AS more and more people now have access to the Internet, given the recent rollout of the government’s provision of free Wi-Fi connection to some areas in Metro Manila, a network security provider warned users to be very cautious of sharing personal information on a public domain, as they may fall prey to hackers.
Alvin Rodrigues, Fortinet market-development director for Southeast Asia and Hong Kong, lauded the national government, particularly the Department of Science and Technology’s Information and Communications Technology Office, for pilot-testing the free Wi-Fi zones at the Rizal Park in Manila and the Quezon Memorial Circle in Quezon City last week.
This came after President Aquino approved last month House Bill 5791, titled “An Act Providing Free Public Wireless Internet Access in Public Buildings, Terminals, Parks and Plazas Throughout the Country.”
Once fully implemented, the project will cover 7,112 public places in 967 towns, 3,269 schools, 202 rural health units, 59 major rail stations, 21 seaports, 10 airports and local governments across the nation.
Also, it will serve around 105,000 concurrent users with 256 kilobits per second each, which is considered the lowest prevailing speed requirement for broadband service.
The free Internet service, which has a budget of P1.408 billion, is expected to achieve 99-percent connectivity by the third quarter of this year.
“Public Wi-Fi is not a bad thing. It’s a good thing,” he said, while citing that it increases connectivity among people who have no access to the Internet. “And that’s what the government is addressing.”
But what makes it dangerous is that it could be taken advantaged of by cybercriminals at large, who could also get into the network meant for general use.
Fortinet International Inc. (FII) Country Manager for the Philippines Jeff M. Castillo said hackers are so intelligent that users do not know they are being robbed of all their personal information, even just from their mobile phone.
“So this is the thing that we have to rethink when using a free Internet connection,” he said.
While the decision still comes from end-users, FII regional presales consultant Nap S. Castillo noted that it depends on the level of confidentiality and security they have when they are online.
“We all know that wireless network is the easiest part of the network where hackers can really do the hacking,” Castillo said.
Among the practical activities done online, he advised the users not to do their banking transactions on the Web, especially in an open wireless network, as more and more users can easily connect into it.
“Because if I am a hacker and I also get hold of the Wi-Fi password, I can still do nasty things that I used to do,” Castillo explained.
For Rodrigues, he, likewise, cautioned the users from booking their travel or shopping online in a public domain, as it requires credit-card information that can be traced by the hackers.
He suggested them to use their data plan, instead, for most of their transactions in cyberspace.
“The idea here is to minimize personal information from being taken freely on any sort of public domain. Human is often the weakest link [here]. Human ignorance or human lack of awareness on network security is the culprit here. And that’s where the level of education is needed,” Rodrigues stressed.