Not sure if this is the place to put this or if it should be in the Security sub forum or both forums.
I just came back from a trip to Puerto Rico. We were at the ferry station waiting for the boat to take us to our destination. While sitting in the waiting area, I decided to pull out my smart phone and do a WiFi scan of the area to see what is out there....you can tell I'm really bored at this point. What I found when I did the scan was extremely concerning.
The scan turned up a WiFi network called ATM. And yes, there were two of them there. This by itself isn't so bad except the WiFi network these ATM machines were using are only WEP encrypted. I did a visual inspection and yes, the only wired part of the ATM machines was the power plug. As you all should know by now, WEP isn't a proper method of protecting any wireless network as it only presents a small speed bump to any would be hacker.
This post is just a cautionary tale for anyone to be extra sensitive about things we typically don't give a second thought about in terms of security. And not to just pick on the ATM in question, this is also a concern with point of sale devices with merchants. It's almost impossible to verify all places where you use a card to do a financial transaction as having the best security. What I've been doing is to only use a couple of credit cards for any general transactions so I can more easily spot any suspicious activity and only use my bank/ATM card at my bank's ATM machines.
I just came back from a trip to Puerto Rico. We were at the ferry station waiting for the boat to take us to our destination. While sitting in the waiting area, I decided to pull out my smart phone and do a WiFi scan of the area to see what is out there....you can tell I'm really bored at this point. What I found when I did the scan was extremely concerning.
The scan turned up a WiFi network called ATM. And yes, there were two of them there. This by itself isn't so bad except the WiFi network these ATM machines were using are only WEP encrypted. I did a visual inspection and yes, the only wired part of the ATM machines was the power plug. As you all should know by now, WEP isn't a proper method of protecting any wireless network as it only presents a small speed bump to any would be hacker.
This post is just a cautionary tale for anyone to be extra sensitive about things we typically don't give a second thought about in terms of security. And not to just pick on the ATM in question, this is also a concern with point of sale devices with merchants. It's almost impossible to verify all places where you use a card to do a financial transaction as having the best security. What I've been doing is to only use a couple of credit cards for any general transactions so I can more easily spot any suspicious activity and only use my bank/ATM card at my bank's ATM machines.