Hello WAMUGers, Especially people who occasionally use Public Wi-Fi Networks (Hotspots); Unsecured Wireless Networks; found in coffee shops, hotels, airports and conferences. Yesterday as I was waiting for a Logic Board replacement being done at MacWorx Joondalup, I popped over to a coffee shop to rush off a couple of emails and enjoy a latte. I really needed a 'Caffeine kick’ and did need to send these emails.
I sent the emails as quickly as possible, and took more time enjoying the wonderful ‘life saving’ latte ;-) While enjoying my coffee I started to think about the risks of using my computer, iPhone or iPad on this type of public Wi-Fi network. It goes without saying… I of course would never access a Financial Site (Bank etc) or any site that required me to type in my login details! I do have a reputation as being very security conscious... (& of course I’m always on about having current Back Ups ;-) So when I arrived home with new Logic Board replaced in MBP I did a bit of reading and searching about an easy way to quickly setup a Virtual Private Network (VPN) for this type of situation. I found “Cloak” which I will try out next time. So thought I would post a bit about this problem and one way to hopefully protect WAMUG members who use Public Wi-Fi Networks sometimes. <https://www.getcloak.com/about/features/> <http://blog.getcloak.com/about/tech/> "WHY CLOAK? Cloak is a service for your Mac, iPhone, and iPad that keeps you safe when you’re connected to public wireless networks like those found at coffee shops, hotels, airports, and conferences. Exactly how unsafe are public hotspots?" VERY unsafe! Also another reason why I don’t use Firefox as my Internet Browser. <http://www.computerworld.com/s/article/9193201/How_to_protect_against_Firesheep_attacks> Cloak secures your Internet traffic without the hassle: <http://www.macworld.com/article/1165985/cloak_secures_your_internet_traffic_without_the_hassle.html#lsrc.nl_mwgems_h_crawl> TinyURL if link above doesn’t work: <http://tinyurl.com/7emp4mc> /Quote: Cloak secures your Internet traffic without the hassle By David Chartier, Macworld.com - March 20, 2012 Thanks to iPads, iPhones, and ever-lighter MacBooks, we’re doing more work and play while on the go than ever before. A caveat of working this way, however, is that most public Wi-Fi networks (hotspots) are anything but secure, which means they’re prime targets for would-be hackers, identity thieves, and general do-no-gooders. If you’re lucky, your company provides you with a virtual private network (VPN) for securing your Internet activities. But if you’re like the rest of us, you need to fend for yourself if you want to hide your login credentials, email, and other sensitive activity from prying eyes. That’s where Cloak comes in. Put simply, Cloak is a VPN that just works. It encrypts all your Internet traffic so other users on the same network can’t snoop over your shoulder, so to speak. But Cloak does away with the typical VPN song and dance of digging into System Preferences and filling in a bunch of cryptic server details and protocols—not to mention having to shop for and set up your own VPN service in the first place. With Cloak, you simply sign up for an account at GetCloak.com and install a little menu-bar utility. /End Quote Cheers, Ronni 17" MacBook Pro 2.3GHz Quad-Core i7 “Thunderbolt" 2.3GHz / 8GB / 750GB @ 7200rpm HD OS X 10.7.3 Lion Windows 7 Ultimate (under sufferance) -- The WA Macintosh User Group Mailing List -- Archives - <http://www.wamug.org.au/mailinglist/archives.shtml> Guidelines - <http://www.wamug.org.au/mailinglist/guidelines.shtml> Settings & Unsubscribe - <http://lists.wamug.org.au/listinfo/wamug.org.au-wamug>
