[ news_security_news ]
Sheriff's Department Combats Open Wi-Fi
Doug Caverly
Staff Writer
2006-06-30
 Security News RSS Feed
If you are in control of an open Wi-Fi access point (and if you live in Douglas County, Colorado), the police may come a-knocking at your door in the near future. It won't necessarily be a bad thing, though - they'll just advise you to lock the access point down.
In an interview with 9news.com, Brian Radamacher of the Douglas County Sheriff's Special Investigations Unit explained the campaign. "If someone is driving by on the street they could easily use your internet access to commit a crime, whether it's fraudulent credit card transactions or surfing child porn or something else," he said.
Such illegal activity could affect the owners of the Wi-Fi access points, even if they were uninvolved and unaware. "The unfortunate thing is when we go to issue the warrants or something else you may end up getting your computer seized because of it," Radamacher said. "A lot of times it can take months to get your computer back after the processing."
The Sheriff's Department intends to outfit some of its cars with equipment that can detect unsecured networks. In a practice known as wardriving, they will then motor about and look for open Wi-Fi access points. If they find any, "they'll try to warn of potential security issues. They'll also drop off brochures with instructions to computer users on how to password protect their networks," according to 9news.com.
A recent study found that 46 percent of the Wi-Fi access points in Indianapolis don't run encryption. For many people, this represents a conscious choice. Both in terms of sheer volume, and in trying to change people's minds, the Douglas County Sheriff's Department may have a lot of work ahead.
About the Author:
Doug is a staff writer for SecurityProNews. InternetFinancialNews, SearchNewz, and WebProNews.
More news_security_news Articles
Security News RSS Feed
|
|
