-complexity setup less than large-prime algorithmic encrytption.
$8.95/mo web hosting
I guess it is theft. Warchalkers are performing wireless security audits for free, thus stealing from themselves.
Nowhere in the article does it say that someone that simply chalks a sidewalk is a thief!
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An advisory issued by the handset maker said anyone using bandwidth without the permission of the person paying for it was simply stealing.
Now Nokia has joined the chorus of criticism by saying that anyone who sits outside an office and uses a company's wireless network to do their own web surfing is stealing.
"This is theft, plain and simple," wrote Nokia in its advisory.
The company said that anyone using a company's bandwidth without permission is reducing the amount of a valuable resource available to the workers in that organisation.
Nokia warned that if too many warchalkers log on together, the whole network inside a company could slow down.
It says anyone that actually logs in is technically a thief. That's it. It does not say that someone that leaves a chalk symbol is with that act alone a theif.
Let's pay attention to the distinctions, people!
Robots are everywhere, and they eat old people's medicine for fuel.
You're right, except that both the Slashdot title and the BBC title are wrong. Quote the BBC:
(emphasis mine)
So actually, what Nokia is saying is that sitting outside a company and using their bandwidth is stealing and not actually the act of warchalking.
Avantslash - View Slashdot cleanly on your mobile phone.
"Nokia warned that if too many warchalkers log on together, the whole network inside a company could slow down."
They would not noitce, 200 people sitting on the sidewalk outside their building with laptops??
Elp
"You keep using that word, I do not think it means what you think it means..." Inigo Montoya
Obvisouly you can't go prosecuting theft when you can't casually determine the difference between a network that is non-deliberately insecure and one that is deliberately open. It's like me putting my telephone outside my house with not restrictions on it and complianing someone used it to make a phone call.
I'm sure everyone is aware that Nokia isn't without a vested interest in what's going on here right? If the concept of freely available or at least tolerated wireless 'borrowing' catches on, it -will- hurt the adoption of horribly overpriced 3G solutions which they have an extremely large investment in seeing through. In many ways, a decentralized wireless infrastructure makes a lot more sense and it is feasible with things like 802.11 and the derivative technologies that will happen.
It is definately in their self-interest to make this activity heavily illegal, but everyone should remember they are far from a casual onlooker.
..don't panic
We, the wireless networking users, have taken Nokia's comments under careful consideration, and have issued our response. Thank you, and have a nice day. :)
The Uncoveror: It's the real news.
Listening to their music is passive. Using someone else's network consumes resources and possibly denies those resources to the company paying for it.
Corporate Internet connections are frequently bandwidth metered or bandwidth limited. "Burstable" connections are where the price increases as usage increases. Your usage increases bandwidt and thus has the potential for increasing their cost.
Learning HOW to think is more important than learning WHAT to think.
They're not lawyers. They're not law makers. They're not chalkers. They probably aren't even getting chalked. So why does anybody give a flying fuck about their opinion?
http://www.linux-wlan.org/index.html
i fi cations.html - Slick, huh?
Check it out. They make Prism2-based 802.11 devices.
No 11b devices listed there, but I wouldn't be surprised that if they had classic 802.11, they have 802.11b
If WAN rather than WLAN was not a typo, they make plenty of WAN equipment too. Check their site. http://www.nokia.com/
http://www.nokia.com/phones/nokiad211/d311_spec
A lot of cellular companies see 802.11 as augmenting 3G, not competing with it. Or more properly, 3G as augmenting 802.11. 802.11 for your 'net in the cities and 3G out in the boonies.
retrorocket.o not found, launch anyway?
Because at the stop light, you don't get to pick which CD they're playing.
Well, I can certainly make a request.
When connecting to someone's wireless network, at some point you're going to be making use of their resources (DHCP server, intranet, bandwidth, firewall...whatever).
A perfect example of an automated request process!
Now, if you do not wish to honor my requests, for songs OR for bandwidth, then stop granting my requests. Simple as that.
Eve Fairbanks says I drive a hybrid!LOL
If a kid jumps into my swimming pool (which isn't fenced in) and drowns, I am responsible because a swimming pool is an attractive nuisance.
I don't see any difference between the pool and an insecure wireless LAN, so I'd have to think the WLAN is an attractive nuisance and therefore the responsibility of the owner, not the so-called thief.
Generally, if people leave useful stuff out on the sidewalk, the default assumption--barring notification to the contrary--is "free to all."
I don't see how an unsecured network is any different. It is so easy to add password or other simple security that it is reasonable to presume that anybody offering network access to the neighborhood intends to do so. Of course, simple courtesy demands that one not abuse such a service--by sending out 10,0000 spams, for example.
