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33 members have voted
As for intentionally not paying internet because there is an unprotected signal, that's probably not ok. I don't mind the stealing so much (I'm a gray area ethics guy), but slowing down your neighbour's internet is mean. You could offer to pay him a few bucks a month, but if he refuses he might also slap a password on.
Let's extend this. If you're in a hotel that doesn't offer free internet but you learn of a passcode or way to avoid the charge, is it okay to avoid it?
If your neighbor had a nice rose bush in front of their porch, would it be okay to take a few of the blooms, since they didn't put a fence around it.. or in boymimbo's hotel password scenario, didn't put a lock on the fence?
Quote: 7outlineawayI consider the phrase "stealing free internet" to be an oxymoron.
dito!! If the owner is not password protecting their connection...my assumption is that they don't care if others use it!!
Quote: boymimboLet's extend this. If you're in a hotel that doesn't offer free internet but you learn of a passcode or way to avoid the charge, is it okay to avoid it?
It's as okay as it would be to sneak into an empty room and spend the night. Or to skip out on the restaurant bill after consuming a meal. In other words, it's not ok.
Quote: jsantee97dito!! If the owner is not password protecting their connection...my assumption is that they don't care if others use it!!
So it's okay to take your neighbor's garden hose since they didn't "protect" it?
Quote: AyecarumbaSo it's okay to take your neighbor's garden hose since they didn't "protect" it?
If they send the signal into my house then i can use it, if they put a garden hose in my yard i would use it if needed.
Quote: jsantee97Nope...but were not talking about garden hoses!
So, it's okay to use their water to wash your car, but not take the hose?
Quote: kracker21If they send the signal into my house then i can use it, if they put a garden hose in my yard i would use it if needed.
But they are not sending a signal into your house. Your wifi card is sneaking into their access point. You are breaking and entering.
Also, remember those Baby Monitors and Web Cams you might have around your house? Especially the older or cheaper models? They can be sending a signal for half a block or more.
Quote: slytherYou aren't stealing from your neighbor (unless you bog down their connection speed), you are stealing from the ISP.
Your neighbor paid for the access, you did not. Just because it can be taken, doesn't mean that it is okay to do so.
Quote: jsantee97If I didn't lock down my wi-fi...I would assume that others would use it. Therefore I would put a PASSWORD if I didn't want others to do so!!
When did the world change from, "Thou Shalt Not Steal", to "Lock It, Or Lose It"?
Quote: boymimboStealing? Sure. It's up to the homeowner to secure their connection however.
If it's not nailed down, it's fair game? It's up to your neighbor to lock his doors, too, though I'm confident you don't carry the principle that far.
Quote: AyecarumbaWhen did the world change from, "Thou Shalt Not Steal", to "Lock It, Or Lose It"?
I don't know...but somewhere along the way it did!
Quote: jsantee97Here is a theoretical situation for you....it's 9:00 PM and you just realized your mortage or credit card payment was due today and you have no grace period, if you miss the payment shit hits the fan...you go to get online to pay and your internet connection is down, but tada neighbor123's connection is up and open for business. What do you do?
If you know which neighbor and he's home, go and ask "May I borrow your WiFi to pay my mortgage? I'd be glad to pay you for your trouble." If he's not home, I'd use the connection and try to make ammends later. If I don't know which neighbor, I'd make use of the connection, but only for paying the bank and nothing else. I'd be more mindful in the future to get the payments done on time.
Quote: jsantee97Here is a theoretical situation for you....it's 9:00 PM and you just realized your mortage or credit card payment was due today and you have no grace period, if you miss the payment shit hits the fan...you go to get online to pay and your internet connection is down, but tada neighbor123's connection is up and open for business. What do you do?
Thank goodness your neighbors also left their keys in the car! You borrow the car and drive to the library a few miles away, where you know you can get free internet. Since you feel bad about using your neighbor's gas, you leave $0.65 on the dashboard.
Just giving you a hard time. I'd use the neighbor's internet also.
