Island WiFi access

[Webbsatwinni]

I do not know if anyone can answer this, but we were on rattlesnake this weekend and I use a tethered link to my Blackberry to access the internet.

While I was online, a "free Wifi Access Point" (that was the label on the connection) become active. I did not link to it, but I have a hand held WiFi signal strength meter and I was able to see that the signal was very strong on the island. The only other information I could get from it was that it was a peer to peer connection and that it was unsecured.

Does anyone know if this is a usable free link and if so, where it may be coming from? I know it may be a long shot that anyone will know about this, but I thought I would ask the forum.

[wifi]

Take a peek at: http://www.nmrc.org/pub/advise/20060114.txt

You are seeing a computer close to you advertising this 'free access point' ad-hoc style. If you try to connect to this free network, you will never receive a DHCP assignment and just hang forever.

[B R]

I was in Utah this winter using my windows mobile device the way you are using your blackberry. I watched as the "start > run > ftp........" was displayed on my computer. It opened up a DOS command prompt at that command and the hacker started downloading malicious code onto my computer from an ftp site in Denmark. I quickly unplugged the tethered connection, found the file he downloaded and reported him and his ftp site to CERT.

I had my Windows firewall turned off since most of the time I'm protected by my workplace firewall or a firewall on a wireless router. Those tethered connections offer no firewall protection at all. At the very least, make sure your computer is up to date and the windows firewall is turned on.