What is better? A password protected Wi-Fi or a digital certificate?

Today, the line between online and offline continues to blur. No matter where we are, we navigate the Web to search for information, to communicate, to entertain or to connect to social platforms. So, we often use Wi-Fi networks without being aware of our options in order to ensure data security while browsing the Web.
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Choose smart: navigate the Web through a secure public Wi-Fi network

Wi-Fi networks are a fast effective way to connect to the Internet through a wireless connection. In the last years, the popularity of these networks has expanded very much, and therefore, they are available and used, both in public areas (e.g. parks, coffee houses, and in private space (at home).

The main benefit of Wi-Fi networks is that they ensure fast login to Internet for all devices located in the coverage area, through radio waves. However, this becomes also the main harm when the Wi-Fi network does not operate using effective and proper methods to secure information for the users.

My data password

When we use a wireless router to access the Internet at the office or at home, usually, we protect the wireless network with a password.

This password is used by the device to encrypt the data transferred through radio waves between a smartphone, tablet or laptop, and the wireless router.

Imagine that this password is like a key for access, both for the connection with the wireless router, as well as for the data transferred through radio waves, between the devices and the router. Therefore, if we have the “key”, we can “lock” our data, but please pay attention, at the same time, we can “unlock” all data which are communicated by the router to other devices.

Every time we give this password to a user we expand the circle of trust through we transfer on a daily basis, sensitive data, such as passwords, emails, authentication data for different accounts etc. Even if this method is relatively safe when used at home or even at the office, things are not the same when we related to a public Wi-Fi network.

“Please tell me, which is the Wi-Fi network password?”

When we browse the Web using the password protected Wi-Fi in a coffeehouse, we believe that our data is safe. It is good to know that, in this case, our personal data is as public as the password used to protect it. The password is available for free to any customer of the coffeehouse.

A hacker might sit at the table next to us and “unlock” all information transferred by us through radio waves to the wireless router, using the password provided to the clients of the coffeehouse, to all customers who want to navigate on the Web.

A public password protected Wi-Fi network is as secure as a password free Wi-Fi network

Protecting the wireless router of a public network with a password is useful only to limit the number of the connections to the customers of that coffeehouse and cancels any impact on information security given the fact that the password is public.

The solution for a public secure Wi-Fi network: .HOT-SPOT.RO SECURE

Hot-Spot.ro service provides free Internet access by a public Wi-Fi network. In order to handle the information security issue we provide two types of connection with a different level of security:

  1. .HOT-SPOT.RO connection is not secure and provides Internet access by an unencrypted data transfer. We recommend you to use this connection only to configure .HOT-SPOT.RO SECURE connection or to access information which is not sensitive, acting fully aware of the security issues. The security of the personal data transferred in the authentication process is
    connection with our portal.
  2. .HOT-SPOT.RO SECURE connection is accessed and encrypted based on a private digital certificate. Each user has a single digital certificate. What are the benefits in comparison with a regular password? Each user operates a single private key with a predefined availability (usually 2 years), which is used in the process of authentication, encryption and decryption of the data transferred to the wireless router. This single key cannot be used to decrypt data transferred by other devices that use a different digital certificate.