What to do about your hotel's hacked WiFi

3 days ago
2 min read

This week Microsoft published an extensive article detailing how Russian Hackers have infiltrated hotel, airport and conference center WiFi networks across the globe. Known as Midnight Blizzard, the group has been able to successfully snoop and re-direct connected guests to successfully steal Microsoft 365 accounts by using fake login pages and verification prompts that look completely legitimate.

The attacks aren't just targeting WiFi connected laptops, but phones, particularly Android devices where a malicious installer installs remote, back-door access to your cell phone.

The Takeaway

According to researchers, AI has a lot to do with why Midnight Blizzard has been so successful. It's no surprise considering OpenAI's recent HuggingFace incident and now with the latest Meta AI jailbreak attack. All of us are going to be subjected to more sophisticated cyber attacks than ever.

For now however, there is a possibility that if you connect your device to a hotel, airport or conference center's WiFi then bad actors could be monitoring and manipulating what you're doing. If you don't feel like reading that long, technical article, here is a summary of Microsoft's recommendations:

When traveling, treat hotel, conference, airport and other guest wireless networks as untrustworthy.
Use private connectivity such as mobile hotspots, satellite and eSIM-based cellular connections.
If you need to connect to trusted corporate infrastructure, consider suing enterprise-managed travel routers or hotspot devices that establish encrypted runnels back to trusted corporate infrastructure before accessing sensitive resources.
Avoid downloading software updates, certificates, browser updates, network troubleshooting tools, or security utilities presented through captive portals or other unexpected pop-up messages or web prompts.

Stay safe out there.

-Attila

New Friday Funnies!

What do Russians call a bad Wi-Fi connection?

Inter-niet.

Why did the router blush?

It saw the devices connecting.

Why should you buy a WiFi enabled espresso machine?

To get the latest Java updates.

Where can you find working WiFi in hell?

At the hotspots.

What can you do when the Internet at home goes down?