Is it wrong to borrow someones Wireless Internet?

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Soldato
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Yesterday I re-built my laptop so we can take it with us when we go camping in August and watch DVD's late at night (when its raining!), and use the campsites wireless t'interweb access (free to campers!)...

I got my DVD Flashed, and working so I thought I'd install my cheapie 11g card I got fo £12...

Plugged it in installed the drivers etc... and fired up the search for local networks (just out of interest to see who was out there!) I found about 6 networks most of which were locked with either WEP or WPA encryption, except for one!...

It was called "Free Internet" and didn't require any password!... I only hopped on for 2 minutes to see if I could... browsed OcUK at Broadband speeds (I'm still on dialup till later this month!!).. but got a pang of guilt!... and logged off!.

Was it wrong of me to hop on someone elses t'interweb or, as it was called "Free Internet" is it ok?... :confused:

Do I beat myself up?, or do I not worry about it and keep using it till my own broadband goes live!?!.. :confused:

Oooo I feel soooooooo Dirty!.
Sim
 

olv

olv

Soldato
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What are you worrying about? The network was called "FREE INTERNET". now i have absolutely no idea what that means to you but to me that means "Wahoo free internet, jump right on board, the more the merrier".

Whether a network is called 'Free internet' or not, if the owner is careless enough to leave it unprotected then they cannot complain about people freely using their connection.
 
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This is going back a few months now but i found out someone was using mine, not sure how long they had been using it for.

I was speaking to a old school friend of mine who lives a few doosr up the road from me, and he was explaning that he was due to get broadband soon, but he had been using a local unsecured wifi connection, that got me thinking and when i searched for other wifi networks there was none and i logged into my router and there was another computer connected.

I have now added security to my network. I used to always hop on to people's networks, i bet they don't even realise so i would'nt worry about it, if it's unsecured then it's free for all :p
 
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as it was called "Free Internet" is it ok?

Maybe/Maybe not, it could be somebody with good intentions and just wants to share the web access to people.

However it could also be somebody who has malicious intent and wants to record what people around them are doing. Be carefull of typing in passwords/logins to any sites that dont require SSL, as anything which is sent over plaintext (forum logins as an example) can be recorded his side. As most people use a single (or only a few) different passwords, this would also give them the possibility to get other data.
 
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It's like free sandwiches. They look good at the time but it's only after you've finished it do you begin to wonder... "Who made these?" "why are they Free?" and "that mayo tasted funny!"

:)
 
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bramski said:
It's like free sandwiches. They look good at the time but it's only after you've finished it do you begin to wonder... "Who made these?" "why are they Free?" and "that mayo tasted funny!"

:)

that was (sort of anyway) what was going through my mind!... :)
 
Soldato
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there's a house on our street with a completely open network ... not only can we connect, we can also access every portion of their router!!! and they have all the ip/ports to all their pc's listed lol.
 
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olv said:
Whether a network is called 'Free internet' or not, if the owner is careless enough to leave it unprotected then they cannot complain about people freely using their connection.

Errrr, no.
It's not only unethical it is actually illegal to do so.
Just Google up the issue and you'll see that somebody has already tested this in court and won.
If I leave my front door unlocked does that give you the right to walk in and start using my electricity and water supply?
 

olv

olv

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To be honest i'm not really concerned with the legal or moral implications.

Personally, I have my own private, secured wireless network so don't have the need or inclination to use an unsecured wireless network (not that there are any in my vacinity) but if i was ever in the situation without internet access I would have no issues with borrowing the use of an unsecured network to browse the web. Obviously it's unfair to completely take the mick and endlessly leech off somebody elses connection but for short periods of email checking on the go then it's a harmless crime imo.
 
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stoofa said:
If I leave my front door unlocked does that give you the right to walk in and start using my electricity and water supply?
A more accurate analogy would be that you had run pipes and cable from your house so everyone on your street had a plug socket and a tap inside their house, but connected to your supply.

Quickly use it to charge your phone or have a drink, you'd never notice. It really would be an idea if you put a locked box around them that needed a 128-bit key to open... :)
 
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Actually, there have been cases of people going next door and plugging mains cables into their supplies, so the analogy is sound.

The right thing to do would be to find out who has the open connection and offer to close it. The rest is illegal and not for discussion on the forum.
 
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