undefined | Better HN

0 pointsmysterypie8y ago0 comments

> * If you're on mall wifi, you can already see unencrypted traffic for everyone else*

Without contradicting your observation, I want to mention that virtually anything important you do on the Internet these days--from online banking to Google searches to reading Hacker News--is protected by a second independent layer of encryption: HTTPS. I'm not excusing the WPA2 flaws, but I do think that your bank info, web searches, and Hacker News comments are secure even at the mall.

If someone can offer a credible explanation of why online banking or other HTTPS activity is insecure on public wifi, I'd like to hear it please.

0 comments

kakarot8y ago

If you don't have extensions that force HTTPS on all content, you could, for example, get served a malicious image file.

from the article:

> they won’t be able to pretend to be a secure site like your bank on the wifi, but they can definitely pretend to be non-secure resources

cjbprime8y ago

You're right, though you're being a little rose-tinted about the situation. I think amazon.com shopping turned on redirects from HTTP to HTTPS last year sometime -- before that they would even redirect from HTTPS to HTTP. That means that until last year, in most instances, your coworkers or your fellow coffee shop customers could see which items you were considering buying online on Amazon. That's really, really bad!

Also, HTTPS doesn't protect domain names. If you're making TLS connections to (e.g.) a porn site over WiFi, the other people sharing your connection don't need to decrypt your traffic to know what you're doing.

j / k navigate · click thread line to collapse