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EFF Advocates Leaving Wireless Routers Open
SD-Arcadia writes "We will need a political and technological 'Open Wireless Movement' to reverse the degradation of this indispensable component of the Internet's infrastructure. Part of the task will simply be reminding people that opening their WiFi is the socially responsible thing to do, and explaining that individuals who choose to do so can enjoy the same legal protections against liability as any other Internet access provider."
Yeah, I'll really enjoy making that assertion before a judge, *after* my door has been kicked in and my gear confiscated!
"Slow down, Cowboy! It has been 3 years, 7 months and 26 days since you last successfully posted a comment."
... it might get rather expensive to share one's WiFi. Yes, it would be nice to have uncapped service, and some of us might have such. But that's not the case here in Quebec.
If you sometimes find yourself needing an open wireless network in order to check your email from a car, a street corner, or a park, you may have noticed that they're getting harder to find.
No, actually, I haven't, because I just use the bloody cellphone I carry all the time in modem mode. I need the service, so I pay for the service. I don't leech and expect somebody else to foot the bill (note that I don't consider using a coffee shop's wifi either, unless I have purchased something from them).
Tell all of this to the guy who had his door kicked down and assault rifles put to his head after a wardriver used his open access point for distributing child porn.
Maybe if Communism actually worked I'd consider doing something like this.
Unfortunately here in the UK, the law is a might fuzzier on that one. But even so, there are other issues on open wifi, like the easy of arp spoofing, or rogue access points. Not to mention, what happens if I want to open a sensitive service on my own internal networkfor some reason.
This obviously has benefits to society but comes at the cost of making your home network less secure - most routers don't separate the internet side of things from the home network side of things, so it's similar to allowing a person to connect their PC to your LAN socket. Any machines on your network are now visible to an attacker.
Sorry, but my karma just ran over your dogma.
I don't leave a connected extension cord going out to the sidewalk so anybody can use my electricity...
I lock my doors so they can't use my shelter or car...
My car's gas tank has a lock on it so I can't "share" my gasoline.
Anybody think that these guys don't encrypt their home APs?
A few more cases like that and we might get some laws changed...
No sig today...
"Notice all the vehicles outside, parked up and down the street?"
"Yeah, bunch of leeches."
"How can you say that? They're taking advantage of a basic freedom, exercising their rights, lest the government usurp them!"
"Have you looked at the plates on the cars and vans?"
"Uh, no. What's special about them?"
"Exempt. Almost all of them. They're using your connection due to cutbacks - they are the government."
A feeling of having made the same mistake before: Deja Foobar
Most of us have had the experience of tremendous inconvenience because of a lack of Internet access. Being lost in a strange place with no way to find a map; having an urgent email to send with no way to do so; trying to meet a friend with no way to contact them.
A wise man once said "A lack of planning on your part does not constitute an emergency on my part."
GLaDOS for President 2016! "Well here we are again. It's always such a pleasure." -- GLaDOS, 2011
Yeah, it'll become fucking illegal to have open wireless access points anywhere.
After all, if you have yours open, you are "obviously" intending to aid child pornographers. Or terrorists. Or democrats. Or something.
Most home users have their APs on their private network. Behind that hardware firewall that at least gives them some protection. Advocating that people who don't understand the risks of an open AP, especially one that is not segregated, is really poor judgement on the EFF's part.
"Why would I pay for internet service when I can just use someone else's?" Eventually, no one is paying for it. Overall access to the internet decreases.
And if I am paying for it, why would I let other people degrade my connection, hurtle me toward the bandwidth caps, and possibly do illegal things and get my door kicked down?
Letting strangers onto my network or my connection is something I'll be safely be saying no to for the indefinite future.
Isn't this exactly what Fonera is all about? You buy their WiFi hotspot and connect it to your Internet connection creating a separate WiFi hotspot from your personal secured WiFi and anyone who also owns and provides a hotspot is able to access it. That way you don't get freeloaders because only people who opt-in can access the network. There are even some ISPs who are starting to deploy them.
"A person is smart. People are dumb, panicky dangerous animals and you know it." - K
WPA2 encryption
network name: "password is Orange1"
problem solved
"The ability to delude yourself may be an important survival tool" - Jane Wagner -
reminding people that opening their WiFi is the socially responsible thing to do
No, it is not. This is like saying it's socially responsible to leave your keys in the ignition so your neighbors can barrow your car when they need to run to the store. It's not socially responsible to suggest that it's OK for people to use Internet connectivity they don't know anything about, like who the man in the middle might be. It's not socially responsible to allow unknown third parties to rile though your personal belongings, like those tax returns you left on that unsecured windows share.
