Wardriving why

Antennas are crucial to attackers carrying out a wardriving attack. The attacker mounts an antenna to their vehicle then moves around an area to identify vulnerable networks. Wi-Fi networks operate in the 2. Attackers have a wide range of antennas to choose from, such as omnidirectional antennas that pick up signals from all directions. Bluetooth operates on the 2.

Attackers can use Bluetooth to capture data being broadcast by insecure, vulnerable devices. Bluetooth is likely to become a growing focus of wardriving attacks due to the growth of automation. The wardriving process itself is not dangerous, but if hackers gain unauthorized access to a Wi-Fi network, they could access any computer, laptop, or mobile device connected to it.

The attacker may also carry out illegal activity using the network, such as broader identity theft attacks , that could lead to financial loss or result in the network owner being charged with criminal acts. There are no laws that specifically say wardriving is illegal. There is no law against gathering or collecting data from wireless networks or creating computer-generated maps.

However, attackers can use the process to exploit insecure networks, which creates a gray area around protecting personal privacy. Wardriving can be dangerous and illegal when it involves accessing private and corporate networks.

Street View was used for wardriving by Google, which used equipment to locate local-area networks LANs , wireless hotspots, and home Wi-Fi networks. Truth be told, he was not the first person to ever drive around looking for wifi networks, however he was the first one to automate the process with wardriving software and GPS. He is a network security-type guy and has done quite a bit to raise awareness about the subject.

Check out his whole profile here. As I mentioned, not all wifi connections originate from private homes but actually offered to the public free of charge by local businesses or the localities themselves.

These cases are obviously legal and encouraged. The doubts arise when you use wardriving tools to connect to someone else's private network. This whole topic seems confusing and definitely depends on where you are.

I did, however find a very thorough article on the subject and although it dates back a few years, I think it still sheds some insight. It comes down to a few different laws that may or may not be too outdated to cover such a topic. First of all, unauthorized access to a computer may be illegal in your area and yes, this includes things such as routers, etc.

If the connection is unsecured and there is nothing telling you that you're not allowed to access it, is it truly unauthorized? Study this topic out before going too far with wardriving. The other legal issue is that of theft of services. Since the service provider only sold service to the owner of the wifi network and not you -- who is at fault, the owner who is sharing or you the wardriver?

These things must also be studied out. NOTE: The term "wardriving" comes from "wardialing," a systematic method of dialing phone numbers in search of modems popularized in the movie WarGames. The definition of Wardriving on this page is an original TechTerms. If you would like to reference this page or cite this definition, you can use the green citation links above.

The goal of TechTerms. We strive for simplicity and accuracy with every definition we publish. If you have feedback about the Wardriving definition or would like to suggest a new technical term, please contact us. Want to learn more tech terms? You are shocked. How this could have happened? Well, that car you hardly noticed a few days ago was the problem. Your home Wi-Fi was in the crosshairs of a wardriving attack. Matthew Broderick starred in a movie called War Games back in At one point in the movie, he uses a computer to dial multiple phone numbers to identify a working modem.

This was called wardialing, and wardriving is essentially seen as an evolution of this process. Also known as access point mapping, the objective behind wardriving is to identify vulnerable Wi-Fi networks that can be easily exploited.

Wardriving has been around for a long time. Computer security researcher and consultant Pete Shipley coined the term wardriving way back in Since then, there has been a dramatic increase in the use of wireless networks, meaning wardriving as an attack technique has come into its own and also become quite popular.