http://yro.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=03/11/22/1936213&mode=thread&tid=123&tid=137&tid=193&tid=99

Talk about big time pwning.

-J.

Dude got busted stealing wireless Internet access. How? He got busted with his pants down, beating off to child ****.

- J.

if it wasn't for the fact it was kiddie ****, that would be funny

Indeed. Imagine the owner of the wireless network getting the call from the cops and his ISP over this.....

One reason not to get wireless unless you know how the **** to set it up properly and secure it.

- J.

Firewalls people

Originally posted by Creed
Firewalls people

The problem with wireless isn't so much the firewall it's the base stations. People set them to broadcast at max strength figuring it will cover their whole house. It can also spill out of their house, onto the street, or even wider. This means Joe Blow can drive by, scanning for hotspots, find your improperly configured LAN and scam Internet access for free, whilst any issues with it gets traced back to the account holder.

Now you see the horrors of wireless. A person with a notebook and proper wireless gear can scan for hotspots, and use the Internet for almost anything. It's called 'wardriving'. Taken after the old term 'wardialing' when hackers would write programs that dial number after number and record anything with a modem answering.

That's right - hack in almost anyway and be completely untraceable, download child ****, send death threats, etc. Traffic over wireless LANS are generally insecure as well. Something like 66% of most wireless networks aren't even encrypted. This means you can do whats called 'sniffing' - grabbing private network traffic out of the air. People's emails, passwords, you name it. Even the basic encryption that comes with WAP is relatively easy to crack.

- J.

I am going to write that down

Read the arguments on the slashdot website and you'll understand how severe the issue of wireless security is.

- J.