Re: VPN service for personal devices

What you need to be careful is others on the same open network trying to access your computer. You should be running some sort of firewall and identify the network as a public network so the firewall will block all incoming requests. I taught my neighbor once upon a time by browsing his computer from his driveway and showing him is pictures using my laptop.


Chris Bipes
Director of Information Services
CrossCheck, Inc.



-----Original Message-----
From: PcTech [mailto:pctech-bounces@xxxxxxxxxxxx] On Behalf Of Dan
Sent: Wednesday, February 11, 2015 2:30 PM
To: PC Technical Discussion for IBM i (AS/400 and iSeries) Users
Subject: Re: [PCTECH] VPN service for personal devices

Scott, thanks for busting some bad preconceptions I've apparently had.
Maybe it's just old information, back when HTTPS was more the exception
than the norm, and you couldn't count on websites for which sensitive
information traversed back and forth utilized HTTPS. I do note which
websites use HTTPS and those that don't, and I wouldn't use a website that
doesn't use HTTPS on pages for which sensitive information is communicated.

Frankly, I don't (think I) really care if a snoop (ISP, hacker, whoever)
sees the names of the sites I visit. As long as they're not seeing the
content going either way, have at it. I would be willing to listen to
arguments as to why I should care, but my browsing habits are fairly
boring. I have no plans to overthrow the gubbermint, I have no plans to
take over the world, I'm not into illicit drugs, etc. So, I guess what
I've learned here is that HTTPS is all I need to be secure, even on open,
unsecured networks. (Of course, I've got anti-virus, anti-malware tools as
well.)