How do I secure wireless capable laptop in a public location?

Greetings,

I have two desktops that are hard wired into a router that is connected to a cable modem with Time Warner Cable. When I use my laptop I just plug the laptop into the router and use it a I do my wired desktops.

How do I secure my laptop with WAP or WEP when I go to a motel and use their free wireless network? I do not have a wireless router in my home. All computers are hard wired into my SMC Barricade Broadband Router Model number

7004ABR.

I would like to use my wireless capable laptop in motels when I travel. How do I go about setting it up so it is secured?

Thanks in advance for your help and understanding. I hope I gave you enough information and understand what I am asking.

Leigh

Reply to
Leigh
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On Wed, 24 Jan 2007 20:30:20 -0800, "Leigh" wrote in :

You can't.

Reply to
John Navas

Hi,

WPA and WEP are forms of encyption that are set in the wireless router or access point.

If its not set, then you can't use it with your laptop.

Your two best tools to keep yourself secure when using an open wireless network are common sense and a firewall.

The common sense tool is real simple: Just keep in mind that anything that put out into the network could potentially be discovered. Don't do any activity that could potentially lead to harm (such as identity theft). I.e., don't access an online banking web site unless the web site is SSL'd (encrypted) -- and the SSL encryption is from the login page, not just once you have logged in. Also keep in mind that some "open hotspots" may actually just be a masquerading honeypot. Security is a two-way street. I travel relatively often also and although I haven't come across any yet, I always do keep the potential in mind. Its not difficult to set these things up. All someone needs is just a laptop. They don't even need an AP, as there is software that will emulate an AP through wireless client cards.

You don't have to be overly paranoid when using open wireless hotspots, but you do need to be cautious...

Reply to
Eric

See if your ISP offers VPN service. The better ISPs provide this on all accounts, for example Sonic.net, which is the premier ISP in the San Francisco Bay Area, includes VPN on all accounts. I checked Time-Warner Cable, and unfortunately it appears as if their VPN service is only available to business customers.

If your ISP doesn't offer VPN service, look into a private VPN service.

See "

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" They used to have free accounts for individuals, but now the free account is limited to a 10MB test account, then it's about $1/GB.

I think the best deal is at "

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" It's not really a VPN, but it should be fine for what you need, and it's only $25/year. It used to be called "Spotlock."

Reply to
SMS

As has been said as a general rule you can't. You could use .. Tor for web

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for Free webmail such as Hotmail, google, yahoo etc
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Reply to
Mr User

If the network you connect to isn't using WPA or WEP then whatever you send across the it will be unencypted. The only thing you could do about it would be to make a VPN connection back to the house. This would encrypt your traffic through a 'tunnel'. Nothing on the local airwaves would see the contents of it. This would require you have something at home configured to accept the incoming VPN connection. Either a PC, configured appropriately, or a router that is designed to accept VPN connections.

I do this anytime I'm on the road. The downside to it is ALL my traffic gets routed into it. In order to load a web page it has to encrypt the packets, send them over the local wifi, back to the house, decrypt and then forward from there to the Internet. The security is worth the potential performance hits but in general it's not that bad.

-Bill Kearney

Reply to
Bill Kearney

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