On the other hand, it is certainly theft to break into the network, no matter how rudimentary the security.
Well, take that analogy to its conclusion. It only justifies sniffing traffic leaking out. By using that wireless network for internet access (or any use infact) you are throwing stuff into their premises and consuming their bandwidth without permission. It is stealing, plain and simple.
Just as leaving your door unlocked doesn't make it ok to come in, not protecting the network doesn't mean it's ok to exploit it. Administrators should secure wireless networks with extra care, but it is not the responsibilty of warchalkers to exploit that.
All that being said, Warchalking is a hell of a lot more innocuous way of finding out that you are wide open than, say, corporate espionage. I came in for an interview at a company that operating in a single suite on the third floor of a building. I noticed a warchalking mark outside the premises and thought 'some company's administrator needs to get it together'. I get the job and find out they have an access point wide open. They had it carefully positioned in the middle of their small suite so they would get best reception. I mentioned what measures I thought should be taken and they said they didn't want to deal with the hastle on employee laptops and that they *knew* the wireless wouldn't extend beyond their walls. Some months later I was able to show them that I could connect from the ground outside the building, and then they let me enable 40-bit WEP. about as secure as a wet tissue, but better than nothing.
XML is like violence. If it doesn't solve the problem, use more.
Agreed, but with one caveat.
In a traditional (wired) LAN, if I were to install rj45 jacks in the outside surface of my building, at ground level, and someone walked up with a laptop and plugged in AND my dhcp server happily gave them an address and allowed them to use my resources -- is that really "theft"?
I would say no. I have (perhaps unwittingly) created a public terminal and allowd people to share my network. Perhaps I didn't *intend* for unauthorized people to use it (maybe I had the idea that a salesman could stop by and download something without having to go up to their office, or some other equally stupid idea), but then again, they didn't *steal* the ip-address, nor did they *force* my router to accept their traffic. I gave it to them without bothering to validate their identity... Stupid me.
Now, how is wireless access any different? If you are stupid enough to setup a WAP without restricting it by MAC address and/or using encryption, then you essentially have an open rj45 port on your wall. It would be theft if I asked for a dhcp address, you said no, and then I tried to hack my way in anyways.
As another analogy, if I leave my car open and you get in and drive off, you're stealing because you deprived me of the use of my car. If I leave my car open and you hop in the back seat without my permission, you're guilty of trespass. If, on the other hand, you see a city bus with has no place to pay fares and no indications that you need to do so, how is it stealing if you get on and ride it? It costs the city money to cart your butt around... but if they're too dumb to charge you or keep you off, that's their fault.
An unprotected WAP is like a big flashing neon VACANCY sign. Please don't try to pass YET MORE STUPID ANAL-RETENTIVE LAWS to make it a punishable-by-finger-removal crime... instead, learn how to secure your network and make your sysadmin do their job!
How is WarChalking theft? It is not! This demonisation of WarChalkers in the mass media is akin to the ignorance of the distinction between Hackers and Crackers.
I am a Computer Professional; I am also a WarChalker. I am not a criminal or thief. I have never stolen bandwidth or illegally accessed a computer.
The first issue to remember is WiFi is public spectrum it belongs to everybody not to a particular company simply because they've bought an Access Point.
Secondly most WarChalkers provide internet access via a WarChalked WiFi Access Point out of community spirit or as part of expermental community wireless projects.
At first it appeared to me that some technically ignorant Nokia marketing droid had simple jumped on the sensationaist anti-WarChalking bandwagon as paraded in the mass-media.
However as I write this it is becoming increasing obvious to me that this attack is more insipid. Nokia's problem is that cooperative community based Wireless Access Projects run by WarChalkers are competition that will in future destroy their existing business models.
Asking a wireless server for access and receive the requested access is against the law.
Stealing my right to understand how a device works and build my own device (just the way I like: "Do it by yourself") IS NOT against the law.
Stealing my right to buy a CD (cdda compatible) and play it in the ONLY cdda compatible device I have IS NOT against the law.
Stealing my right to develop my own software and do with it whatever I want, even give it way for anybody who wants even see its source IS NOT against the law.
Stealing the right of a country to solve its own problems, and decide it's time to change its president (dictator or not), without the agreement of the proper organization responsible for these cases IS NOT agaisnt the law.
Accepting money and gifts from big companies to submit new laws following thir interests, instead of the people interests and freedom, IS NOT against the law.
I hope to still have the right to disagree with things that I think that is REALLY wrong and MUST, or else we will become slaves of laws that were created by our own legal and political representants, representing others interests.
-=-=-=-=
I know life isn't fair, but why can't it ever be un-fair in MY favor!?