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Any risk to joining "open" Linksys wi-fi hotspots?

S

slate1

macrumors regular
Original poster
I joined an open Linksys wi-fi router at a place of business I trust and now anywhere I go that has a Linksys router set up sans security, my phone joins it.

Are there any risks involved in doing that? I'm envisioning someone grabbing personal information off my phone or something! 😉
 
I think there is more of a risk for the person that has their router open without knowing it. A couple of my neighbors have their router open and I could go in and change their router settings if I wanted (I checked, they left the default admin password on and everything) so I informed them on how to make it secure.

But if it is a small business like a local mom & pop coffee shop, then they most likely have it opened for anyone who'll come into their establishment.
 
There's always one open near my house, I dunno whose it is or why it's open. There's no real establishment near my house, except for a car dealership. (maybe it's theirs? lol)

I always worry about using it (even though I don't have much sensitive info on my laptop, and I don't do stuff like check my bank account when on an open network) but so far nothing has happened... knock wood.

I only use it when my internet goes down (like once a month for an hour or so).
 
slate1 said:
I joined an open Linksys wi-fi router at a place of business I trust and now anywhere I go that has a Linksys router set up sans security, my phone joins it.

Are there any risks involved in doing that? I'm envisioning someone grabbing personal information off my phone or something! 😉
Click to expand...

Is your iPhone jailbroken? If no, then no one can get anything off your iPhone.

If yes, and you have ssh installed and running, but have left the passwords in their default states (alpine is the password) then they could theoretically steal whatever is on your iphone, and if they wanted to be mean, they could delete stuff from it too. This would require them knowing you connected to their AP, know what your IP on their AP was, and then connect/"hack" into your iPhone, and then do their "stuff". All while your walking by. Its not likely unless they are specifically looking for iPhones, or are a script. 😉
 
On the same subject - is there a way to remove memorized wi-fi auto-connect SSIDs? (Without jailbreaking) ?
 
Someone can sit on the network and sniff all the wireless packets going to and from the router. From this dAta they can pull passwords and login details for unecrypted sites.

Most likely this won't happen but if your a high profile person it is something to keep in mind.
 
Diode said:
Someone can sit on the network and sniff all the wireless packets going to and from the router. From this dAta they can pull passwords and login details for unecrypted sites.

Most likely this won't happen but if your a high profile person it is something to keep in mind.
Click to expand...

After they have access to the network. Assuming they do not, they will have to sniff for a password, do some packet injecting, gain access, then start some sniffing.

If they are already attached to the network, then ya, they can do pretty much what they want. This exact reason is why I make ssh tunnels back to my box at home for checking email and web browsing when I am away from home. On my MBP though, not my iPhone. I keep myself from doing things on my iPhone that are sensitive for this reason. Once I can make tunnels that safari and mail can open and shut, on the iPhone, I will start doing that too.
😉
Security much? 😀
 
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