Keep your data safe when connecting to public wireless hotspots

by Scott Carmichael on

How about we open this article with some good old fashioned scaremongering? Any time you connect to a public Wi-Fi hotspot, almost every single piece of data you transmit can be picked up by anyone within range of the same network.

When you connect to an unencrypted Internet hotspot, almost everything sent between your computer and the Internet is sent in a format that anyone can read when they install a small piece of software.

There are hundreds of free “network analyzers/sniffers” available on the Internet, and even untrained users will be able to start sniffing wireless traffic in a matter of minutes. Now, before you freak out too much, you need to know that not all traffic is susceptible to snooping, and that there are ways to protect yourself. Also important to know – sites and services like banks and email providers use a secure Internet protocol that makes snooping virtually impossible.

(Photo from Flickr/Corypina)
Turn off “auto connect”

On your computer, make sure “auto connect to Wi-Fi hotspots” isn’t enabled. Always verify that the hotspot you are connecting to is indeed from the provider you want.

There are real scams out there, usually involving wireless hotspots called “Free public Wi-Fi” – these “honeypot” hotspots are set up with the sole purpose of trying to steal your data. If you really need to get online, the urge to connect to the first open hotspot you find may be tempting, but it pays to be secure.

Don’t share files on your computer

When you connect to a wireless hotspot, anything you are sharing on your computer, may be shared with anyone else connected to that network.

So, to prevent this make sure you either disable the file and printer sharing feature, end the files/folder sharing option, or pick the correct network type. Only the most recent versions of Windows will present you with the network “location” popup, so be sure to pick wisely.

Get yourself a 3G or 4G adapter

Don’t trust working on a public network at all? Invest in a 3G or 4G wireless broadband adapter, and you won’t have to worry about people listening in on your data. Network connections with a mobile broadband service are encrypted, and extremely tough to hack/eavesdrop.

Of course, your own 3G adapter comes at a price – you’ll be paying around $50 for access, and you’ll be limited to the coverage area of the operator, but if the information you transmit is really important, the investment won’t be hard to justify.

Create your own secure connection with a VPN

A VPN – or Virtual Private Network is a system that transports your Internet traffic to a secure server, then passes it on to the Internet. By using a VPN, everything sent between your computer and the VPN service is encrypted. Access to a VPN is usually pretty simple if you work for a large company. but even consumers can get their own VPN setup without too much hassle.

The easiest, and most popular (free) consumer solution is Hotpot Shield. With Hotspot Shield, you simply enable the application when you are at a public hotspot, and your traffic is securely sent over their VPN.

Another solution (that I’ve used a lot myself) is Hotspot VPN. Their no-frills web site lets you create a VPN connection (which you have to manually configure). Hotspot VPN is available for under $9/month, or for $3.88 if you only want a day pass.

Once you have set up a VPN, all Internet traffic on your computer passes through the secure servers of the VPN company, making eavesdropping nearly impossible.

More advanced users may want to consider setting up their own VPN at home, using Open VPN, or even by installing an improved firmware version on their router, turning it into a router/VPN server.

Connect securely to your home PC, then connect to sites you need

Several weeks ago, we reviewed Logmein – a service that lets your remotely connect to your computer. With Logmein, you can connect to your home PC using the Logmein software, your browser, or the Logmein Ignition client for the iPhone.

Once connected to your home PC, you can use all the Internet applications you want – securely. The downside is of course that your home PC needs to be turned on 24/7 for the connection to work.

Secure sites are your best bet



Staying secure is as simple as making sure the sites you connect to are secure – so always look for the https:// and/or padlock symbol in your browser. Modern browsers also allow you to hover with your mouse over the site name to be sure it is a verified web service, and not a spoof.

ALL traffic is vulnerable – not just web traffic

Just because you are a responsible user that keeps an eye open for the “padlock” in your browser, doesn’t mean you are safe.

ALL traffic you send over Wi-Fi could be vulnerable. This includes your Twitter application, photo upload programs and anything else that accesses the Internet. When possible, make sure your applications access the service using a secure connection. If in doubt – don’t use them.

