Man Arrested For Robbing Internet

Originally Posted by ITN.co.uk

A man who was spotted in the street using his laptop to access an unsecured wireless connection has been arrested.

The 39-year-old man was seen sitting on a wall outside a home in Chiswick, west London, by two community support officers.

When questioned he admitted using the owner's unsecured wireless internet connection without permission and was arrested on suspicion of stealing a wireless broadband connection.

The man was bailed to October pending further inquiries.

Dishonestly obtaining free internet access is an offence under the Communications Act 2003 and a potential breach of the Computer Misuse Act.

The move is the latest example of police cracking down on a crime that did not exist several years ago when wireless internet access was relatively rare.

Can't say ive never done it meself lol.

ITN News Report

me neither...but to do it that obviously...askin for trouble

wow, totally unbelivable, its the owners fault for not securing it, just like leaving your bike outside a shop with no chain, if your goin to leave it unlocked, people will take it

I suppose the argument with that though Andy, is that just because someone doesnt lock something up, it doesnt give another person a right to steal it and get away with it.

Say someone saw you leave your car unlocked and decided to get off in it, you remembered a few mins later and went out to lock it, only to find its gone.

Would it then be okay for that person to take your car, cos you never left it locked after all?

Personally though, I couldnt care less about people robbing net when there are 11 yr old kids getting shot dead.

well i see where ya comin from....but the idea of takin a bike without a chain is still theft.....the internet idea tho is pathetic...if people buy wireless..and dont lock it.....then theyre idiots....but if they do..thats also pathetic....cos its a waste of money just to provide for one household...using it on the street is a bit touchy...but using next doors or someones in your street i think is perfectly excusable

It happens a lot in London.

Saw a documentary about a year ago about it, and theres so many unsecured wireless networks all throughout London.

I do it myself if I can, but its normally just easier to use mine.

bike or internet... both cost money

at the end of the day, the person with the internet might not actually know about securing their connection

Originally Posted by ckb180

if people buy wireless..and dont lock it.....then theyre idiots....but if they do..thats also pathetic....cos its a waste of money just to provide for one household

How is it pathetic to buy wireless for ur house?

Whats pathetic is having large wires or bundles of thousands of wires going up an down the house (if using a non wireless router). including the screwing holes which enables access to different floors which destroys the house if u then decided not to have the internet no more. Also if you do share wireless with next door the signal strength might not be strong enough sometimes also if u had a 1mb for example then theres absolute no point in sharing it lol.

Also what if when you dont use the wireless router and wants to turn it off to make sure no one trys to hack in to use ur internet and u want to turn it off? means u cant cuz ur neighbour is sharing it.

Either way... I still prefer wire hehe... although I use wireless on my laptop of course, I would always choose wired over wireless if I had a choice (my media centre uses wires, but my laptop would be silly wired cos I like to move it about hehe).

Im old skool though, I like things that just work haha. RJ45 is truely plug and play

Wireless is also the radio.

So if i don't have a Licence to listen to the radio is it really that wrong?

I see it was community police too, so they had nothing better to do then?

Wonder if the owner of the wifi is at all bothered?

even if the man is found guilty i would still do it
as its a needs must imo

2 people in my road had Wireless brodband and i mentioned to them there broadband is wide open and what recked me head was someone was around the corner using a laptop in there car using there broadband so i locked it up for them as i have Wireless my self n Ad-Hoc (peer to peer) for my laptop and i change my password everyday just to make sure people dont Brute force attack it thats if people would sit out side all bloody night tryin heh! but its good to take that precaution etc.. But yes i would never use anyone elses broadband cause you are asking for trouble cause if they have logging enabled on there router you can gurantee it that you will be traced some way or another....

nice one mate, shoulda sent em a virus too lol

yer, i see your point matty, but as ckb 180 said its only the internet, but then it doesn t really matter what it is, its still theft, strange one !

£35 a month * over 12 months a year = £420

cost about that for a hald decent bike... if someone took my bike without telling me, regardless of whether they were going to return it would fook me off... as would someone taking my internet, y should they be allowed to sponge from me... dont think anyone has tried lol... have a job guessin my password anyway

£5.00 a month over 12 months = £60.00 hehe.

If they wanna use me net for free they can haha, but they will have a job, the need to get a connection to it before they can try breaking the WPA looool (im 8 floors up lmao).

could always sit in the close haha

I can pick matty's up but that's if i'm in the lift lol
Then i have to guess the password everytime the lift goes up and down lol

IMHO the government should provide Free wifi hotspots in public places. i.e libraries.

They owe us that much....

I live in a 3 storey double fronted 100year old mid terrace, I can pick up 5 wireless networks.

Is there a law against sharing your BB connection between neighbours, what about TV, multiroom etc.

No law against it. But it is usually against provider AUP's.

Isnt Norwich or somthing got a live wide wifi and its free?
Seen something on the TV a while ago, the repeaters were on lamp posts

Originally Posted by Waddi

IMHO the government should provide Free wifi hotspots in public places. i.e libraries.

They owe us that much....

I live in a 3 storey double fronted 100year old mid terrace, I can pick up 5 wireless networks.

Is there a law against sharing your BB connection between neighbours, what about TV, multiroom etc.

there has been word of that for a long time... was going to mean replacing millions of pouds of lamposts tho.... i dont know if that was just scotland tho or down there too... i know there are places where they have this tho

I was thinking the other day of opening my wireless up and making a Proxy server when they goto any website goto my Webserver i use to Host a Chatroom but got a page saying.. TRYING TO STEAL MY INTERNET HAS JUST COST YOU.. YOUR COMPUTER and have a fake download screen downloading a Virus. That would be funny ;D

lol or just make a blue form in vb that sits on top of everything saying that (and disable windows task manager lol)

heh yer good idea