The truth is that many of the big non web companies that are offering or planning to offer wifi in their stores for pay or free will be sniffing the traffic so that they can mine the information of where people go to create better marketing relationships. They will be using a login page that is not their own site but say Bestbuy.com with the login for the wifi network imbedded in the page at McDonalds. By sniffing the traffic McDonalds can see how long the user stayed on the site and what they bought so that bestbuy will be paying appropriately for the marketing. Bill Titer -----Original Message----- From: tcwug-list-bounces at tcwug.org [mailto:tcwug-list-bounces at tcwug.org]On Behalf Of Mike Ellsworth Sent: Monday, June 07, 2004 1:04 PM To: sulrich at botwerks.org; 'Twin Cities Wireless Users Group List' Subject: RE: [TCWUG] Another point on the wifi hotspot business model curve.. Steve, Yeah, snorting traffic on public Websites is a risk that I have been waiting for corporate America to finally realize. Yet I don't see T-Mobile exploiting this possible advantage. If I were in charge of corporate security for a company of any size, I'd forbid employee use of public Wi-Fi. Mike Ellsworth The WiMAX Guys, LLC StratVantage Consulting, LLC 952-525-1584 mellsworth at stratvantage.com www.StratVantage.com www.TheWiMAXGuys.com Get a free one-hour wireless network evaluation. Forward this message to freebie at theWiMAXGuys.com They that can give up essential liberty to obtain a little temporary safety deserve neither liberty nor safety. Ben Franklin, ~1784 -----Original Message----- From: tcwug-list-bounces at tcwug.org [mailto:tcwug-list-bounces at tcwug.org] On Behalf Of steve ulrich Sent: Monday, June 07, 2004 12:34 PM To: mellsworth at stratvantage.com; Twin Cities Wireless Users Group List Subject: Re: [TCWUG] Another point on the wifi hotspot business model curve.. when last we saw our hero (Monday, Jun 07, 2004), Mike Ellsworth was madly tapping out: > The most interesting thing I got from this article is T-Mobile's > claim that it is more secure (and more reliable) than free hotspots. > Anybody got any idea how they can claim that? I've used their > service and it wasn't running any security as far as I could tell. it's not just about link layer security. when you put your traffic onto an open hotspot from john doe you really don't know what they're doing with your traffic. it's not in the best interests of a t-mobile or SP to harvest subscriber traffic for their nefarious applications. i'm not saying that tmobile and other SPs can't sniff your traffic. but wifi with a branded hotspot probably isn't going to be snorting all the traffic that goes by. whereas you're more likely taking your chance with the freebies. further, many reputable carriers have the ability to do things like virus/worm mitigation in their access infrastructure. that's nice if someone jacks into the same segment and starts to hose you down with the virus of the day. such mechanisms would not be visible from the users persepctive. as with many things in life if you're going have unprotected packet exchange, you have risks. if you'd like to mitigate those risks, slather on the protection with copious amounts of crypto and f/ws. { snipped - misc .signatures } > > -----Original Message----- > From: tcwug-list-bounces at tcwug.org [mailto:tcwug-list-bounces at tcwug.org] On > Behalf Of Andy Warner > Sent: Monday, June 07, 2004 9:44 AM > To: wireless at tc-unwired.net; tcwug-list at tcwug.org > Subject: [TCWUG] Another point on the wifi hotspot business model curve.. > > Apologies in advance if this ends up being one of those > "subscriber-only" pages that drops you through to a login screen; > but the NYTimes carried the following article about the growth of > free hot-spots, contrasted with the fortunes of pay-per-use hot > spots; along with the struggle to find a sustainable business model > for the pay-per-use carriers. > > http://www.nytimes.com/2004/06/07/technology/07wifi.html?8hpib=&pagewanted=a > ll&position= -- andyw at pobox.com { snipped - misc .signatures } -- steve ulrich sulrich at botwerks.org PGP: 8D0B 0EE9 E700 A6CF ABA7 AE5F 4FD4 07C9 133B FAFC _______________________________________________ Twin Cities Wireless Users Group Mailing List - Minneapolis/St. Paul, Minnesota http://www.tcwug.org tcwug-list at tcwug.org https://mailman.real-time.com/mailman/listinfo/tcwug-list _______________________________________________ Twin Cities Wireless Users Group Mailing List - Minneapolis/St. Paul, Minnesota http://www.tcwug.org tcwug-list at tcwug.org https://mailman.real-time.com/mailman/listinfo/tcwug-list _______________________________________________ Twin Cities Wireless Users Group Mailing List - Minneapolis/St. Paul, Minnesota http://www.tcwug.org tcwug-list at tcwug.org https://mailman.real-time.com/mailman/listinfo/tcwug-list