The problem with this however, is that although you can quickly and easily configure a new router with basic settings, the start-up wizards usually don’t mention anything about wireless encryption. To be fair some of the top commercial models do, but the basic routers you can pick up for home usage simply ignore encryption because it can be confusing to people with little computer knowledge, and they want to make it as easy as possible. This can be dangerous, as leaving your Wi-Fi connection open and unencrypted could leave you open to all kinds of attacks.

Lets take a situation where someone has bought a new router, plugged it into their Internet connection and started surfing the web using the wireless connection, without setting up any encryption. If this computer user lives in a block of apartments or perhaps in a built up area, the coverage of the router’s wireless transmitter will easily penetrate outside the confines of the home. It’s even possible that houses across a fairly wide street could pick up the signals. Certainly those people living in the immediate vicinity, or in a parked car outside, would be able to simply log on and use the Internet. (You can try it out yourself with a free software like TekWifi)

The computer user may be blissfully unaware that others are using his Internet connection. Or, he might be aware and simply not care. The truth is, this is a dangerous practice. Wi-Fi hijackers may not just be able to use the Internet, with a little networking knowledge; someone could hack into the user’s computer and steal information or vandalize information. If the user keeps passwords or bank details on his laptop, these could be compromised and used to steal money or commit fraud. Personal files, family photographs and emails could all be lifted directly from an unsuspecting computer user with an open Wi-Fi connection, all without them knowing about it. You wouldn’t let strangers walk into your home and start looking about, so why let them into your computer network?

Not only that, but if someone else has access to your Internet connection, they could commit crimes such as fraud, or download illegal content. Technically you could be held liable for this, as an ISP might track illegal activities to your connection. Even though you are not responsible for the crimes, you could end up being asked some serious questions by the authorities. Be safe and set up encryption on your Wi-Fi today!

Check out our guide Find Out Who Is Surfing On Your Wireless Network to check if someone else is using your wi-fi network.

That could leave their wireless routers open for unauthorized access, especially if no encryption or weak encryption is configured.

The best option here is to use the strongest encryption possible. That however may not be always possible, if devices that need to connect to the wi-fi router do not support that.

Wireless Network Watcher is a free software program that scans a wireless network for connected computer systems. It displays all computers that are currently connected to the network in its interface, making it dead easy to identify unauthorized access to the network.

Each connected device or computer is represented with an IP address, device name, MAC address, company that created the network adapter and device information. These information can be exported and saved to various formats including html, xml and text files.

The program is fully compatible with 32-bit and 64-bit editions of the Windows operating system. It supports all Windows versions from Windows 2000 to Windows 7, including Windows Server versions.

The program can only scan the wireless network the computer it is running on is connected to. Users who want to scan a network that they are not connected to need to connect to it first before scanning it.

It can happen that the wrong wireless network adapter is identified by the program. It is possible to select the right one under Advanced Options (F9).

Wireless Network Watcher is a portable program that will start the scan automatically right after it has been started. It can take a few seconds before the list is populated.

Windows users can download the program from the official website over at Nirsoft.

Heatmapper is a free software for Windows that can visualize the coverage of detected networks in the vicinity. That’s not only helpful to determine the best locations to go online but also to find out if your wireless network extends to neighbors, of if their network covers your home as well.

The application can display the coverage on a grid or, if available, a map of the neighborhood. The application supports various image formats that can be loaded so that the coverage is displayed directly on the map which improves identification a lot.

The application itself detects Wi-Fi networks automatically and displays them on the map or grid. It is possible to list the networks based on signal, channel, SSID, Mac address or security settings.

It is important to walk around to survey the coverage from different rooms or locations to get detailed information about the coverage.

It goes without saying that this is easily done with a laptop or mobile computer. Desktop owners on the other hand usually do not need the additional information, unless they are looking for a good spot to place their computer desk and computer on.

Heatmapper is compatible with 32-bit and 64-bit editions of Windows. The program can only be downloaded after a short registration on the developer site.

Just one problem- the availability of informational networks doesn’t actually mean that the information is cheap. A recent trend in consumer complaints has been that of contesting data bills incurred while traveling abroad. Since we all know that most people are too meek to voice their displeasure at most things, this can only mean one thing: we are all getting ripped off!

Take, for example, the case of Paul Martinez, a resident of Boston, Massachusetts who took a weekend trip to Toronto for a baseball game. His total time in Canada was less than 48 hours. His total time using his handheld device was less than two hours. His bill? $675. Ouch, that’s a lot of popcorn and peanuts.

Martinez isn’t alone in getting stuck with a massive bill. The problem is that wireless don’t have to restate their terms of roaming, using foreign networks, or extra charges once you have signed the agreement. They’ve done their job and if we don’t read the fine print, that’s really all of our problem. By not knowing the details, consumers set themselves up to be gouged.

For every guy like Martinez who is willing to talk about his bill there are a hundred others that don’t say anything. The data companies are making money hand over fist and they aren’t likely to change the way they do things.

One way to keep yourself from getting into trouble is to call your phone carrier before you travel. Companies like AT&T offer data plans that are only slightly higher for international use than they are in your home country. At the very least, call your carrier before any travel.

A second precaution is to either shut your phone off or put it in flight mode when you are not using it. This keeps you from being charged for incoming calls, e-mails, and texts.

If you are using a wi-fi device, make certain that you have configured it properly so that you are actually using the wi-fi and not a secondary data connection. On some phones the applications each have to be set individually, so make sure you have everything figured out before you cross any borders.

