Top Ten Ways to Avoid an Evil Twin Attack
Wireless security concerns don't seem to be slowing hotspot growth. In 3Q09, AT&T hotspots serviced over 25 million Wi-Fi sessions – 66 percent more than in 2Q09. Aircell now offers in-flight Wi-Fi service on over 4,000 flights per day. In my hometown (Philadelphia), Comcast just launched over 2000 new Xfinity hotspots.
Yet, few public hotspots protect users from wireless security threats like eavesdropping, spoofing, or evil twin attacks. Good hotspots protect login values like usernames, passwords, and credit card numbers. But after login, data privacy is often up to the user.
Hotspot data theft is well-understood and easily defeated with SSL websites and VPN connections. But the same cannot be said for evil twins – hacker access points that use real network names (SSIDs) to bait users into connecting to them. Here we describe the symptoms of an evil twin attack and how to avoid falling for them.
