Well this is a bit disturbing. These Florida folks just don't seem to get it.
http://www.sptimes.com/2005/07/04/State/Wi_Fi_cloaks_a_new_br.shtml
Now it seems to me that this guy who was wardriving, might have been up to no good, but it would seem to me that he might have a good defense against this "alleged crime". The owner saw him several times and didn't tell him to leave. The owner knew that his wi-fi was open. The owner knew how to lock down his wi-fi and didn't. Now it seems to me that just like it's not a crime to trespass (like wlaking across someone's yard), if there are no signs to the contrary, that the owner by his lack of action to secure his network gave implicit permission for use. Of course, IANAL, so I'll be trying to watch this case to see what happens. I think it's more than due time to consider writting some legislation to protect innocent wardrivers. Case in point, back in May, while visisting my mother at the hospital, my brothers and I did some wardriving so we could keep up with our email and work activities. The hospital's wifi wasn't due to be up and accessible for another month, so we found some access points locally and connected at the picnic area on the grounds of the hospital. We could see and connect to the hospital's wi-fi but it wasn't yet configured completely so no 'net access. There were acouple of other access points, that were open and running under the default configuration. We suspect they were: one of the offices in the adjacent doctors' building and a private cable/dsl connection in the neighborhood.
Any discussion?
Brian J.D.
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