We bring along our laptop, smartphone, and/or tablet when we go places, as a part of our daily ritual of mobility WiFi has become essential, we connect to WiFi at all time to conduct businesses, catch up emails, connect to social media, or browse the net, even in a public place.
It is common that airports, coffee shops, hotels, and many other locations offer free WiFi. Even though we know the security risks, it does not stop us.
The result of a recent survey pushed by Xirrus Inc., of Thousand Oaks, Calif., in conjunction with Morgan Wright, a cybersecurity expert and senior fellow at The Center for Digital Government, a research and advisory institute on IT policies and best practices in state and local government shows:
The researchers found that 91 percent of survey participants know that public Wi-Fi is not secure, but 89 percent of them use it anyway. More alarming, 44 percent of Wi-Fi users connect to three or more public networks a day, while 3 percent connect to more than five public networks a day. The problem, per experts, the more networks to which a user connects, the more likely he or she is to download malware on a public connection and transport the virus to secure work or home network.
The result shows 83 percent of those surveyed access their email, whether personal or for work, and 43 percent access work or job-specific information. 46 percent of the survey respondents indicated they have not received corporate Cybersecurity training in the past year.
Whether it’s online banking or work email, Wi-Fi users are accessing sensitive information, the report advocates the public Wi-Fi providers from hotels to convention centers to retailers to healthcare facilities?to provide better online security for their customers. Individuals and employers, likewise, have a responsibility to provide employees with the tools and education to keep corporate data safe.
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