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Google knows nearly every Wi-Fi password in the world

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271–280 of 312 posts

Re: Google knows nearly every Wi-Fi password in the world

#271

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I dont really see your logic, Gubment can put you in prison, take your rights away, companies targeting ads can't. It makes sense that one would be outraged at the former.

It's spelt "government". Spelling it "Gubment" doesn't suddenly turn everyone who's reading your comment against the notion of an elected democracy, it just makes you look stupid. And the reason that it's much scarier if private companies abuse privacy than if the government does it, is that you yourself decide who the government is. You don't get that right wrt a private company.

The government charters and governs companies so if companies are out of control who do you blame?

Re: Google knows nearly every Wi-Fi password in the world

#272
post #134

Your WiFi password is only useful for someone who is within 100 feet of your house. If you have federal agents surveilling you from 100 feet away you have way bigger problems than your WiFi password.

Actually its from further away than that with a high gain directional antenna (I've hit WiFi hot spots about a mile distant using same) but the point is that they can do this from outside your property. You would probably know if someone was in your house but you'd be hard pressed to notice a Yagi antenna pointed at your window from across the street or down the block a bit. That said, I read the article more as 'yet…

>Actually its from further away than that with a high gain directional antenna

The idea that the parent poster was trying to point out is that at the point the feds are within 100 ft of your house in a truck or 1000 yards but targeting your house with an antenna, they'll find a way. How secure your Wifi password is irrelevant. At that point they've probably tapped your phones.

Re: Google knows nearly every Wi-Fi password in the world

#273

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As long as we're continuing to be cranky about spelling, "spelt" is a perfectly valid British spelling of the past participle of spell.

Yeah, but you guys went and replaced the perfectly cromulent "aluminum" with "aluminium", so already I am suspicious.

aluminum sounds illiterate

Re: Google knows nearly every Wi-Fi password in the world

#274

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You are talking about a group of people mostly from places like EFF, Creative Commons, and other wonderful orgs. They do it because they want to make the world better, and because it's the right thing to do. Maybe you are too cynical and jaded to do something like that, but they aren't. Your opinions have zero basis in fact. There is a difference between the people Google has employed to do the work and the corporate…

"There is a difference between the people Google has employed to do the work and the corporate strategy behind the work. I have no doubt that the people you describe are truly passionate and dedicated." Of course there is difference, but you haven't explained what evidence you have that this it the corporate strategy. I actually know the corporate strategy, and i'm stating for a fact it's not as self-interested as yo…

I am very cynical about Google these days after the revelations about its cooperation with the NSA.

Thanks for your work and I hope you don't take my remarks as any kind of criticism of the work you do.

Put more cautiously, I think indirect corporate benefit is the main impetus for Google's philanthropy and lobbying programs. There is not necessarily a specific business outcome associated with the philanthropy... it's more like "branding" and "brand awareness" campaigns. The payoff is far into the future and is extremely hard to measure.

Re: Google knows nearly every Wi-Fi password in the world

#275
post #238

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> OK so in the case of a "normal" lost password then how is it that it's safe on Apple's servers? In a word, it isn't. The new password is no more nor less safe than the old one. Or are you asking about the data, not the password? Pretty much the same answer.

OK, so Apple is in the same boat as Google. If you can reset your password and still access your data, then it wasn't encrypted in any meaningful way.

Actually, your passwords are gone if Apple resets your Apple ID.

If Apple resets your Apple ID password and you restart your device (remember: the Apple ID is kept decrypted in RAM while the device is running), you lose the entire keychain and must re-enter all passwords.

Re: Google knows nearly every Wi-Fi password in the world

#276

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As long as we're continuing to be cranky about spelling, "spelt" is a perfectly valid British spelling of the past participle of spell.

Yeah, but you guys went and replaced the perfectly cromulent "aluminum" with "aluminium", so already I am suspicious.

Laughing My Ass Off

Re: Google knows nearly every Wi-Fi password in the world

#277

Earlier quoted context omitted.

While I don't like at all the idea of government surveillance without court order, I find the idea of corporate surveillance even more horrifying. Actually, this is what amuses me in the whole privacy affair. So a bunch of companies were using and abusing your data to target ads at you and shape your news stream so that it's more addictive, and people were cheering. A government (still mostly democratic, though not f…

I dont really see your logic, Gubment can put you in prison, take your rights away, companies targeting ads can't. It makes sense that one would be outraged at the former.

In the short run, maybe. In the long run, no, no, no.

It is hopeless to expect the gov't to not do whatever corporations commonly get away with.

Once the corporations do it, the information in question becomes private property. Now all the gov't has to do is persuade the corporation to hand over or "sell" some little nuggets of their private property. As it is private property that is not yours, it is none of your business in the eyes of the law whether these nuggets of private property are dizzyingly complete records about you.

Re: Google knows nearly every Wi-Fi password in the world

#278

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Unfortunately, I have had to enable WEP a few times for certain OS / network card / router configurations, so there are or can be compelling reasons to do this. Pretty sure it was XP though my wife's XP box is working fine with WPA2 on my current router. However, I try to treat even my home WIFI as if it were a coffee shop. The password is there to keep leechers out, but I still vpn into a more secure location for so…

You may find sshuttle interesting [1]. It's essentially VPN implemented via SSH tunnel. [1]: https://github.com/apenwarr/sshuttle

The one annoying thing is that you can't do selectively do DNS over the VPN, but that's really only useful when you want to separate work / personal on the same machine at the same time.

Re: Google knows nearly every Wi-Fi password in the world

#279

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Actually its from further away than that with a high gain directional antenna (I've hit WiFi hot spots about a mile distant using same) but the point is that they can do this from outside your property. You would probably know if someone was in your house but you'd be hard pressed to notice a Yagi antenna pointed at your window from across the street or down the block a bit. That said, I read the article more as 'yet…

In OpenWrt there is a "Distance Optimization" field, described, "Distance to farthest network member in meters." I would guess this allows some assumptions about the raw timing of transmission through the air, which no antenna could overcome. However, since it's just called an optimization, not a security feature, I'm not sure of the actual effect. Do you know if this really changes your long-range scenario? For my s…

It's only available in madwifi. It depends on power/gain/antenna...

http://madwifi-project.org/wiki/UserDocs/LongDistance

Re: Google knows nearly every Wi-Fi password in the world

#280

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I dont really see your logic, Gubment can put you in prison, take your rights away, companies targeting ads can't. It makes sense that one would be outraged at the former.

It's spelt "government". Spelling it "Gubment" doesn't suddenly turn everyone who's reading your comment against the notion of an elected democracy, it just makes you look stupid. And the reason that it's much scarier if private companies abuse privacy than if the government does it, is that you yourself decide who the government is. You don't get that right wrt a private company.

not really. everyone involved in the NSA scandal is not elected.

from the people that authorizes budget, to the contractors in hawaii reading your info, to the agents in CIA/FBI building evidence against you, to the cops arresting you...

not a single one is your representative. Your only representatives are all in the same dark as you are.

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