Moved house....quick wireless connection question

[odinsnephew]

I just moved house and I now reside in a big town house, aka student ville in Exeter so im obviously in range of various wireless networks. When I first got here I tried the wireless and found that im already connected to a pretty decent 'unsecured' connection. Internet and WoW is absolutely excellent so im fairly happy.

But is using wireless and being connected to an unsecure network more dodgy? A friend mentioned not doing any monetary transactions through it, which I will not do but am I liable to be haxxored just by using the internet and WoW?

Is it free internet ftw or 'a bit of a problem and pay for teh internets plz' ? Not that I mind paying, but if its free.....well its free so why not?

Cheers and thanks ;)

[Kalos]

It's a slightly overrated risk for gaming. If people really wanted your details, it'd be the trojan route. Basically, they'd have to A. Be a really desperate and crooked person B. Have an awareness and desire for WoW. and C. Hang around for hours within roughly a 100 meter radius. It's C. that makes it unlikely. A trojan is just far more effective for getting WoW details, bank details are worth it but not a cheap account (no offence). I can't see anyone who just happens to live very close by wasting hours or days waiting for you to log on and sniffing out the details from the unecrypted signal. Not to mention, if they really wanted they could have simply interfaced with the router itself to do the job. And WEP encryption, with the right hardware, can be broken in minutes anyhow, hardly secure. I do all my bank transactions, when I do them, on a small office laptop nobody else uses for anything and using a physical cable. But I think it's over protective for gaming use. Banking details are universally prized, WoW accounts are worth something to a pretty small minority of the hacking community I'd imagine, no monetary opportunity gain.

[odinsnephew]

Cheers Kalos and thank you :)

I just hope im in with honest, non playing WoW students :grin:

[elsegundo]

lol im pretty sure you're not the only one mooching off the wireless network. you can always search every computer on the network.. and if they have shared files... its all yours for the taking. haha. if anyone goes on my computer, all my old homework, all my girlfriend's current homeowrk, and all our mp3/videos are on share. i dont mind sharing them with anyone who needs it. its better than loading up limewire or whatever torrent they have just to get a song i already have.

[odinsnephew]

Sooo its free internet ftw then? And im fairly safe unless Elsegundo's girlfriend is near and hax my pictures/homework?? :grin:

[elsegundo]

pretty much. if you have essays on there that may be used for her english, psychology, philosophy, sociology, or human sexuality classes, she'll jack those.

[TPMdm]

I know it isn't much but if you don't have anything set to "share" then it will prevent the casual snooper from getting in your base and killing your d00dz

[jnelsonwhat]

I only have one tip for you in this situation. Be logged in as a normal user with no admin rights. I've testing many wireless holes at work (Department of Corrections IT) and found that most intrusions and trojans are caused by this mistake alone.

J

[Xlorep DarkHelm]

I just moved house and I now reside in a big town house, aka student ville in Exeter so im obviously in range of various wireless networks. When I first got here I tried the wireless and found that im already connected to a pretty decent 'unsecured' connection. Internet and WoW is absolutely excellent so im fairly happy.

But is using wireless and being connected to an unsecure network more dodgy? A friend mentioned not doing any monetary transactions through it, which I will not do but am I liable to be haxxored just by using the internet and WoW?

Is it free internet ftw or 'a bit of a problem and pay for teh internets plz' ? Not that I mind paying, but if its free.....well its free so why not?

Cheers and thanks ;)

If you do your banking/money transactions through a secured connection (like https), then there is still a lot of encryption that an individual would need to sort through to figure out your banking information. Tighter security is good, but there is such a thing as going overboard with it.

It is kind of stealing someone else's internet connection if you are using various unsecured internet/wireless networks in the area. There are a great number of them, I know, because there are a great number of people who don't bother with it. But it is still effectively stealing their bandwidth.

[clevins]

Hmm... I'm of 2 minds on this one. Yeah, they left the connection unsecured... but playing WoW for hours and sucking up a significant chunk of the bandwidth is kinda... i dunno, seems like an abuse of hospitality to me. But like I said... they left it open.

[Kalos]

Hmm... I'm of 2 minds on this one. Yeah, they left the connection unsecured... but playing WoW for hours and sucking up a significant chunk of the bandwidth is kinda... i dunno, seems like an abuse of hospitality to me. But like I said... they left it open.
WoW isn't very bandwidth consuming, suprisingly. Barely any more that two or three IMs on background running in terms of consumption. Now automatic updates, that's a bandwidth hog :laugh: But there are far worse things to be doing than playing WoW that would, if the charge was per MB, cost hundreds of times more if the connection happened to be something like a 10 Mb line.

[Clavina]

The only problem with using the connection is that you'll have no control over what it's used for. If someone decides to use it for downloading torrents 24/7 it will pretty much ruin your wow playing.

Apart from that I would say free internet ftw, get as much use out of it as you can before it gets closed :)

[Baboon]

In my country (Netherlands) some strange Judge decided it was hacking to use a wireless network like that, even when it's not secured. But well, maybe that's only here.

Btw I've had horrible experiences with wireless. People being called Unknown Entitiy all the time, random disconnects. If during a raid a guildie gets disconnected, they often blame their Wifi. I just use a decent reliable piece of cable.

[surodat]

In my country (Netherlands) some strange Judge decided it was hacking to use a wireless network like that, even when it's not secured. But well, maybe that's only here.

Btw I've had horrible experiences with wireless. People being called Unknown Entitiy all the time, random disconnects. If during a raid a guildie gets disconnected, they often blame their Wifi. I just use a decent reliable piece of cable.

That's really odd.

I mean:
/click connect
/arrested

Sometime you don't even have to click connect... It just automatically connects.

I guess it could be consider private property. I mean, you don't have to have locks on your doors, but that doesn't give everyone free reign to walk into your house and raid the leftovers in your fridge. It's stupid not to have locks, but the laws there sometimes to protect stupid people.

An interesting precedent calling a wireless unsecured radio frequency private space, if that is indeed what they're doing.

[SirBazturd]

haha. if anyone goes on my computer, my old homework, all my girlfriend's current homeowrk, and all our videos are on share. i dont mind sharing them with anyone who needs it.



oh...you two have any good videos?? :wink:




I know it's cheap and juvenile, but I couldn't resist.

[elsegundo]

oh...you two have any good videos?? :wink:




I know it's cheap and juvenile, but I couldn't resist.

she has all of chapell show, some horror, and some japanese stuff i dont really care about.

i have a bunch of movies, the sopranos, 30 rock, and pretty much all the initial d episodes. the live action movie was a waste of... everything.

they're all from dvd so pretty decent quality.