My high school's WLAN isnt encrypted...

[MatthewF01]

Originally posted by: psiu
Personally, might be a good way to make money (not THAT way). Head over to the IT folks after school and tell them:

1) you noticed the network *appears* to be open;

2) would it be okay if you brought your laptop in for school purposes, i.e. not have to copy floppies back and forth for school papers and such?

3) speaking of which, do they have an intern, co-op, or work study type program over the summer?

I would highly doubt they are *retarded*, more along the lines of the typically overworked and underpaid folks who work in schools...which would go along with scaring teachers. Think about all of your teachers being left unattended in front of computers and you have to clean up the mess afterwards?

*thinking................................*

Scary, isn't it?

They are probably getting around to securing the wireless but it's probably lower on the list than keeping everything running on a day to day basis.

Anyway, that's my $0.02.

edit: hmm....hadn't seen the work bit (my fault for not reading all the way through). And it seems like the topic's getting a little angry. To the original question: Yes, if you don't ask, they probably wouldn't like you getting in w/o permission (whether they are making it easy or not).

you make good points.

Setting up all those new computers with the correct wireless information is probably more trouble/work than its worth. I guess they dont fear for their security? With things like student grades/files, teacher files, blahblah its interesting the network is so open.

although im sure that once youre in theres more security measures on the inside?

 

[psiu]

Setting up all those new computers with the correct wireless information is probably more trouble/work than its worth. I guess they dont fear for their security? With things like student grades/files, teacher files, blahblah its interesting the network is so open.

although im sure that once youre in theres more security measures on the inside?

That was my thought, the security is still there (although, of course, what level), odds are you can't login under a student account at the school and access that stuff. Whether it's going to be a wireless or wired connection is relatively irrelevant.

Anyway, might be good experience in an IT setting (from the standpoint of dealing with end-users, security updates, learning when not to rush in *fixing* something and having the network go down) and something to put down on a resume later and possibly get some sort of credit towards class work or something.

Anyway, good luck with it....:beer: Since you're 17 that's just really frothy apple juice....

 

[AFB]

Originally posted by: MatthewF01

Originally posted by: psiu
Personally, might be a good way to make money (not THAT way). Head over to the IT folks after school and tell them:

1) you noticed the network *appears* to be open;

2) would it be okay if you brought your laptop in for school purposes, i.e. not have to copy floppies back and forth for school papers and such?

3) speaking of which, do they have an intern, co-op, or work study type program over the summer?

I would highly doubt they are *retarded*, more along the lines of the typically overworked and underpaid folks who work in schools...which would go along with scaring teachers. Think about all of your teachers being left unattended in front of computers and you have to clean up the mess afterwards?

*thinking................................*

Scary, isn't it?

They are probably getting around to securing the wireless but it's probably lower on the list than keeping everything running on a day to day basis.

Anyway, that's my $0.02.

edit: hmm....hadn't seen the work bit (my fault for not reading all the way through). And it seems like the topic's getting a little angry. To the original question: Yes, if you don't ask, they probably wouldn't like you getting in w/o permission (whether they are making it easy or not).

you make good points.

Setting up all those new computers with the correct wireless information is probably more trouble/work than its worth. I guess they dont fear for their security? With things like student grades/files, teacher files, blahblah its interesting the network is so open.

although im sure that once youre in theres more security measures on the inside?

Most likely.

 

[MatthewF01]

Originally posted by: psiu

Setting up all those new computers with the correct wireless information is probably more trouble/work than its worth. I guess they dont fear for their security? With things like student grades/files, teacher files, blahblah its interesting the network is so open.

although im sure that once youre in theres more security measures on the inside?

That was my thought, the security is still there (although, of course, what level), odds are you can't login under a student account at the school and access that stuff. Whether it's going to be a wireless or wired connection is relatively irrelevant.

--**see thats why im saying that im not BREAKING INTO their network, nor do i have the desire to. I would like to access my school files from my own computer so I can end this physical disk-swapping madness. Although IT dept would probably go nuts if they ever saw me stick my JumpDrive into the desktops at school for file transfer.



Anyway, good luck with it....:beer: Since you're 17 that's just really frothy apple juice....


--**hah give me a break... we're not goin' anywhere... us anandtechers can share some suds.

 

My school has a guest system set up, so if you hook anything up to the network you'll get internet, and in the library you'll have access to the printers but they have damn good security keeping you out of everyone else. From city hall they can tell which computer is where and what its looking at, quite a nice network I think.

 

[MatthewF01]

Originally posted by: JAGedlion
My school has a guest system set up, so if you hook anything up to the network you'll get internet, and in the library you'll have access to the printers but they have damn good security keeping you out of everyone else. From city hall they can tell which computer is where and what its looking at, quite a nice network I think.

thats pretty nice! is that a university or a high school?

see... thats all i want.

 

highschool, but considering the entire city or something is on the same network, I wouldn't doubt that city hall and the education center would have it too. My main point is that, this could be why the network looks open. In my school grades and other really important stuff is kept on a physically seperate network in one room so no matter how 1337 you are, you first need to sit down and plug in infront of the data center people to cause real damage.

Oh, btw, I first learned this while poking around at my schools network. One thing, make friends with the networking teacher (if yo have one). The first thing we did in that class was promise to tell him when we're about to do something crazy so he can make up a good excuse, like a networking "project" or something, and second, close the door and talking about our own networking experiences wink wink.

unless your covered, dont do much

 

[AFB]

I want a network teacher.

 

[MatthewF01]

im good buddies with the IT teacher... though i havent had him for IT, where I could probably get away better with such a 'stunt'.
he was my teach for computer programming and electronics..

i had to bring my laptop to school today to type a paper that i dillydallied on doing... and when i booted up Windows, before I disabled my WLAN the machine didnt even pick up on their SSID...interesting.

 

[AFB]

No its not, they just disabled broadcasting. That means that they have at least some(not much) security sense. There could be possible MAC filtering and who know what authentication.

 

[MatthewF01]

Originally posted by: amdfanboy
No its not, they just disabled broadcasting. That means that they have at least some(not much) security sense. There could be possible MAC filtering and who know what authentication.

yea i figured they just turned SSID Broadcast off.

 

[AFB]

Good old security through obscurity.