Why Public Wifi Isn’t Secure
Why is public Wifi not secure? It’s hard to deny that securing your internet connection is one of the best things you can do for yourself. Having your hotspot gives you the freedom to make your own choices about what you want to do online and for how long you want to do it. But, on the other hand, public or shared Wifi makes you vulnerable. In a nutshell, public or shared Wifi is the type of internet connection where many people share the same connection. As such, there are different ways in which people can break into your network.
Let’s start with the easiest way to break into a shared public network. Anybody who knows the correct digital fingerprints of any wireless router or access point will be able to easily break into your system. As such, public networks are more susceptible to attacks from hackers. In addition, hackers can bypass firewalls and protect themselves by using alternate methods.
On the other hand, public and private networks are much more difficult to breach. One method that many hackers use is flooding. They flood a network by sending as many fake traffic packets (packets with duplicate copies of the same data) to the destination as possible. The aim is to overload the receiver with as many requests as they can. When the device receives and checks these packets, it will prioritize them and allow users to access the requested web pages.
If you choose a public or shared Wifi hotspot plan, then you will be at the mercy of any hacker. Because your internet connection is open to everybody, there are many people on the internet at the same time. Therefore, for every request made to your network, your application will have to process lots of requests in order to process it and show you any results. If the request cannot be processed, the server will not show you any information or details. Therefore, your application will depend on the quality of connections that each other users have and not on the quality of your own internet connection.
It’s easy to see why some people might consider public WiFi networks insecure. But if you think about what happens during the period when there is a lot of traffic, it becomes clear that it is quite different from private networks. With private networks, each computer stays within its private local area. This means that there is a limit to the number of people connected to a given computer at any one time. So even though you might find it a hassle to log in to different computers simultaneously (as there is a delay between each connection request), you don’t need to worry about the other computers because their connection speeds will be lower.
Public networks, on the other hand, are much more reliable. Therefore, when you are in a public WiFi cafe, you are able to access different public networks without having to use up all your available data plan every single time. This is because these networks always have enough bandwidth to accommodate all the users who wish to connect to them. Because of this, your data usage is lower compared to what you would have used in a public WiFi cafe.
However, if you are using a public network, it does mean that others can also gain access to the same network. Private networks are much more secure since only you can log on to them. When you have an account with a service provider such as Gmail, Yahoo, Hotmail, or Facebook, you are practically permitting them to keep your details on their database. You do not have to share your details with these big companies if you do not wish to do so. If you want to protect your data, then public networks are the way to go.
You should also know that while a public network is easy to access, it is much harder to stay anonymous when on it. Since other people will know your username and password, you will be vulnerable to attacks from various internet viruses. Also, your IP address will be visible whenever you visit a public site, which means that any hacker will be able to trace your internet connection back to you. So while public Wifi might seem like a good option, you need to understand that you have to put in mind a lot of things first before making a choice. As long as you are sure about what you are getting into, you will use a public network as secure as you wish.