Firewall your computer

Always make sure your computer has a reliable firewall installed. Many systems come with this nowadays, so make sure you have it turned on, and set to block incoming traffic. Firewall software is usually “set and forget”, so there is no excuse for not being protected.

Don’t forget your mobile device(s)

Keep in mind that your handheld device is just as vulnerable as your laptop computer. Anything you transmit in the open on an iPhone or other Wi-Fi enabled device can be intercepted.

Thankfully, modern devices like the iPhone and Droid also support VPN connections – so if you really want to be secure, consider subscribing to a VPN service, or setting up your own VPN server.

Restrict what you do on Wi-Fi

This final tip is also the easiest to implement – don’t do anything on Wi-Fi that you wouldn’t want to share with anyone else. This means no bill payments, no Ebay auctions or anything else that could get you in trouble if someone grabbed your user name and password. Don’t underestimate how quickly someone can grab your password and start stealing from you.

Logan airport to continue offering free Wi-Fi

by Scott Carmichael on

Boston’s Logan airport has voted to continue to offer free Wi-Fi. The service had been free since Google sponsored it during the Holiday season.

Now, the addition of free Wi-Fi is certainly nice, but not really newsworthy. What makes this piece of news more interesting is that it puts an end to a long battle the airport operator had with others that offered Wi-Fi at “their” airport.

Back in 2005, Massport got rather upset when they realized that Continental Airlines was offering complimentary Wi-Fi in their club lounge. Of course, the airport claimed that the Continental system could interfere with the airport wide system.

What they really meant, was that they were annoyed that Continental offered free Wi-Fi, taking away revenue from the overpriced Airport system (at $7.95 per day).

In the end, Continental told the airport operator to take a hike, and got the FCC involved. Since Wi-Fi is in open unlicensed spectrum, the FCC agreed that Massport could not demand anything from Continental.

We are now five years past that incident, and the airport has probably made its multi-million Dollar investment back, which means anyone at Logan can finally enjoy free Wi-Fi without having to pay a penny. Fingers crossed other airports in the country pay attention.

Gadling visits Aircell – the company behind Gogo Inflight Internet

by Scott Carmichael on

There is no denying it – Gadling loves Gogo Inflight. So much in fact, that we begged to take a look behind the scenes at what makes this inflight Internet service run, and grill their executives on when we can finally have Internet on every single flight we take. It was a fascinating day, spent with people that really love what they are doing.
The geeky side of Aircell

The Aircell network consists of 92 ground stations. Think of them as the same kind of cell tower you have in your back yard, but looking up at the skies. The technology is very similar to what you use on Sprint and Verizon (EVDO Rev.A). Thankfully for Aircell, looking up at the skies requires a hell of a lot less towers than looking towards the horizon (like cellphone companies need to do). For starters, there are no trees and buildings blocking your view, and when you look up, there is no curvature of the earth to deal with.

Some other background information for the geeks – their network uses cellular equipment from Chinese manufacturer ZTE (their first major network sale in the US. The rest of it runs pretty much the same way any major network operates – a lot of Cisco and IBM equipment, and a backbone powered by AT&T. At the moment, each airplane gets 3.1mbit of bandwidth.

Their network operations center was surprisingly boring – a handful of people keep a close eye on the ground based network, and one guy watches the planes. The reason for this is actually great for Aircell – their equipment has proven to be extremely reliable, and they really can keep the entire network running with just a couple of guys.

In their network operations center, the wall has the screens you’d expect from any NOC – a couple of network status screens and a large plasma TV with 100’s of planes. The planes are all color coded to show their status. Thankfully all but one or two planes were green which may have explained the serenity in their room.

Aircell equipment installations

At the moment, Aircell has gear installed on just under 700 aircraft (this does not include installations on private planes). When you realize that just 12 months ago it was only on 23 planes, you’ll understand what an amazing accomplishment this has been.

The really amazing number is that the Aircell team can install the entire system on a plane in just 8 hours. Airlines hate taking a plane out of operation, and obviously, Aircell can’t ask the airline to hand them a plane for a couple of days. So at the moment, the Aircell team arrives at the airport, gets access to a plane at 10pm, and by sunrise, the plane has been equipped with everything it needs to offer Internet access in the skies.

