Stephen Lawson of IDG news services recently discussed the common practice of bandwidth poaching in densely populated urban areas. “It’s not hard for even an innocent user to tap into a broadband Internet connection via an unprotected wireless LAN: As soon as the Wi-Fi client detects the network, the user can click on it and join. Some broadband subscribers even like opening their networks. But Internet access may not be the only thing being shared.”

I can only agree in that too many novice users of broadband routers/access points don’t bother to set up their wireless networks correctly. Sure, it is convenient to just take the wireless router out of the box, plug in the ethernet cables and start using the laptop from anywhere in the home. However, reading through the router instructions and enabling a minimum of wireless protection only takes a few minutes - I can’t feel pity if someone’s unprotected Wi-Fi network gets abused…