After a recent event, it came to my attention that some computer users still do not understand the simple concept of wireless or virus security. When you attend an event, hotel, coffee shop, airport, or your home and connect your computer up you are responsible for your own data and machine safety. What I mean is running without any anti virus, firewall or encryption is not a very wise thing.
Some people recently blamed a hotel wireless and room connection for the virus they got on their machines. Had they simply taken proper precautions they would have had no problems. Someone came to the event and obviously did not care about their machine or others and spread a virus. Of course those in the same boat lacking proper knowledge or caution got infected with an old virus that a freeware virus checker or a cheap one would have caught. Is it the responsibility of the host to make sure and inspect each and every machine coming to the location such as wireless access point like a coffee shop, airport, or a hotel? Not in my personal opinion. So the small minority of people running around these public network access spots either spread or get infected thus creating a network overload and problems for everyone and the cycle goes on and on. So make sure you have anti virus and a firewall running on your machine at all times especially in a open network. Expecting the host of a connection to be able to protect you is unreasonable. In the latest virus if you were not updated on your Operating System service packs, the only way to stop the spread is to disable on the network all connections which will defeat any access to all others on the network. Filtering on the server for all viruses known and unknown is not realistic so your machines safety is ultimately up to you. When I get in my vehicle, I do not expect the manufacturer to buckle my seat belt or make sure I do not drive unsafe as that is my responsibility.
As far as wireless security, simply having a personal firewall on your machine does not prevent access to your sensitive data. It only protects the local machine and not the data you are broadcasting to the wireless access point. You must make sure at any time you run encrypted (WEP) packets if at all possible. This prevents someone with a free utility from capturing and viewing all of your email and other data transferred in airborne packets. It is scary to see how many use little to no security out there. Your neighbors could be snooping or even a bad person could be using your wireless router to gain access to the internet. Make sure you setup a WEP encrypted wireless network to prevent bad things. Recently the Canadian court has been considering that the owner of a home wireless network that was unencrypted and used to access illegal content from the internet may be responsible because the router owner did not take proper precautions to protect access.
Why does it always appear to be Microsoft operating systems that are vulnerable? This is a hotly debated topic but the facts show that hackers and virus writers want to infect or compromise the largest populations and that is the 90%+ share of all PC computers, the Microsoft Windows crowd for now.
I will write more on this subject soon but just as you would hopefully not get in your car without fastening the seatbelt, getting on a motorcycle without a helmet, or wear safety goggles with power tools you should be also responsible with your computer and not rely on others to make sure everything will be 100% safe.
Helpful articles/links:
Microsoft Security Site
Microsoft AntiVirus Site
Microsoft Steps to Security
Article on Canadian WiFi case
Defending Against Insider Infections.
http://msnbc-cnet.com.com/2009-1033_3-940460.html?tag=st_rn
http://news.com.com/2030-1069-5077872.html
Survey: Increasing Number Tap Into Neighbors' Wireless Net
Nosy Wi-Fi Neighbors
Be safe out there...
-Shaan