Finally, "legal protections" are for people who can afford lawyers.
I'm a physicist. Among other things, I've made a few codes and I've developed some numerical schemes. What would you say if I asked everyone in the world who wanted to use my formulas to pay me a nominal fee? What is the difference between you asking them to pay to use your algorithm, and me asking them to pay for using my formula?
I agree you have to be payed for your work, but you have to be payed when _you create_ something, you shouldn't be payed when _someone is using_ something you created. And yes, I understand it's complicated to make that work, but it's the truth. And it works for physicists and mathematicians.
new sig
Be careful what you wish for. A new law may outlaw non-commercial open wi-fi or it may make wi-fi router owners legally responsible for its users.
And let's face it: the EFF has constantly sided with pirates on issue after issue. I suspect this is the EFF's way of helping pirates by frustrating any enforcement of copyright.
Your view of the EFF is rather twisted, they espouse freedom to do as you wish electronically without copyright infringement or the like, why should everyone else suffer because the pirates find these freedoms useful at times?
I can in all honesty say I have never pirated a single piece of software (helps I mainly use OSS of course) and yet I strongly agree with most of what the EFF say with many topics.
I have at times kept a separate access point dedicated for the purpose open for people to gain access to the internet (limited by QoS so it stays sane) passers by are free to use it as they wish. If others did the same then when I am visiting their area I could use their wifi as well. How is this a bad thing. Wifi is far more convenient than mobile internet access when available. So long as you keep security controls in place in case malicious people try to connect I see no harm in providing a useful service to your fellow man which costs you nothing.
Bullshit. Even if you're pro gun rights you have to be an idiot to think that 'backfiring raids' will make the government think, 'gee we should stop doing these'. The actual response would be, 'gee we should bring MUCH more firepower as the default'.
In the case in question forensic examination of the defendant's computer equipment showed no traces of the files he allegedly downloaded. Provided your theoretical pedophile can manage the same feat, he can probably get away with it too. However since the kicked in doorway usually comes unsuspected, I think his story won't match the evidence on his computer.
Seven puppies were harmed during the making of this post.
The problem is how those stories will be reported. Instead of "Innocent man has door broken down for leaving wifi open," it will be "Child pornographer shot dead, one police officer injured." The laws favor law enforcement when executing a no-knock warrant, and the media presumes guilt. Imagine how hard it will be to hear them yell "Police" when they have just set off a 180db flashbang in your house, or how hard it will be to see their badges when they have a tactical light in your eyes.
And for the record, I have a gun next to my bed at night.
I have an open access point in a DMZ on my network at home. I've only allowed ports 80, 443, and 53 on the traffic on that access point and bandwidth limited that traffic to 128k/sec. I've found it's just enough to be useful for guests, and restricted enough to prevent permanent use.
-ted
The push to eliminate guest wireless has largely come from ISPs, especially the cable companies, who don't want people sharing bandwidth with their neighbors instead of everybody buying their own connection. A few ISPs, such as Sonic and Speakeasy, actually encourage sharing and roaming, but the companies like Comcast that also are pushing bandwidth caps have been the main propagandists against sharing wireless, and they're also the people who didn't want you running a web server from home when the broadband business was getting started.
On the other hand, sometimes there are actual problems. Back when I was running open wireless, I once got a call from my ISP saying they'd blocked half a million spams from my address overnight, and could I check that my computer wasn't infected? The computer was fine, but my neighbor's laptop had gotten infected and was blasting away over my wifi. Eventually when I upgraded to wireless-N I turned on encryption; unfortunately the wifi standards don't give you an easy way to have open access and encrypted connections, and I'd rather have the privacy.
Bill Stewart
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I just RTFA to make sure I'm getting this correct, because I normally am fully in support of "damn the man" stuff like this, but this is just ludicrous. There has never been a time in my life where I have needed to "urgently" check my email and been unable to, nor has there ever been a time where the only thing standing between me dying of thirst and reaching a nearby oasis has been my ability to access Google Maps on a laptop. In fact, I would like to go so far as to say that if you are the kind of person who ever "urgently" needs to check your email, consider: a.) purchasing a cellphone and distributing that number to whoever might need to get in touch with you, b.) purchasing a smartphone so you can check your email without a WiFi connection, and/or c.) checking your email before you leave for a four-week safari. Who is this demographic that can afford a laptop and conducts vital business via the Interwebs, but can't afford a data plan?
I know that people around here get fussy about car analogies, so...
This is like asking me to buy a horse, and leave the horse saddled in my front yard just in case anyone needs to use it to go somewhere. And then just trusting that no one is going to hop on the horse, rob a stagecoach, and then drop the horse back in my yard for the posse to find.
