In reply to a post by Pipexer:

They are infecting people's machines by getting people to click on links and then install malware to mine bitcoin or whatever. No need to hack WiFi for that.

I'm aware of that - I was trying to add some input to the topic in as much as people who "Hack" will generally go for the low hanging fruit first.

This concept of not noticing who is on your home WiFi I believe will become less prevalent. I'm doing a bit of a stint out in the US right now for work and Xfinity (Comcast) have user access pretty nailed down on their new ISP routers. You essentially can do a bunch of things like setup times for the kids to be online, setup certain users parental controls and others no restrictions, have priority devices such as TV streaming boxex etc. It even breaks down usage per user etc.This is on the ISP provided gateway, so standard now... I would expect if the comcast / sky merger goes ahead, the same type of tech to be carried over (possibly).

A brief look here:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gSNsxwzYZJk

In the UK, things such as the BT Whole Home WiFi provide similar dashboards.

As the GUIs get better and more "app" friendly awareness will probably rise...

Edited by ukhardy07 (Mon 07-May-18 19:09:20)

That is interesting. I could improve my security by enabling MAC Restriction mode but that does take extra effort.

In reply to a post by Michael_Chare:

That is interesting. I could improve my security by enabling MAC Restriction mode but that does take extra effort.

Restricting access by MAC is a waste of time, people can just change their MAC Addresses, I have a Tablet where the MAC Address is different every time I start the Wi-Fi, I also have network hardware that use Software MAC Addressing, so that won't work.

Paul

Perhaps a future feature could be WiFi On demand (Unless it already exists), essentially building flexibility on top of features like "active on hours" setup in the router.

So using any activating means that you like, ie sitting in your favourite chair or perhaps a certain hand gesture, could then activate your Wifi rather than having it active 24/7.

It would save energy (I know, a very small amount) but it would mean those wardriving would more likely miss your WiFi setup.
Or if the Wifi Handshake is all too slow, you could use an additional option on the routers firewall eg enable/disable all ports which could be activated far more quickly.

Edited by Vorlon (Tue 08-May-18 22:50:07)

Wi-Fi power saving modes already exist