Unsecured Wireless: The Driver becomes the Hunted?

From: karavshin (anonymous_at_discussions.microsoft.com)
Date: 01/02/04 

Date: Thu, 1 Jan 2004 19:36:15 -0800

I've been enjoying my new Toshiba Tecra M1 laptop. This evening I was experimenting with one of its powerful components, its Centrino wireless card. I live in a condominium complex which is also adjacent to an industrial estate. When I went war driving in my living room I found at least a few networks, including one or two which were unsecured. From these I got an IP address and could surf the internet happily.

As I was browsing "My Network Places" I remarked on the large number of computers exposed to me. It started me wondering, "is my laptop secure in this environment? Am I falling for a honeypot by using this network?" Really, I don't know. I need to figure out "how do I secure my XP client computer from Shadow of Death when I am using a randomly-discovered wireless network" ?

Is it as simple as just turning on my firewall? Is there something I should do to hide the very existence of my client PC on that network? What else should I be concerned about?

I sort of know the answer, yes, there are lots of things to worry about. Anyone want to suggest the few fixes and precautions that stem eighty-percent of the danger?

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