At a certain point, personal responsibility has to enter into all of this. Of course someone shouldn't be liable for nasty things accomplished using a WiFi connection if they made an honest effort to secure it, or just didn't know that that was something one ought to do. But if they intentionally leave it open for anyone to use, they should accept some of the blame when someone uses it to do something naughty.
And furthermore, it's WiFi, not clean drinking water. Since when is leveling your paladin a vital civil liberty? What's next, should I set up an HD projection system on the side of my house so that people outside aren't suppressed by the tyranny of Netflix requiring a subscription? Because Ironman 2 is one of those bits of information that "wants to be free"?
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They don't go after people who "download" it. Just the other day there was a story on here about someone arrested for "downloading" KP. It also mentioned in the same article the story of another who was arrested for "downloading" Millions of images from a boat using a cantenna several blocks away from the WAP.
But if you actually read the SOURCE articles for that, the truth comes out: the one who "downloaded Millions" did NOT "download" but UPLOAD. And it wasn't Millions that were UPLOADED (for, obviously, that would take many many hours and this was alleged to have happened in one very late night) but MILLIONS of images that were found on the guy's PC when he was raided.
This seems to be a deliberate confusion of the truth. "Upload" is consistently confused with "download" in articles like this so the reader is led to believe if you even download something from the internet big brother doesn't like then the MIB will come knock down your door and drag you to hades. Of course this is in the interests of the MEDIA OWNERS who publish this nonsense, because the more fear of the internet they can generate the more likely people are to be good little sheep who only use their connections as an extension of their TV sets, thus ensuring even more monthly income for the big media giants who own shit like hulu and who profit from others like netflix.
The witch hunt won't end until the last big media conglomerate lies dead in its grave. This is why I don't have cable, I don't go to movies, I don't subscribe to magazines, and I don't "rent." Ayup, I watch what the fuck I want to watch, and listen to what the fuck I wanna listen to. Sorry Alice, I know you own your work but I've bought enough copies of Billion Dollar Babies in my life from people who show absolutely no respect for the rights of the people of the society from which they profit.
For years we've been trying really hard to get everyone to close down their open WiFi spots to prevent hacking/leeching/malicious activity/etc. Now they want us to do the opposite? I'm sorry, while I don't think a person should be held liable for the child porn their neighbor downloaded using their open WiFi, I also don't think we should be telling them to just ignore security. We have botnets precisely because people ignore security.
They are paying for a service and shouldn't be told to let others use it for free. Why wouldn't they then just cancel their service and use someone else's for free? They shouldn't have to open their computer up to being hacked (or do you want to explain to them how to beef up their security after telling them to lower their security?) just so someone can get free service. They shouldn't have to worry about bandwidth caps just so their neighbor can stream netflix for free.
They SHOULD be hassled if something goes wrong on their open network as a lesson to secure their system.
Hell, I turn off both my router and my cable "modem" when I'm not using them.
IANAL, but I play one on
So, is it then the socially responsible thing to provide free access to my other basic services, too? Is the EFF suggesting that I need to provide a series of power outlets outside my house, so that people can share that? And a sink and toilet as well? Should I be sharing my heating/cooling too?
Please. Get a grip. I pay for the services just mentioned, just like I pay for internet access. If someone wants the same services, then they have to figure out how to pay for them themselves.
Put my fist through my alarm clock with its ding-dong death inside my ear. - The Blackjacks.
The fact that those people failed to do proper work doesn't make the EFF wrong. IT means the police are wrong.
I have seen a lot of police busts, and not once have I seen an officer shout the crime at the person while they where being arrested. Maybe it's different in NY.
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Which then results in Mexico - the people getting raided also get more firepower, and then get MONEY, and then just BUY the police.
You know, I have some sympathy for your point here, but I don't see a lot of evidence, either. Back in the misty days when Thompson sub-machine guns could be purchased over the counter and Clyde Barrow toted a BAR, the cops weren't notoriously polite to the people they arrested. Apparently the widespread availability of firearms did not, in fact, prevent "third-degree" interrogations and prisoners who never even made it to booking.
I suspect our perceptions of how it used to be are based on a sort of Pleasantville image of happy white people trusting their neighborhood patrolman, who spent most of his time helping lost children with melting ice-cream cones.
After all, before all those hippie liberals got in the way, it didn't occur to most cops that they shouldn't tap your phone, turn out your pockets, hold you for days without access to a lawyer, or "tune you up" before formal questioning.. Each of those issues had to be dragged through a court before Officer Friendly gave them up.
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