[P1] OT: Setting up Public Wi-Fi

[Nikon's World]

On Thursday, March 11, 2004, at 11:39  PM, Pam Sorooshian wrote:

>
> On Mar 11, 2004, at 4:09 PM, Brian Pearce wrote:
>
>> With the technology being made so much easier to use, all kinds of 
>> people can easily set up these sorts of networks and use them, and 
>> that includes people who's expertise doesn't go too much further than 
>> plug-and-play. In some cases, those who do so may well be unaware of 
>> some of the basic security measures that should be taken; but just 
>> because one could take advantage of them, doesn't mean one *should.*
>
> Well, yeah, that would be me --- I just followed simple directions, 
> plugged the cablemodem in to a Linksys router and have my mac plus 
> several pc's all connecting wirelessly. (Okay a brand new Dell laptop 
> and my iBook each took about 30 seconds to set up, the other pc's took 
> many many hours to clean up all the problems that seemed to erupt one 
> after another as soon as I tried to connect wirelessly, but I finally 
> did it - and the so-called support from linksys was worse then 
> nonexistent - they wasted hours of my time.) Anyway - I'm clueless 
> about most of what you guys are talking about - I have no idea why 
> anybody would want to sniff my computers - they do everything BUT 
> smell good, as far as I can tell <BEG>.
>
> Although the signal reaches all over our house and onto the patio, it 
> doesn't reach out to the street. Do I have some reason to worry about 
> security?  What would people be trying to get from us and what would 
> they do with it? Please - simple nontech answer needed.
>
You probably don't have much to worry about but if you want to be on 
the safe side simply change the network name and password and stop the 
the router from broadcasting the SSID. It is all straight forward and 
simple to do. Setting WEP would also help but it is not the easiest 
thing to do on a mac and pc network. You can go here to find out more 
about security and your Lynksis router.

> Sometimes when I open the lid to my ibook, to look something up on my 
> calendar, for example, it connects to somebody's wireless network and 
> downloads my email immediately. I'm not "doing" anything to connect - 
> I just happen to have my email program open and it does it before I 
> even realize it. This happened to me at my dentist's office before and 
> it happened to me today when I was just in a parking lot waiting for 
> my daughter to get finished with a dance class. All of a sudden I 
> realized that I had new mail. Seems like people have to take some 
> responsibility for preventing this - or are we legally obligated to 
> always have our airport cards turned off? I tend to turn it off when 
> I'm out, because I heard here that the battery will last longer if it 
> is off, but even so it doesn't seem that I should be considered to be 
> doing something illegal just because I don't get it turned off 
> instantaneously when I open the computer - seems like the people with 
> the network could probably more easily prevent me from unintentionally 
> accessing their network, couldn't they?


If you want to prevent your computer from connecting to networks other 
than yours, go to System Preferences, click on the Network tab, click 
the AirPort tab, click Join a specific network, enter your network 
name, then hit the Apply Now button and your set. Now your laptop will 
only connect to your network.

>
> -pam
> National Home Education Network
> <www.NHEN.org>
> Serving the entire homeschooling community since 1999
> through information, networking and public relations.
>





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