Ah WiFi. It’s almost everywhere now. Right now, in fact, I’m writing this post from a local coffee place that has great, free WiFi and awesome dark chocolate mochas, but WiFi isn’t everywhere. For the times I don’t have access to WiFi, I carry a USB data stick (EVDO modem) that gives me DSL level connections throughout most of metro Vancouver. MacWorld has a short piece on six ways to get online when you don’t have free WiFi around, and while all of these are great tips, I also want to caution you not to forget security when you’re looking for your next WiFi fix.
Yes, WiFi security is still important. No, it isn’t a common thing for people to have their computers hacked at conferences or coffee shops (unless those conferences are hacker conferences, and then you’re just toast), but this doesn’t mean you should be stupid about it.
Let’s first tackle when you do have WiFi available and you’d like to have a little more piece of mind.
Initial steps: turn off your file sharing. Yes, it’s great when you’re at home, but out in the wild, it isn’t so awesome. That is, in fact, saying “Hey come over here an browser my computer!” I am dumbfounded at the number of times I can just innocently see a ton of machines in any given coffee place that are sharing their files, songs, movies, and (erm) “other files”.
Next look at securing your connection. Lots of people use the free HotSpotShield service, but I go a step geekier with this SSH trick from Gina Trapani and Lifehacker. Yes, you need a host that lets you have SSH terminal access and doesn’t might the pass through traffic. My host doesn’t seem to mind for a while, then I have to reconnect. Small price to pay I think. I know that all of my connections are secured and encrypted.
Last thing is if you’re sharing your connection via WiFi (as I often do from my MacBook), put a password on that connection. Yeah even if it’s a simple one, just do it. Fine, your friends have to enter a password to mooch off your connection, but that’s better than the alternative which is someone using your connection to do something not nice or hugely bandwidth sucking.
Look I know that my SSH terminal connection with a SOCKS proxy is a little extreme for some. In fact I usually only connect to my hosts via SSH or SFTP anyway so that critical info is safe and GMail is set to always use HTTPS to connect (but I don’t think that covers IMAP), but I’d rather be safe than sorry.
Not to mention if I’m writing about blogging, WordPress, etc and just being stupidly ignorant of key security steps, well I’m not that much good am I?
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