The Scary Reason Why You Should Never Log On To Public Wifi

04.04.21 12:43 AM By Aishwarya

Do's And Don't While Using Public Wifi




New Delhi, India/ AnyTechTrial.Com


With numerous employees now performing from home, business networks are opened to countless untrusted networks and – potentially – some unsanctioned devices. Naturally, the question of security arises given the necessity to make sure that employees are well prepared for the challenges related to remote work. It also means businesses must be sure that their security infrastructure is well geared to secure personal and company data.


 As many companies are moving to the cloud for the benefit of access and security, migrations are becoming a way of life for the IT teams. In this process, we at AnyTechTrial are  also modernizing our legacy applications (also referred to as a migration process). While conducting the migration process, companies are failing to think about the robust security aspects, which is costing them heavily.


 Maybe you think that the matter of cyber attack is exaggerated, or perhaps you think that it only happens to a little number of individuals . Using an unknown public wifi in hotels, restaurants, cafes and jeopardized your personal information. The truth is that every year, over half the adult population has their personal information exposed to hackers, specially through social media on internet.


 The truth is that it’s exceptionally easy for novice hackers to spy on anyone using unsafe and unsecure public WiFi, whether it's login details and passwords your photos anything and everything related to your privacy are prone at a high risk . The advancing technology also increase the threat from hacker hacking the websites that you are using in your day-to-day life.  They’ve even created out-of-the-box hacking devices where all you've got to try to to is connect a WiFi Pineapple and start hacking. Also, hackers will found out networks that look legitimate but are literally Evil Twins, so once you log into them, the hacker can see everything you're doing online.


 HOW HACKERS DO IT: COMMON APPROACHES


Experts say there are several common ways in which hackers compromise public WiFi networks. 


Fake hotspots: Hackers set up a fake network with an innocuous name that fools consumers into thinking it’s legitimate, such as “Cafe Coffee Day WiFi” in a coffee shop. They can then record all the keystrokes of individuals who use that network, including user names and passwords to varied accounts. 

Man-in-the-middle attacks: Cybercriminals take over a public network and use the established connection to the victim’s machine to redirect their communications, often to a fake website that looks like your bank, for instance , and tricks you into abandoning log-in credentials. 

Malware: Once on the network, they can send you fake notices saying you need to install an update. But instead of updating your system, they install malware that then gives them complete access to your system, including files and photos. They might even be ready to activate the online camera or microphone.

 • Sniffing: Using a WiFi sniffer, anyone can locate insecure WiFi networks and monitor their traffic. They can record that traffic and analyze it to get useful details. 


Few Important Points To Keep In Mind Using Public Wifi


  • Use HTTP                                                                                                                                                                                                                          Regular website file transfer content in plain text, makes it’s to target easily to anyone who has hacked your network connection. Many websites use HTTP to encrypt the transfer data but you should not rely on the website for your safety or to keep you protected. You can create this encrypted reference to the browser extension HTTPS everywhere. With this plugin enabled, most website connections are secured with HTTPS, ensuring that any data transfer is safe from prying eye.
  • Confirm the Network Name                                                                                                                                                                                 Sometimes ransom ware set up fake free public wifi to attract people. The café coffee day network may not be named as “free café coffee day” wifi network. Deliberately connecting to an unknown public wifi can provide your personal information in the hands of malicious hackers. If you are not sure about the authenticity of the wifi, you can probably ask the employee of that location because employee will known the name of the official network which will help you to get connected. If you see no one around you you can move to a secure place where you can be assure that the network is not fake. 
  • Avoid Automatically connecting to wifi hotpots                                                                                                                                                 These days smartphones and tablets may be set to connect automatically to any other available network. This setting can seriously can put your privacy at risk. Not just that this setting can allow your device to connect to any wifi hotspot specifically set up to steal your information, even without your express consent. Modern smartphone have this setting disabled by default, but this is the setting that you need to check it twice. Just open the wifi section in the phone’s setting app, the open if you don’t see an option to disable then you are safe otherwise turn this setting off.
  • Bitdefender is a global cybersecurity and anti-virus software company. It was founded in 2001. They develop and sell anti-virus software, internet security software, endpoint security software, and other cybersecurity products and services.
  • F-Secure builds award-winning detection and response solutions and offers world-class cyber security services to stay businesses and other people safe. It is a Finnish cybersecurity company based in Helsinki, Finland. 
  • Kaspersky Lab is a multinational cybersecurity and anti-virus provider headquartered in Moscow, Russia and operated by a holding company in the United Kingdom.

 

  • Turn Off Sharing
You may share your music library, printers or files, or even allow remote login from other computers on your Wi-Fi network in the privacy of your own home. Unless you disable these settings before connecting to a public Wi-Fi network, anyone else within the  vicinity could also be ready to  hack into your PC.
If you’re using a Windows PC, you’ll want to start by opening the advanced sharing settings of the Homegroup section of the Network and Internet settings in the Control Panel. From here, you’ll be ready to  toggle file and printer sharing also  as network discovery, which can  make your computer visible to anyone connected to an equivalent  network. For Mac, just attend  System Preferences, then Sharing, and confirm  none of the choices  are checked.

  • Watch out for Evil Twins:                                                                                                                                                                                                   As we mentioned above, hackers will found out their own hotspots in busy areas, so always ask someone who works at the situation for the connection details to form sure you’re connecting to a legitimate network.

  •  Paid WiFi doesn’t mean safe WiFi:                                                                                                                                                                          Simply because you purchased WiFi access (such as on a plane or in an airport) doesn’t mean that it’s safe. In fact, nearly all public WiFi is totally open and completely insecure. Most of the safety publicly WiFi networks is made in to the payment system to safeguard your mastercard . Beyond that, there’s no encryption to prevent anyone from eavesdropping on your communications.

  • Change your passwords frequently:                                                                                                                                                                  If you're like most of the people , you almost certainly use an equivalent password for all of your online accounts. If you are accessing any websites on a public WiFi networks which are accessible via a password (such as Gmail, Facebook, LinkedIn, Twitter, etc.), these can be easily be stolen out of thin air. So confirm you employ complex passwords and alter them a minimum of once every six months

  • Use a VPN:                                                                                                                                                                                                                     Finally, buy a VPN and use it on all your devices!




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