The company

During the day, Aircell opened up every office in the building for me – nothing was off limits. I spent some time chatting with their CEO, their VP of airline operations and even spent some time in their mock airplane cabin complete with coach and first class seating. This cabin-in-an-office is where Aircell did some real hands-on testing of how people work on their computer, and probably realized like the rest of us that using a large laptop in a coach seat is a major hassle.

The future

As Aircell adds more aircraft to its network, and more users learn the joy of inflight Internet, you obviously run the risk of towers becoming too crowded, and the speed grinding to a halt. Thankfully the company is fully prepared to deal with that. When they showed me their current base station map, they showed how easy it is to just add new towers. So easy in fact, that they can even add towers for one specific high-traffic route. So, if too many people start using it between LA and San Francisco, keeping speeds acceptable involves nothing more than a new tower looking up to the skies on that route.

In addition to this, Aircell already has a future plan laid out for a migration to 4G technology. They have picked LTE as their next generation system, and as the market evolves, they’ll be able to beam as much as 100mbit to a single aircraft.

Of course, when I asked which airlines we can expect to join the ranks of the current Aircell customers, the room got rather quiet. But it is safe to say that pretty soon, almost every major US carrier will have committed to offering Internet in the air. There is only one competitor for domestic US inflight Internet access, and they have yet to see a major rollout to any aircraft.

One big topic at the Aircell HQ is video – video is big on the ground, and if it is up to them, it’ll be big in the skies as well. There were very few details about their plans, but if you picture turning your laptop into an inflight entertainment system with content coming from equipment on the plane, you’ll get an idea of how Aircell envisions the future of flying.

Wrap-up

I’d like to thank Aircell and everyone that took the time to speak to me. It was fun to see so many people speak so passionately about what they are doing. Despite some grumblings from the media wondering how they’ll ever make money, the company has a pretty solid outlook on the future. Usage is up month after month, they just reached the one million user mark, and are going to hit two million within the next month.

Obviously most passengers would prefer the service to be free, but when you look at the amount of money that has been pumped into building this network, it is pretty amazing they can offer it at this current price point.

The unsure future of in-flight wifi

by Grant Martin on

Remember when Clear Security started giving away discounted and free memberships earlier this year? At the time, the company marketed the effort as a means to increase membership and awareness, but in hindsight we now see that it was also a death rattle. Only weeks after announcing a host of specials, Clear unexpectedly terminated its service, stranding tons of passengers with costly expired memberships.

Could that same demise prove possible for in-flight wireless? 2009’s holiday season has brought numerous deals for free onboard internet, and this could very well be a last ditch effort to drum up support. As Mary Kirby at Flightglobal highlights, an average of six users per flight are using internet, which surely can’t be enough to pay for operating costs. How long can this sustain?

Some could also argue that wireless has greater value than the niche service that Clear offered. But think back to the time when seat-back phones were installed on airplanes — that seemed like a good idea too, right?

For what it’s worth, I hope that the airlines stick with their wi-fi plans. As the population of passengers continues to age, the technology generation is quickly forcing out the less tech-savvy baby boomers and wireless usage is surely going to pick up. As an industry, we just need to wait for the boom.

[Via Brett Snyder at BNET]

Free wi-fi in Times Square

by Katie Hammel on

It’s been quite the week for free wi-fi announcements. Airlines and airports seem to be offering it up like mad, to much thanks from travelers who need to stay connected. The latest hotspot for free wi-fi: New York’s Time Square.
Yahoo!, in cooperation with Times Square Alliance, is now offering free wi-fi in the pedestrian-only area of Times Square. Just get online and head to http://m.yahoo.com. Laptop users will see a welcome screen and can then select “Times Sq Free Wifi” to connect to the web (you can use any site to search the web, not just Yahoo!).

The contract for free wi-fi in the area will last at least one year, with the possibility of a three year extension.

Now, if only we could get hotels to take note. . . .