Strange/stupid places for an AP.

Started by syklops, March 24, 2006, 07:44:47 AM

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Im starting this thread so other people can add where they have found wireless routers that should not have been. If you were driving past Mount Cheyenne and got a plik from Kismet, this is the place to put up your story.

During my brief stint with 2600-Dublin, I was doing alot of War driving. One day i went into town to do some shopping, and my laptop was in my bag, wifi card on, recording everything I got. When I stopped in Mcdonalds for some refreshments i had a look at what I had caught, and had found 64 AP's in about one square kilometre. One SSID intrigued me. it was CBOI Wireless Net. The only acronym that I thought came close to CBOI that was in the area was the Central Bank of Ireland. Surely they did not have an AP. ??? I finished my tea, and walked  over to the CBOI, and sat in the seats in front of it. Out came kismet and tcpdump. masive amounts of information filled my scrren and sure enough, they had an un encrypted AP connected to their network. As I watched the packets fill my screen, I suddenly had images of the FBI or our equivelent storming my house for hacking their network. I also had images of someone else actually doing it, and transferring the country's money to a numbered account in the bahamas. I contacted their IT department about the major flaw in their network, and a week later i walk passed, and found no AP. I had saved the day!

Anyone else have similar stories?

I know this is a necro post and as my first post too but the thread above this one isn't fantastically active either.

You know just by running kismet they'd have no way of finding you as kismet is completely passive. If you were running netstumbler on windows then there'd be traces of you being there but kismet sends out no information at all and only receives.

You may have already known, just incase.

Kismet is a great tool, and it is difficult to trace, but I wouldn't go so far as to say impossible.  Netstumbler is way easier to trace, but it is a great tool for windows machines.  I'm about to install Kismet on a Compaq iPaq PDA, strangely enough.  Great tip, Kismet does rock.
Build a man a fire, and he'll be warm for a day. Set a man on fire, and he'll be warm for the rest of his life.

You're completely right yes.
I think there's a huge market for a program with the capabilities and gui of netstumbler but with the passive capabilities of kismet.
Easier said than done though.

Back slightly on topic, not a wierd location exactly but I was surprised at just how many people use wireless AP's. I didn't think wireless was that widely integrated into our culture but it really is. A short drive from my home town to a nearby town found well over 200 AP's, most of which were unsecured too.

True, true.  Though, the difference between a secured and an unsecured wireless network is 3 minutes.
Build a man a fire, and he'll be warm for a day. Set a man on fire, and he'll be warm for the rest of his life.

Depending on how much you know what you're doing :P

Unfortunately I don't get a laptop for about another year. Though when I do it's going to be a decent one and have a decent wireless NIC too.

It takes me longer than 3 minutes just to read the instructions on what i'm doing and work out all the commands :D

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