I wouldn't be concerned about what they can or cannot do. I would be concerned that its possible that a unsecured WiFi is intentionally setup as such by someone that wants to attermpt to gain access to any info you may have. If you were just surfing the net on a unsecure connection...no big deal. However, if your accessing info on your computer concerning financial or very private info... Why take the chance when you have other solutions for a backup secure connection? Mark
Do any of you guys who are computer experts know whether or not a Verizon wireless card is secure? It is impossible to get a straight answer out of Verizon. But it seems that at least part of the transmission is through the airwaves, and thus could be vulnerable. For this reason I have always avoided or limited my use of any wireless connection to access sensitive info such as bkge accounts -- including the secure wireless connection in my own home. Am I being ridiculously over-cautious? Also, I have found the Verizon wireless card (which supposedly works at 'broadband' speed) to be far to slow to do anything except close out a trade in an emergency. Frequently it is unable to bring up a complete chart.
My friend purchased the following unlimited plan from sprint: http://www.sprint.com/business/products/products/pcsVisionPlan_tabA.html http://www.sprint.com/business/products/phoneCategories/connectionCards_phones.html it works really good and the best thing is Verizon doesn't have a real unlimited wireless plan; "If more than 5 GB/line/month are used, we presume use is for non-permitted uses and reserve the right to terminate service immediately". http://solutions.vzwshop.com/bba/pricing.htm I'm not sure about the level of security and encryption methods used in their wireless network, but I believe it should be much better then regular home wireless networks.
I'm pretty sure there are a lot of tools that can be used to sniff data passing through a network. http://sectools.org/ A famous, not the best but easy to use tool also stated on the above website can be found here http://www.oxid.it/cain.html this tool can also crack the wireless access key we use to secure our home wireless networks by sniffing packets and analyzing them --------------------- http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Packet_sniffer
EVDO Security : http://articles.techrepublic.com.com/5100-1009-6004489.html Short answer: Definitely more secure then WiFi but any wireless connection is subject to attacks, its just a question of how much time/effort someone wants to spend defeating it. I've never heard of an EVDO connection being hacked. Regarding EVDO Terms of Service with respect to streaming data: "Unlimited NationalAccess/BroadbandAccess services cannot be used (1) for uploading, downloading or streaming of movies, music or games, (2) with server devices or with host computer applications, including, but not limited to, Web camera posts or broadcasts, automatic data feeds, Voice over IP (VoIP), automated machine-to-machine connections, or peer-to-peer (P2P) file sharing, or (3) as a substitute or backup for private lines or dedicated data connections. " I'm pretty sure streaming quote data is covered by either "automatic data feeds" or "dedicated data connections". According to this article from Robert Cringely (and other posts I've read about EVDO) http://www.pbs.org/cringely/pulpit/2006/pulpit_20060928_000980.html if you go over the unpublished monthly bandwidth limit they will cancel you. If your sales person told you its ok make sure you get that in writing.
that's the same thing that others with one of those famous retail brokers said, when they stole his account... search on this and see the threads on this topic.... also, unless you can "trap and trace" the line, you really aren't saving anything, just pick up the phone and call your broker directly, forgot that one, huh?
like I stated before, Sprint wireless is much better then Verizon ... Verizon is a loser in the long term ... it's like BankofAmerica expensive with no customer service ... same thing goes with Fidelity ... anyhow you get real unlimited internet with Sprint wireless, or at least at a higher limit point http://www.sprint.com/business/products/products/pcsVisionPlan_tabA.html