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Vent: A hotel wifi hack in Denver made me stop using public networks cold turkey
I was at a conference in Denver last month and connected to the hotel's free wifi to check my email. Within an hour, I got alerts for three login attempts from a city I've never been to. The hotel's network was wide open, no password, and someone had set up a fake portal that looked legit. Now I'm totally against using any public wifi, even with a VPN, because that risk feels too high. But my coworker says I'm being paranoid and that a good VPN is enough for checking basic stuff. What's your take? Do you ever use hotel or cafe wifi, or do you avoid it completely?
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ericb666mo ago
Stop using public networks cold turkey" seems like a big jump... a solid VPN should handle that fake portal risk. I still hop on hotel wifi with mine on, just for basic stuff.
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ninabutler6mo ago
But a VPN isn't a magic shield. Fake portals can still trick you before it even connects.
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adam_nguyen76mo ago
Saw a tech blog post last year that broke down how those fake hotel login pages work. They can grab your data the second your device tries to auto-connect, before any VPN app even wakes up. The writer said the only real fix is to turn off auto-join for networks and manually connect with the VPN already running. It's a hassle, but it checks out.
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