Friday, July 2, 2010

Internet Privacy Revisited

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If you haven’t heard, Google is under investigation for capturing internet traffic from unsecured WiFi access points via their Street View cars all around the world since 2006. Please note that the WiFi was unsecured: any secured WiFi hotspot was protected.

Until recently, Google has claimed that the traffic they captured by accident was not sensitive in nature. However, it has now been found that Google has been gathering more than just random internet traffic from its Street View cars. It has been reported that the information that Google collected contained email passwords and other more sensitive information. So basically, Google can have your email password right now, and that is a scary thought.

The internet world has been harassing Facebook for an extended length of time over privacy concerns, but Facebook never drove to your house and snooped on your home network’s traffic. And so I say that this is a further invasion of privacy than what Facebook has ever committed (yet), but to the average person, Google can do no wrong. I have written a blog post about how Google is going to take over the world, and while that was in jest, when stories like this break, you just wonder how true it could be.

So please, for everything that’s good: secure your WiFi! Here are some resources for doing this yourself:

Securing your Wireless Network

How To Secure Your Wireless Network

How To Secure Your Wireless Home Network

How To Secure Your Wireless Network Connection

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