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'Free Public WiFi' Isn't a Normal Wireless Network. It's a Zombie.
If you've ever found yourself looking to hop onto a free wireless network while killing time at an airport, you've probably come across an available network called 'Free Public WiFi.' At first, you think you've hit the jackpot. It's free. It's public. It's Wi-Fi. Game on. A few seconds after you attempt to connect, though, you realize that this so-called wireless network doesn't actually provide access to the Internet. What's going on? Is this a joke? A ruse? A virus? No. It's a zombie. Free Public WiFi, you see, isn't your average wireless network. It's an "ad hoc" network, meaning that, when you connect to it, you aren't connecting to a wireless router, but to someone else's computer within your immediate vicinity. As NPR explains, Free Public WiFi appears to have arisen from a bug in an older version of Windows XP. When a computer running this version of XP can't find one of its preferred networks, it creates a new ad hoc network, which it automatically names after the last network it joined. Because this new network is visible to others within range of the XP-equipped computer, others can "join," thereby allowing the name to spread in much the same way that a zombie spreads living death by biting people. At one point, then, someone must have created the 'Free Public WiFi' ad hoc name, which clearly succeeded in luring other users to join.
Unlike zombies, however, Free Public WiFi won't eat your computer's brains. In fact, there's nothing inherently malicious about joining the network, or other common ad hoc creations like 'linksys,' 'hpsetup,' 'tmobile' or 'default.' Wireless security expert Joshua Wright speculates that it was probably created by someone looking to pull off an innocent joke, in an attempt to lure a friend into joining "so he would get a Web page with some kind of a gross image or childish prank."
Still, Free Public WiFi and its zombie brethren could provide an easy way for hackers to infiltrate and corrupt our hard drives. The vulnerability is so obvious, in fact, that it's a veritable red flag for security experts looking to tighten up a company's wireless network. As Wright explains, whenever he and his team of experts see the name Free Public WiFi pop up on a company's list of available networks, "we break out the champagne."
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Comments
3
Subscribe to commentsSally GOct 12th 2010 7:08AM
Please tell me how using such a service could allow hackers to get into my computer? The article is excellent about the derivation of such wireless connections, but not about how using it can be dangerous—or is it? There is a network I usually see on my computer at home that ends with “-public”; would it be dangerous to use it?
rickgrewellOct 12th 2010 8:02AM
@(Unverified) This is a bunch of crap. Amar Toor is just making stuff up so he keep a job. AOL sould check this stuff out before runnung it!
Pks29733Oct 12th 2010 11:13AM
@(Unverified) The 'Zombie' networks could allow hackers in if the system doesn't have the correct security or updated security. 'Oh I have protection on my computer', yes you may but if there's a 'hack' on the 'zombie network' your computer will be 'hacked' as it's logging on to it.