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India Looks To Make Open WiFi Illegal
from the overreact-much? dept
In most of the discussions we've had over the years concerning the legalities of open WiFi networks, the issue was whether or not it was legal to access an open WiFi network. Over in India, they're taking a different approach, apparently preparing rules that would outlaw offering an open WiFi network (via Slashdot). This is in response to the recent bombings in India, where officials believe the bombers used open WiFi networks to email each other. That seems like a pretty big overreaction. If it's not open WiFi, the terrorists will come up with other ways to communicate -- and in the meantime you inconvenience everyone else, and make it impossible for those who want to offer open WiFi to do so.
Reader Comments
(Flattened / Threaded)
Who Will They Call?
Well, who are they going to call for help enabling WEP?
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Re: Who Will They Call?
Whoever the product manufacturers can afford when customers insist on cut-throat prices.
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Re: Who Will They Call?
WEP Busters
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It's not that the terrorists were using WiFi to email each other, but that they were sending bomb threats using an open wifi network. In such a case it became impossible to track the sender of the mail.
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Re:
Sorry, logically explanations have been banned on techdirt's blog.
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Re:
Email each other, email/chat bomb threats to others...regardless it is communication.
But, as pointed out, if not WiFi then some other means of communication will be used.
Why not ban the telephone? Why not ban the Internet altogether? Why not ban plain brown envelopes?
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Then they will ban
Payphones
Pay as you go Cells
Even the Post office must close
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They are scared
Well - they are scared. They won't end up doing it, but I think they might take other actions to monitor all forms of communications (as we do in the US). India has already started requiring an ID in order to get a prepaid phone. You must have either a national ID, or a passport that is kept on file. Blocking wi-fi would be impossible to enforce.
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No go
This is the problem with India! With a chunk of the populace illiterate and a chunk of the politicians handling portfolios they never understand properly, the laws that come out are pretty absurd. The way to solving terrorism is not by curbing the lifeblood of its new economy, but by increasing and training its law enforcement agency. India's clash with terrorism goes way back before 9/11. Yet, the number of leads and successful case records are almost zero. Bomb blasts are de riguer. The police make a lot of smoke and fire by arresting suspects and then bank on the same thing each time: the public memory is short.
Indians are resilient and extremely shrewd. They find a way around problems, especially technical problems. You are talking about a country whose street vendors software-hacked open the iPhone even before it was made available legally in the country without any jailbreaking software. The computer tech support guy will fix your Vonage router even though it is not technically sold in the country. And you would think that after the WiFi ban (if it can be implemented), people won't find a way around it?
As usual, the public will forget this also without holding the politician's feet to the fire about terrorism preventive measures.
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Re: No go
I think you missed the point. One of the main reasons they want to ban open Wifi is because with the recent terrorist activity and the threats, it is almost impossible to track the senders.
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Re: Re: No go
Anonymous indian -> "I think you missed the point. One of the main reasons they want to ban open Wifi is because with the recent terrorist activity and the threats, it is almost impossible to track the senders."
and if you tracked everything then IP and MAC spoofing would no longer work and in addition, cracking weak passwords would be made ineffective.
Wow, what a good solution !
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ban everything
then they should ban cars since they used cars for the bombs !
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my city made wardriving illegal. and connecting to someone's home wi-fi. the cable cabal had enough sway to get their TOS passed as law. they did it in exchange for promising to finally roll out a proper high speed internet and not do it as half-arsed as they'd done in the past. on the television side, the city won the argument and the cableco had to promise to offer better channels and HD or the city wouldn't renew their monopoly.
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Officials "believe" an open Wifi signal was used but they have no way to know if their hunch is correct? Wow, that's, um, shockingly stupid of them. I get their intention but the implementation is overly draconian and utterly stupid.
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Meh. Who the hell gives a damn pig's arse what they ban? As Ashwin said, morons implement laws re. things they have no mental capacity to understand. Other morons will make some sort of half-arsed attempt to implement said law. One week later, and everyone's back to their merry old ways, including the people, the cops, the politicians and the terrorists. Sigh...
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