If it says "unsafe", why have it in the first place?

Legacy_user

Being new to the world of smart phones and my recently released EE Rook (android) and with a low user tarif, my data allowance is small, so have turned it off, simply because I wouldn't want to exceed the allowance. It's fine using my home wifi and I have noticed when out in town, there are a great many opportunities to use free wifi from shops/stores etc.

When I experiment to log into one of these, be it Sainsbury, M&S or whatever, it says something like, "this is not a safe etc", so I don't proceed.

Is this what one would expect using this type of connection?
Should I use or avoid?
If it is unsafe, why have the facility?

or should I have something installed to ensure any issues don't come my way?

JJ_Egan

Unsafe = Its your risk .
In many cases the risk will be the same as your home .
But its not just you using the router as at home but any member of the public .
Just don't use public wifi for banking and other sorts of money transactions if you want to feel safer .

HappyMJ

That message comes up because you are trying to access a https site and the wi-fi hotspot is redirecting you to a paywall or a page whre you simply need to either log on or accept the t's and c's.

That page isn't the page you requested so you'll get that certificate error.

It's nothing to worry about, it's actually a good message to get.

My advice and I'll put it in caps.

"NEVER USE ONLINE BANKING ON FREE WI-FI."

I've logged on to several wi-fi hot spots in the past and the one's you should really worry about the the ones that don't come up with that security error. Why? You can access everyone else's phones and computers. Quite a few just remove the password from the router and allow anyone to access. That is the worst thing a proprietor can do. It opens everyone up to being hacked. A wi-fi hotspot should stop you from seeing anyone on the same network and most do but if you don't know how to tell the difference then just don't even try anything potentially where you could lose money.

Email is fine and general browsing but never ever the banking.

grumbler

islandman wrote: »

Being new to the world of smart phones and my recently released EE Rook (android) and with a low user tarif, my data allowance is small, so have turned it off, simply because I wouldn't want to exceed the allowance. It's fine using my home wifi and I have noticed when out in town, there are a great many opportunities to use free wifi from shops/stores etc.

When I experiment to log into one of these, be it Sainsbury, M&S or whatever, it says something like, "this is not a safe etc", so I don't proceed.

Is this what one would expect using this type of connection?
Should I use or avoid?
If it is unsafe, why have the facility?

or should I have something installed to ensure any issues don't come my way?

My understanding is that public wifi is safe for general use. The problem arises if you have to use it for, say, logging into your accounts and entering sensitive information like passwords, card details etc. that can be intercepted.
It's worth saying that if sychronisation is on, I think the phone itself can login to, say, your e-mail account without asking you.

Fightsback

grumbler wrote: »

My understanding is that public wifi is safe for general use. The problem arises if you have to use it for, say, logging into you accounts and entering sensitive information like passwords, card details etc. that can be intercepted.
It's worth saying that if sychronisation is on, I think the phone itself can login to, say, your e-mail account without asking you.

If you are going to use public Wifi use a VPN.

Sooler

This explains ...
http://www.howtogeek.com/178696/why-using-a-public-wi-fi-network-can-be-dangerous-even-when-accessing-encrypted-websites/

System

Thank you for that. I don't use the internet for banking, in fact I only generally surf, so feel easier now I know. I've saved the link in the last post to read later.

Roland_Sausage

HappyMJ wrote: »

My advice and I'll put it in caps.

"NEVER USE ONLINE BANKING ON FREE WI-FI."

DO you have any evidence to support this, or is this just scaremongering?

If you are accessing encrypted pages, and have a firewall on your machine I can't see any issue with it myself.

System

Sooler wrote: »

This explains ...
http://www.howtogeek.com/178696/why-using-a-public-wi-fi-network-can-be-dangerous-even-when-accessing-encrypted-websites/

I have read, but not thoroughly, your link and learnt from it. Whenever I use a rail wifi, I have to enter a password so I feel comfortable there.

The other thing I picked up from it, was HTPPS sites and an add-on that ensure you only use them. I'd like to know more about that.

Then what's this VPN thing, can you enlighten me more please.

paddyrg

Roland_Sausage wrote: »

DO you have any evidence to support this, or is this just scaremongering?

If you are accessing encrypted pages, and have a firewall on your machine I can't see any issue with it myself.

Having an untrusted step in the chain is generally not good. Yes, SSL is a good thing which certainly does help, but a false certificate from an MITM attack is often just clicked-through by non-technical users. The router may also have its own ideas about DNS settings so you type into what looks and tastes like the bank's normal page, which is instead a hooky clone to capture passwords and maybe other identifiers. It may even have real time monitoring so a crook can use your tokens in real time once you've supplied the session validation.

As such, it's not bad advice, I'd say. Yes you are *probably* fine, much as you probably won't have an accident on the drive to work on Monday, but the degree of acceptable risk is up to you - drive drunk or blindfolded or fast and its riskier. Use an untrusted channel to communicate with your bank and again it's up to you.

gunte

islandman wrote: »

Then what's this VPN thing, can you enlighten me more please.

Explained in related link

http://www.howtogeek.com/133680/htg-explains-what-is-a-vpn/