Using Public Wi-Fi Hotspots: How to Surf Safely with JiWire

Do you ever use public wi-fi hotspots, those free or for-fee wireless connections at cafes, hotels, airports, and even entire downtown areas now?

I sure do. For my decade in private practice, I’ve been a bit of a road warrior. Some of my clients take me far afield and there are stretches of planes, trains and hotel rooms. Some of my clients are close to home and I pop into a Panera or Starbucks (because they have wi-fi) if I arrive early for a mediation. Or, if I want to get out of my office to stretch my brain, I may visit my local cafe to sip tea while thinking and planning.

So, I’m frequently in places where I’m checking my email or surfing the net using a publicly available wireless (wi-fi) connection. In fact, I’m writing this from a hotel room in Chester County, Pennsylvania, as I make a little side trip on my way to the ACR conference.

Publicly accessible wireless connections are a great convenience and easy to use, and I silently utter a little thank you to the wireless gods every time I use one. My computer just finds the connection, shakes hands, and says, ok, ready for business. How simple is that?

Simple, yes. Safe, no.

Because every time you or I connect to a public wi-fi, we put ourselves at risk of someone snooping into our computers, tracking password keystrokes, and helping themselves to hard drive contents. That’s why I use a neat little service to help protect me from snoops with far too much time on their hands or darkness in their geeky little hearts.

For several months I’ve been using JiWire Hotspot Helper, a $24.95 per year service that helps protect my computer whenever I surf at a public hotspot. Hotspot Helper does this:

• Automatically encrypts all inbound and outbound Internet traffic (emails, web, IM, VoIP calls, FTP, etc.).
• Ensures I can email just like I would from the office, even at hotpots where email might otherwise be blocked by the hotspot’s operator or require some configuration changes.
• Allows me to find a hotspot from my computer, even when I’m offline. The searchable and automatically updated database includes hotspots in 130 countries.

Neither your nor I need Hotspot Helper. You could learn how to make system changes to protect your computer when you’re at a public hotspot and rely on your regular firewall to safeguard you.

I’m looking for simple, frankly. JiWire’s delivering that simplicity and doing the job I want it to do, for about seven cents a day. (Truth in advertising note: I receive no benefit from JiWire.)

Can I still get hacked? Sure. If someone can hack the defense department or a college’s student records, they can hack my little computer, even with JiWire. But I substantially reduce the likelihood by using a program like JiWire. Rather than try to get through my firewalls, they’re more likely to turn their attention to a simpler target, one of the other (unprotected) laptops in the cafe. Maybe yours.

If you’re not practicing safe surfing, start now. Have a program or service you use and love? Let me know about it by leaving a comment!

Copyright © 2006 by Tammy Lenski. All rights reserved.