Quote: CrystalMathThank goodness your neighbors also left their keys in the car! You borrow the car and drive to the library a few miles away, where you know you can get free internet. Since you feel bad about using your neighbor's gas, you leave $0.65 on the dashboard.
Let's not get carried away...I would think the GSA mileage reimbursement rate would be in order!
The temptation would have to be easy and the problem urgent enough though.
And then unfortunately, I'd probably get caught and have to stutter through an explanation.
HOWEVER, the neighbor may be in voilation of the Terms of Service that he has with the ISP by providing the free access.
If on the other hand you don't pay for internet and you decide to just borrow your neighbor's signal on a permament basis, then this absolutely IS stealing as you are depriving the ISP revenue. Further, if your neighbor is paying by the gigabyte, you're also stealing from your neighbor.
The analogy I'd like to use is that your neighbour has a sprinkler system that happens to inadvertently water (part of) your lawn. Do you walk over to your neighbor's house and offer to pay part of their water bill? You have a hose and a sprinkler too.
The world has always been Lock It Or Lose It. They lied to you in Sunday School. Get over it!Quote: AyecarumbaWhen did the world change from, "Thou Shalt Not Steal", to "Lock It, Or Lose It"?
As for the question, is it stealing to use your neighbor's open wireless?
If your neighbor is broadcasting his SSID, and he he is running with no password, then he is in fact, pushing his network into your house. He is declaring his network is open for anyone to use. The same way your ham radio can listen to other's conversations, or your CB can listen to others, or your AM/FM receiver picks up signals. Wasn't this issue also addressed back when the 18' satellite dishes were needed to receive satellite signals? I believe the broadcasters claimed their signal was being stolen, but the courts ruled the signal was free to be received by anyone. The broadcasters had to encrypt the signal if they wanted it to be private.
In this case, it is your neighbor's WAP that is broadcasting a signal into your house. I am not a lawyer, but I have to believe the law would not convict anyone for theft of service in this situation.
Now, if your neighbor configures his WAP to not broadcast the SSID, and you use other means to figure out the SSID and connect to the network anyway, then yes, I believe you are stealing. By disabling the broadcast of the SSID, your neighbor is declaring it is his intent to not have other's accessing his network. You have gone out of your way to deny your neighbor's wishes, and gain access to your neighbor's network.
What we are really talking about here is the ignorance of people using sophisticated devices, AND the indifference of the people selling the devices. The sellers COULD default the devices to be password protected and not broadcast SSIDs, but that would lead to more installation issues and help line calls. So they opt for the easy, unsecure defaults. The Users could take time to READ the manuals, and try to understand what they are doing, but they don't want to be bothered. They just want to plug it in and go.
Most of the analogies in prior posts are not apples to apples (things like taking a hose, or a car, etc.) since the user is taking an action against a neighbor's object. Let's make an analogy that is more comparable:
Your neighbor puts in an underground sprinkler system right on the property line. You notice that it sprays 3' unto your property. You have always wanted to put a flower garden in that part of your yard, but you knew the flowers would never survive without daily watering. If you put a flower garden in that spot now, are you stealing from your neighbor? It is his water, but he is spraying it in your yard. If you angle his sprinkler to gain access, then by all means it is stealing, but if you don't touch the sprinkler, have you done anything wrong?
I think DJ is right.
I would have to look closer at the fine print, but I believe the wording with the ISP says you are paying for Internet service for your household. So, if you were to make arrangements with a neighbor to 'share' their Internet service, then I believe your neighbor would be in violation of their ISP contract. And, it would be a conscious decision to conspire, even if the neighbor did not realize it was a violation of the contract.
If you are attaching to your neighbor's network without their knowledge, then they may be guilty of negligence by allowing their network to be used outside the household, thus breaking their ISP contract, but it is not willful conduct. And they would have plenty of company in their ignorance/negligence, since the device manufacturers configure the devices that way by default.
