[CWN-Summit] BBC Story: Wireless hijacking under scrutiny

[Sascha Meinrath]

The recent arrests of people for "hijacking" open wireless access points 
also begs the question -- why should _I_ (a random laptop user) be held 
solely responsible for broadcasting to an open access point?  Shouldn't 
the open access point be held equally responsible for "leeching" my CPU 
cycles and my battery power by communicating with my laptop?  I find the 
entire precedent of liability for utilizing an open access point 
extremely dangerous -- both because of the conundrum Harold mentions 
below (that it's often impossible to know whether the access point was 
left open purposefully or not), and because one is not "trespassing" in 
any traditional sense (in fact, one is using an unlicensed band of the 
_public airwaves_).

Given that the WAP is also collecting data from my laptop (e.g., my MAC 
address), shouldn't the owners of these open networks be held liable for 
"hacking" my laptop?

--Sascha

Harold Feld wrote:
> Indeed, I had a friend email me with a question the other day.  He lives 
> in San Francisco and asked:
> 
> "An open wireless network just popped up on my laptop in my apartment. 
> How can I tell if it is meant to be open or if someone just left it open 
> by accident?"
> 
> My advice was to look at the name of the network.  If it had a name, and 
> was open, you could reasonably assume that the person left it open 
> deliberately.  After all, if they knew enough to change the default for 
> the name, then they can be presumed to know enough to enable WEP.  OTOH, 
> if the name is "Lynksis" or some other default name, odds are good the 
> person just left it opne by accident."
> 
> This is not great reasoning, but it was the best I could offer.
> 
> Worse, I occasionally have the problem, when sitting in my back yard, of 
> having my neighbor's wireless signal be stronger than my own.  Since one 
> of my neighbors (I don't know which) has an open network blasting at 
> full power with no defaults changed, my Powerbook will join my 
> neighbor's network by default if his/her signal is stronger.
> 
> Harold
> 
> 
> At 07:33 AM 7/28/2005, you wrote:
> 
>> http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/technology/4721723.stm
>>
>> A recent court case, which saw a West London man fined
>> £500 and sentenced to 12 months' conditional discharge
>> for hijacking a wireless broadband connection, has
>> repercussions for almost every user of wi-fi networks
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