{"id":4726,"date":"2016-07-01T10:08:48","date_gmt":"2016-07-01T02:08:48","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/staging.bankvaultonline.com\/?p=4726"},"modified":"2016-07-01T10:08:48","modified_gmt":"2016-07-01T02:08:48","slug":"what-you-should-know-about-using-public-wifi-online-safety","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.bankvault.com\/what-you-should-know-about-using-public-wifi-online-safety\/","title":{"rendered":"What You Should Know About Using Public WiFi"},"content":{"rendered":"

It’s a lovely afternoon and you’re sitting at a cafe sipping a nice cup of coffee while using the public WiFi. While this may seem like a rather pleasant experience, it could soon turn into a disastrous one.<\/p>\n

Journalist Maurits Martijn from the Dutch independent investigative news outlet, De Correspondent, recently published<\/a> an extraordinary experience that he had where he took Wouter Slotboom, a hacker and cyber crime advocate, to a local cafe. Using a device that cost 70 euros, Slotboom demonstrated in a mere 20 minutes how easy it was to find out where everyone was born, what schools they attended, their occupation, hobbies, sexual orientation, passwords, what apps they are using, and the last 5 things that they googled.<\/p>\n

\n

Information comes flooding in, even from visitors who are not actively working or surfing. Many email programs and apps constantly make contact with their servers\u2014a necessary step for a device to retrieve new emails. For some devices and programs, we are able to see what information is being sent, and to which server.<\/p>\n

And now it\u2019s getting really personal. We see that one visitor has the gay dating app Grindr installed on his smartphone. We also see the name and type of the smartphone he\u2019s using (iPhone 5s). We stop here, but it would be a breeze to find out to who the phone belongs to. We also see that someone\u2019s phone is attempting to connect to a server in Russia, sending the password along with it, which we are able to intercept.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

Yikes!<\/strong><\/p>\n

One of the easiest ways that hackers with bad intentions easily find out your private information is to use fake wireless networks<\/a>. They are considered a hackers ‘best friend’ as it leverages\u00a0people’s desire to use free internet access which they do gain in exchange for secretly\u00a0being able to eavesdrop on them without them knowing.<\/p>\n

We see more and more visitors log on to our fictitious network. The siren song of the little black device appears to be irresistible. Already 20 smartphones and laptops are ours. If he wanted to, Slotboom could now completely ruin the lives of the people connected: He can retrieve their passwords, steal their identity, and plunder their bank accounts. Later today, he will show me how. I have given him permission to hack me in order to demonstrate what he is capable of, though it could be done to anyone with a smartphone in search of a network, or a laptop connecting to a WiFi network.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

In the past, BankVault has published 8 ways that you can protect yourself against public WiFi hacking<\/a>.<\/p>\n

The key is awareness that public WiFi networks are not secure. While this isn’t exactly brand new, we should always remember that our devices are at risk when connecting to it. Even if you are using your computer or mobile device to look up information that isn’t that important in the grand scheme of things such as looking up\u00a0a restaurant, hackers can find out who you are and what your passwords are like Slotboom demonstrated. Here are some of the things that you can do:<\/p>\n