If you own a laptop and travel a lot, you must be accessing the Internet from public Wi-Fi hotspots. Public Wi-Fi hotspots are becoming increasingly popular and nowadays most of the public places such as shopping centers, railway stations and airports provide free access to the internet through these Wi-Fi hotspots. However you need to take some precautions to secure your laptop when you are accessing Internet at the public Wi-Fi hotspots.
The public Wi-Fi networks are generally less secure since they do not use encryption. In such a scenario, anyone using the same Wi-Fi network can try to access your files and monitor your activities unless you have taken the necessary steps to secure your laptop. Here are some tips that will ensure that your laptop is secure at the Wi-Fi hotspots:
1) Before you access Internet through a public Wi-Fi hotspot, make sure the safety features of your laptop are turned on. Check that the firewall of your system is running and the file sharing service is disabled. To check this setting, simply open the control panel and choose Windows firewall. For Windows XP, you need to select the “Exceptions” tab and check in “Programs and Services” option to see if the “File and Printer sharing” option is unchecked. For Windows Vista, you need to click on the “Change settings” option first and then select the “Exceptions” tab and check for the file and the printer sharing option.
2) You must turn off the Wi-Fi radio of your laptop when you are not at a hotspot. The Wi-Fi radio has certain loopholes that allow the hackers to establish peer to peer Wi-Fi connections with your laptop and access its contents. As you can imagine, this could prove disastrous so you must remember to switch off the Wi-Fi radio.
3) You must never send sensitive information such as credit card numbers, bank details and other confidential and sensitive data through an email through a public Wi-Fi network. You must ensure about the security of your email site first before sending such vital information. For secure sites, there is a lock icon present in the status bar of your browser and the web address starts with https instead of the usual http. Ensure the security of the site and then only send such confidential emails.
4) Make sure the public Wi-Fi hotspot that you are using is genuine. Some hackers can set up routers that look like genuine Wi-Fi networks but in reality they are just a facade to steal private data of unsuspecting users.
5) If possible, get a paid subscription to access Wi-Fi network. When you use paid subscription, your Wi-Fi network sessions are automatically encrypted and are safe from the prying eyes.
As you can see from the above list, it is important to keep your laptop secure while accessing the public Wi-Fi networks. The public Wi-Fi hotspots offer a great convenience but they can also lead to serious cases of data and identity theft. It is your responsibility to ensure that the security of your laptop is not compromised and your data remains safe.
(Zikkir)
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