[PLUG] wifi security

Dan Young danielmyoung at gmail.com
Wed Feb 25 23:48:44 UTC 2009


On Wed, Feb 25, 2009 at 2:22 PM, Russell Senior
<russell at personaltelco.net> wrote:
>>>>>> "Carlos" == Carlos Konstanski <ckonstanski at pippiandcarlos.com> writes:
>
> Ted> I find myself spending a bunch of time in coffee houses with
> Ted> wifi. I'm curious about the security. Most of the time I don't
> Ted> care. If someone wants to read my email, they're welcome to
> Ted> it. But what about a credit card purchase? I have not done it,
> Ted> but what if I bought something over the Internet using my credit
> Ted> card and the wifi at Bella Espresso or Jax? Would I be foolish to
> Ted> do that?  -ted
>
> Carlos> Yes, that would be foolish!  Why take chances like that?  Your
> Carlos> only hope of security is if the web page is SSL encrypted.
>
> Since virtually every online transaction that involves money *is* SSL
> encrypted, then it becomes un-foolish again.  These things were pretty
> much solved _years_ ago.

Some (many?) people don't pay attention to which part of the browser
chrome that little padlock is supposed to show up in:
http://isc.sans.org/diary.html?storyid=5908

-- 
Dan Young



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