How to protect yourself on an unsecured network?

Jemjem787 · 11 Apr 2016

A friend of mine is moving into a basement suite and her landlord has agreed to let her use their WiFi, but their WiFi has no password on it. The location is around a populated area and countless of people are probably already connected to it so security is her priority. We have already talked to the landlord and they do not plan on adding a password anytime soon.

What do we have to do to secure her devices? She has a Macbook, an iphone, and her boyfriend who has an android phone. We also have an old printer we would like to hookup, but don't want random people printing to it, but the printer isn't high priority.

Digital Life · 11 Apr 2016

Connecting to a Wifi without encryption is a very bad idea, Probably the only way he can protect himself is to sign up to a VPN service.

Source:
Why Using a Public Wi-Fi Network Can Be Dangerous, Even When Accessing Encrypted Websites

“Don’t do your online banking or anything sensitive on a public Wi-Fi network.” The advice is out there, but why can using a public Wi-Fi network actually be dangerous? And wouldn’t online banking be secure, as it’s encrypted?
There are a few big problems with using a public Wi-Fi network. The open nature of the network allows for snooping, the network could be full of compromised machines, or — most worryingly — the hotspot itself could be malicious.

Another Source:
3 Dangers Of Logging On To Public Wi-Fi

Unencrypted Browsing Is Public

WiFi uses radio waves, and radio waves are anything but direct. They broadcast, and this means that anyone within range can see everything you’re doing online, if they have the right software.

This means that, without protection, anyone who wants to can see:

The danger here is clear, so naturally you’re going to want protection. At home, you can encrypt your WiFi network – this prevents snooping by making all of your traffic unreadable with a key. Public WiFi, however, usually isn’t encrypted – you can tell this is the case when you don’t need to type a password in order to connect.

AddRAM · 12 Apr 2016

Unless someone is physically connected to their device, and as long as they do not download any garbage (which of course is brought on by them self) nothing bad will happen, I promise you that. You have to be connected to a PC in order to do damage to it, I don`t care what any one may tell you.

Random people may see a wireless printer, but they can`t print to it unless they know it`s credentials. And why would someone want to print to a printer when they don`t even know where it is ?

The Landlord not putting a password on the router is absolutely foolish

UsernameIssues · 12 Apr 2016

AddRAM said:

Unless someone is physically connected to their device, and as long as they do not download any garbage (which of course is brought on by them self) nothing bad will happen, I promise you that. You have to be connected to a PC in order to do damage to it, I don`t care what any one may tell you.

Random people may see a wireless printer, but they can`t print to it unless they know it`s credentials. And why would someone want to print to a printer when they don`t even know where it is ?

The Landlord not putting a password on the router is absolutely foolish

I'm guessing that the OP is more concerned with things like this...

...than in preventing harm to a computer/device.

People print to open printers just to be mean.

AddRAM · 12 Apr 2016

Agreed, but they have to be able to connect to it in order to print to it. :)

Jemjem787 · 12 Apr 2016

UsernameIssues is right that of what i am concerned about, and

AddRAM said:

Agreed, but they have to be able to connect to it in order to print to it. :)

In all my days of finding open home networks with printers on them. I have never seen ANY that require credentials, and im pretty confident that in order to connect to them, they just connect to the wifi?

AddRAM · 12 Apr 2016

Wow, you didn`t need to know that printers ip address ? I find that quite amazing.

"In all my days of finding open home networks with printers on them".

Wow, is that what you do ???

AddRAM · 12 Apr 2016

I would suggest to your friend to acquire her own equipment.

And you`re forgetting one important factor, you have to be physically connected to that landlords wireless router to make any changes or see any other devices connected to it.

These smartphone apps may scan the network, and see devices, but that`s all they can do, scan it.

Prevent Someone Else from using Your Wireless Internet Connection

AddRAM · 12 Apr 2016

It would be sweet if the Landlord let her connect her own wireless router to his router, then she could secure it and no one could latch on, but that would be too much to ask

Barman58 · 12 Apr 2016

You could always add a software Firewall to the actual devices connecting to the open network, which if set correctly would prevent anyone from accessing, (or even seeing), the protected devices I always install Comodo Firewall on all systems I deal with Free Internet Security and Antivirus | Security Solutions from Comodo (there are both free and commercial software options on their site, so take care

)

Adding a firewall will add complexity and a learning curve to your computing but that is the price you pay for security these days.

My basic advice with Comodo Firewall is to set it to "training mode" for a few days or weeks to let it learn your web surfing habits and set itself up.

You can also install the Comodo Internet security suite (free) which gives a number of reliable extras for security,

One other thing is to ensure that you set your network type to "Public" which will set windows own network security to it's highest level, (switching off sharing and device discovery Etc)