I’m aware of the risks, but unfortunately I don’t have any other options. I’m travelling long-term and don’t have a home anymore. The prospect of me not getting any work done is far more problematic than the possibility of someone breaking into my device on public wifi. Also with the norm of default-configured home networking devices and aging firmware, you’re not necessarily more secure in that environment when faced with anyone determined.
elt547
Exadra37
I understand your situation, but in that case shouldn’t you plan to have a good data plan on your SIM card?
I have one on mine that also works well when in roaming.
This becomes also a security risk for your employer, but many employers are not yet aware of the risk associated with employees working on public wifi, or they downplay the risk, but in some industries its not an acceptable risk.
Attackers when wanting they always achieve, but the public wifi risk are by far bigger then the ones you face at home.
Not only old routers, even modern routers are crap in terms of security for a persistent attacker.
When on public wifi (or at home if the attacker is outside your home) you also face the danger of the wifi being spoofed by a device like this:
P.S: Maybe a moderator want to split this into another topic with a tile like Risks of working on a public wifi
2
dimitarvp
Might be best to setup a VPN somewhere in Iceland for example. I understand and sympathize that this is not your first prio right now – but I have acquaintances that work from like 20 different places in the world and investing in their own VPN (hosted on an obscure VPS provider) was something that netted them huge returns in peace of mind and reliability.
Just something to have in mind when you can spare $15 a month and a day or two of setting up WireGuard / Tailscale / ZeroTier.
…Or use Mullvad. They are amazing in every way you can think of.
1
elt547
True, I could. The thing is, using a vpn doesn’t really guard against any of the attack vectors that Exadra37 suggested. If someone has physical access to the network or effectively owns it, all the tunnels in the world won’t change the fact that I’m working on a personal machine that isn’t hardened to attackers who have direct network access.
0
dimitarvp
Actually it does protect you. Unless the attackers perfectly spoof a VPN handshake (which requires perfect timing as well) then afterwards every packet is encrypted and then checked on both sides.
VPNs eliminate like 99% of the potential dangers of public WiFi networks.
0