WiFi in the field

One of the few free "public" WiFi access I use. Mainly when there is a bit of tech on the clearance shelf and I want to know a bit more about it before parting with my cash.

give.

Very variable, the "free WiFi" in Days Inn the other month seemed to want everything from inside leg measurment up. I declined and used a bit of my 100MB mobile data allowance.

How do you know who any public WiFi provider is?

The easiest way to find your password is to invite you to logon... with your email address.

If I were so inclined, I'd publish an open Wifi service with a logon page then kick you off after three attempts. Meanwhile I have stored your password and username. Shortly I shall pawn your email and ask you for money.

And if your not paranoid enough yet (and you should be), watch out there's worse to come:

With which you can log on to a free WiFi service, wow! :-)

So apart from maybe getting spammed how does knowing a password help a miscreant?

Or do you really only have one password that you use for everything? I don't, everything has a different password. Constructed via an algorithm so I don't have to actually remember any of them, I can work them out. Mind you I'm still surprised when it does work and some sites can screw it up by not accepting symbols, mixed case or even numbers.

Well, I've made myself a new person on the internet and next time I'm waiting outside the supermarket I'll see if my new "The Cloud" registration works.

No good asking me for money. There is none.

Thanks, everyone, for all the advice.

what if there isn't 3/4g, or it is slow?

True, that is a reason to be careful

Umm, you have an email address, and a password, do you really think the password is going to get you into my email account or anywhere else worth getting into?

My experience is that most independant cafes, pubs, hotels etc just need a passphrase ( often displayed on the wall or the bar) to connect to the wifi for free. But agree that those with landing pages etc are a hassle and I tend to use mobile data instead.

With which I can let you access the internet and log everything you do, analyse it later and then craft a personalised targeted launch against your identity.

That is a different argument from your initial one.

I use ssh.

In message , Bill writes

Well, it didn't.

The browser said there was a problem with "The Cloud"'s security certificate and then went into an endless loop whatever I clicked on.

The other browser on the machine, Opera Mini, seemed to have been damaged by the removal of the Chinese version of Opera (part of my tidying operation to make room for new software), so wanted to reload, but failed.

Back home, on a real service provider, Opera mini downloaded and re-installed fine, and the other Android browser ran normally.

So far, I'm unimpressed.