Airport ethical dilemma

mojo the monkey

I recently bought a nice new iBook with an Airport card. I popped in the card, but didn't expect anything spectacular because I haven't bought a base station yet.



Suddenly I discover that one of my neighbors has carelessly left his or her base station open and unprotected. I am unable to identify the neighbor- there are too many possibilities within the 150 foot range.



Should I cancel my (hideously expensive) $60 a month cable internet access and just leech off my neighbor's connection? What would you do?

amorya

I'd see if you can get file server access then leave him a note telling him it's insecure and he might want to change it.



Then ask if he'd consider letting you use the connection if you contributed say a third of the fee.



If he said yes you'd get fast cheap internet. If he said no, you'd at least have the feeling you did the right thing.



Amorya

xterra48

Yes, I agree. Find the neighbor and ask if you can cut a chunck of his WiFi network, for a price. If not you will have to get your own airport.

i-bent-my-wookie

Well stated, because it is an ethical dilemma. If they did not secure their router then they probably dont know how to check for leeches (thats what you would be) because it usually involves logging in to the router and finding an arcanely named sub-section of an advanced section of the router configuration (unless its an apple product . My router admin interface is sketchy at best, but functional once you have visited every setting and figured out the bigger picture.



If your convinced its NOT the poor old woman down the street who needs to download printable pdf's to get her social security cheque then maybe your ok with that.



Unfortunately only you can answer such a question...





I love surfing for open wireless routers/gateways tho Its pretty fun. Its the light residential areas where I find the most wide open ones. If I go downtown then I find a tonne of routers but they are all secured since they can all see each other and realize that security is necessary. Still fun tho.



A pub in my town offers free ethernet (via plugs) but I never have to use it because some office within airport range has an open router.

i-bent-my-wookie

[quote]Originally posted by I-bent-my-wookie:

<strong>



A pub in my town offers free ethernet (via plugs) but I never have to use it because some office within airport range has an open router. </strong><hr></blockquote>





Just for reference if there are any Calgaryians out there...

I live in Calgary and the pub is Bass Bros. in Kensington. Last time I was there there were two good routers I could leech off



But its cool a bar has Cat5 drops and power plugs too!

fran441

Hey guys. Don't steal internet access.