I travel all over the city everyday from client to client. When I first started doing what I do, I had no data plan on my cell phone. I was rocking the Motorola Krzr. It was a bit of pain having to rely on my iPod Touch for email and Internet when I was on the go but I was always able to find an unlocked WiFi network.
They’re a few reasons why this is not good. For starters, you’re now letting anyone who wants to get free Internet. They can do anything they want on your network, like search newsgroups and download files such as torrents which are able to be traced back to the IP address associated with your account. This will leave the name on the account responsible if someone from the MPAA (Motion Picture Association of America) and your ISP decide to send you a nice little lawsuit for file sharing. Or if you have file sharing enabled on your computers, they can now access any files you may accidentally leave in places such as your dropbox or public folder.
We try and teach all of our clients best practice and suggest some sort of a log-in password. Whether it be their name or something silly, it’s better than nothing! If someone gains access to your unsecured wireless network and you don’t have a log-in password, they can get onto your machine, access your files and fill up your hard drive to capacity making it almost unusable.
In order to lock down your WiFi network you have to access your Airport Utility. For those who don’t know, you can get to this by going to Applications>Utilities>Airport Utility.
Once the Airport Utility opens it will scan your network to find the Airport Base Station you are using. If you have an Airport Base Station and an Airport Express on the same network, make sure you select the actual Base Station and not the Airport Express.
Now select manual setup and make sure the Airport Tab is selected. This is the menu that allows you to set the network password. Make sure you check the box that will allow Keychains to remember the password this way you don’t have to enter it every single time.
It’s a process that takes about five minutes to do and can save you hours of headaches and hassle. Double check you have a password now. If you do great, if not, I’d suggest creating one now.
If you have questions or comments please let us know!
