Be careful when using wi-fi

With people going away this holiday and needing to stay in touch online, it is important to be safe when working on a public wi-fi network.

The website www.howtogeek.com warns to never do banking or to transmit credit card information or anything sensitive on a public wi-fi network, because the open nature of the network allows for snooping.

The wi-fi network could have compromised machines or the hot-spot itself could be malicious.

The website www.support.com gives precautions to take when using a public wi-fi:

•  make sure your computer has a hardware firewall.
•  Use public wi-fi for simple internet browsing only and don’t use public networks to log-in to anything personal, even web-mail. Hackers are aware that most people use the same passwords across everything from email to bank accounts
•  Before joining any public network, determine what wi-fi network is used and don’t join any other networks that may also show up on your computer or tablet as available.
•  Turn off shared folders to prevent hackers from uploading malware (software that is intended to damage or disable computers and computer systems) to your computer over a wi-fi network.
•  Change your Windows wireless network connection properties from the default of “automatic connection” to “on demand” to prevent your computer from automatically joining unsafe networks.