I was working on my laptop one day and decided to log into my router to make some changes. I entered my ID/password and it would not take. I had had an issue where the router had reset itself before, so I tried the default ID/password, and that got me in. I was going through the config screens and things just did not seem right. It was then that I noticed that when I had moved to my family room, my laptop had actually logged into my neighbor's unprotected WAP, and I was, in fact, logged into his network, AND HAD LOGGED INTO HIS ROUTER. (I have it setup to automatically find wifi spots when I am away from my network). I exited and corrected my wireless connection to get back on my own network, but an evil minded person could have a field day with his open system........
What is the best SSID you have seen?
At an apartment complex where my daughter was living I saw the following networks, all secured:
GETYOUROWN
NOFREELOADERS
PWISNINE
Quote: FleaStiffMany people piggyback on some existing signal thinking the owner doesn't know what he is doing, but he just may be watching not only who the users are but what they are doing with it. And since its his network, its legal for him to do it.
What about this one--I moved into a house and the owner was using his neighbors Wi-Fi for months and didn't know it. Yessir, he even had his laptop plugged into his router, but the laptop was set to default to take the Wi-Fi signal. So what we had was one person not knowing he was taking Wi-Fi from another person who didn't know the Wi-Fi was being taken.
After some time I think the neighbor caught on or moved because eventually we could no longer use his network. When a the owner moved out and a new roommate moved in he brought his own router.
It was a lesson to me to secure my Wi-Fi, always.
Quote: boymimboLet's extend this. If you're in a hotel that doesn't offer free internet but you learn of a passcode or way to avoid the charge, is it okay to avoid it?
Reno tip of the day: the rooms in the East Tower of Harrah's Reno are close enough to the Siena Hotel that it's possible to use Siena's wireless network, which for some reason is not password-protected. (Harrah's charges $10.95 for Wi-Fi.)
neighborhood and parking in front of a house that has it. Somebody
is going to report him and it is a crime here. He thinks its funny because
it saves him $60 a month.
Quote: buzzpaffAny chance elderly neighbor is a pedophile? Common way they download photos so as to be untraceable!
No, just a cheap old lady who could afford the service.
Some people set up "free" open networks on purpose, not to be nice, but to steal passwords or banking information. If you have access to the router that someone else's web traffic is going through, you can capture it, redirect it, spoof it, anything.
Of course, the right thing to do is make sure people can't be on your network unless you want them to be. Use WPA2 keys, don't broadcast SSID, and set up MAC filtering: those three techniques should keep out anyone who isn't a professional.
Quote: MathExtremistLots of ways. If you can access the hard drive, drop a script in their startup folder. Or set up a proxy that traps web traffic and instead redirects them to a local site that says whatever you want (the way hotels do if you don't pay for wifi access).
Some people set up "free" open networks on purpose, not to be nice, but to steal passwords or banking information. If you have access to the router that someone else's web traffic is going through, you can capture it, redirect it, spoof it, anything.
Of course, the right thing to do is make sure people can't be on your network unless you don't want them to be. Use WPA2 keys, don't broadcast SSID, and set up MAC filtering: those three techniques should keep out anyone who isn't a professional.
I haven't voted or commented on this thread since I'm torn as to what to think. However, I know have a wireless card through my cell phone provider and can access the internet when I'm plugged in.
Horseshoe Southern Indiana has a blocker on the signal, but luckily Diamond players get Free WiFi there. That annoys me though, b/c if it's my internet, why should you block the signal? I know you want me to use YOUR service (and pay dearly for it), but it still irritates me.
I thought, this was common knowledge.
The routers come with security "on" nowadays. You have to take a conscious action to setup an open network. If somebody has gone through such trouble, I believe, it is safe to assume he knows what he is doing.
I am running an open wifi network at home myself. Everyone in range is welcome to use it. I know that a few people do pretty regularly, one almost constantly.
Quote: RaleighCrapsSo how does a Starbucks offer a free wifi hotspot? Do they have a deal with the ISP that they will be allowing up to xx concurrent connections at a time from their WAP?
They got a business account. It has different ToS from residential one.
BUT, I'm not hip to these techno things. If I'm paying for something and someone piggybacks onto me with no consequence to me, I'd probably not care. If their use lags up my online gaming, I'd drop a mountain on their head.