There are also a number of ways that you can limit your phone use while traveling or save on spending too much. One is to use VOIP (voice over internet protocol) services like Skype, Pingo, and Google Voice for calling back home. If you are using wi-fi, you can actually use your hand-held device for this but otherwise you will find most cyber-cafes abroad are set up for using them. All three services offer cheap calling plans with access numbers in just about every country you may travel in. International calls cost as little as $.02 per minute. You’d have to do a lot of talking to get a $700 phone bill with that rate.

Another factor to be aware of is that often you won’t be able to use your device at all when you are traveling overseas. Many carriers have ‘locks’ on their phones which will prevent use outside of the home country. These can be hacked fairly easily, but if your phone is operating on a different band (for example the USA uses CDMA while most of Europe uses GSM networks) , then there is nothing you can do but put your phone away or buy a new phone while you travel.

If buying a new phone sounds unreasonable, think again. Cheap phones can be bought for anywhere from $10 to $1000 in most countries. Since most countries operate using SIM cards, you may need to get a new SIM in the countries you are visiting. This is usually a cost of something like $20 and includes anywhere from 20 minutes to an hour of prepaid talking time. So, you can spend about $40 and have enough cell juice for most trips and a new phone as a souvenir when you go home.

Most Americans aren’t aware that most of the world uses prepaid services and that they are significantly cheaper than the expensive contracts which are used in the USA. In addition, the USA is one of the few countries that charges you both ways- incoming and outgoing. In civilized nations, no one would think to charge you for someone else deciding to call you. So, getting a new phone and SIM while abroad can be liberating for US citizens and useful for everyone else.

Of course, the other side of this is that those traveling to the States are in for a nasty surprise when they purchase data. Pre-paying in the USA is both more expensive and less efficient than in other countries.

All of this will help you to understand why a big phone bill could come your way if you don’t think ahead about your data usage and cell use before traveling abroad. For Americans using i-Phones, a good solution is to purchase an international data plan from AT&T or Verizon which can be bought in terms of monthly time or in terms of kilobytes.

Also, make sure that you do all of your downloading before you leave your home country. You never know how much it’s going to cost you to use data networks. Talk to your cell carrier/data provider before you travel. Find out if they will notify you when you reach certain limits. In many cases you can request this even if the company does not provide it as a regular service.

Probably the best suggestion is that you put your phone away when you travel. Enjoy the world, your phone will still be there when you get back home.

Homedale is a portable wireless networking software for the Windows operating system that can probably be best described as a wlan monitor. It uses a tabbed interface that displays information about the local network adapter, the available access points and the signal strength of each access point. The access points tab lists the name and mac address of each available access point plus information about the encryption method (WEP, WPA, WPA2), the bitrates, channels and signal strength.

The wireless networking software can be used to monitor the signal strength of selected wireless adapters over time which makes it an excellent analysis tool especially for small and medium computer networks.

Homedale has a size of less than 300 Kilobytes and uses roughly 5.5 Megabytes of computer memory while running the background. The software developer does not provide information about supported operating systems; It ran without problems on a Windows XP SP3 test system.

An alternative for Windows users is Wi-Fi Signal Strenght. Linux users might want to take a look at Wavemon which can display advanced wireless information.

WiFi SiStr (Wi-Fi Signal Strength) displays and logs the signal strength of the wireless connection. This can be helpful if you want to find out why the wireless connection drops frequently or if you want to make sure that the signal strength is sufficient all the time.

The signal strength is displayed in real time and the statistics can be used to analyze a connection over time.

The application is compatible to Windows XP, Windows 2000 and Windows Server 2003 but incompatible to Windows Vista currently. The .net framework 1.1 is required to run the software.

The radar view seems to be the favorite way of displaying wireless networks for several applications of that kind. The main widget displays the radar view, the network adapter and information about a wireless hotspot if one has been selected from the radar. Those information include data rate, channel, SSID and signal strength.

The software monitors the surrounding area in real time and displays new wireless hotspots once they come into reach.

A detailed view is available as well which displays additional information such as default authentication mode, encryption, frequency, network mode and type. The software makes use of all wireless network adapters installed or connected to the computer system. Statistics and a glossary are available for additional information.

Filesharing did not seem to be a concern as well citing the probability of being caught in the act. He is not concerned about bandwidth stealing either, most likely because he has a flatrate.

I would like to respond to this. A low probability to get caught does not mean that it won’t happen. This is my first concern. And the probability rises with every file shared on the Internet. I’m not sure about the law in America but I do know that you are responsible in many countries if a crime can be connected to your IP and that the excuse that you have been running an Open Wi-FI will not help you at all.

Besides file sharing we have the probability that someone is using the open Wi-Fi for hacking, blackmailing, trojans, viruses, child pornography or insults on forums. Depending on your location it could be highly unlikely that this is happening but I would never take this risk in first place.

Bandwidth is another aspect. If someone used all my upload speed to distribute files I would experience slow downs and could not use several applications that require a certain amount of bandwidth. It’s not only about the amount of Gigabytes that you transfer, it’s also about the impact on the system.

Only to help others out – with Internet – that you do not know ? If your neighbors need Internet so badly they could ask, can’t they ?

The article examines the WPA protection in detail and demonstrates how it can be cracked. The first part gives a good overview of WPA and compares it to WPE. The second part goes into detail how WPA can be cracked.