p2p news / p2pnet:- It`s getting harder and harder to surf safely. Everyone wants to know your ID with the lust to sell you more of what you don`t want behind just about every plan to find out who, and where, you are.

Yesterday, William Keeley described how to set up a FreeWan.

Frequent comment poster Tony over in Australia has a few thoughts on the subject.

Read on >>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>

Quoted from the FreeWan article, “But if FreeWan becomes popular enough, it could easily replace the cartel and government controlled internet of today.”

I’m not certain about other countries, but in Oz there are government departments that regulate what parts of the frequency “spectrum” are used by who, and what for. I’ve taken a quick look around the website for the Oz govt department responsible, and there’s legislation already in place governing wlans, and while currently there wouldn’t be a need to apply and pay for a license to run a freewan, I’m sure that if freewans started costing big biz any money, this “flaw” would be rectified very fast.

Anyone interested can look at www.acma.gov.au and search under wlan licensing etc.

If you’re in Oz, remember that the Oz govt also likes to backdate legislation when it suits them. You might find yourself running a freewan legally (at the time!) for several years, then have the oz govt change the laws and backdate them to before you started it up! Then they could tell you that you were acting illegally all along. Backdating of laws has been done and, incredibly, there’s no outrage among Aussies when it happens.

In real terms, it means nothing you do in Oz is ever legal because while it might be legal at the time you’re doing it, there’s nothing stopping the Oz government from changing its mind after the fact, turning you into a criminal. I’m astounded big biz puts up with this, but I guess they figure they’ve got “friends” in government who’ll “protect them” from sudden changes to law, tho I’m sure bigger biz’s could always be tempted to pressure the government into back-dating laws that would decrease competition on them from smaller biz’s.

Also keep in mind, those countries where governments actively block external broadcasts from reaching into their territories would also probably resort to “wardriving” looking for transmitters. Remember, triangulation of transmissions would allow them to find the transceiver within minutes. Since everyone on a freewan would have to have a transceiver, everyone who’s on the freewan at the time would be findable.

Also, since they only have to receive the signals to do the triangulation, it means it’d be impossible to detect them doing it too.

Short of looking out for vans with antennae on the roof, I don’t know how you’d spot them coming. So unless you can get very directional transceivers that the authorities would have to somehow fluke wandering in the path of, I don’t believe it’d be possible to hide a freewan (or any wlan) from them.

And no I don’t think the so called “cantennas” count for this. While I’m sure they do concentrate the signals a bit leading to greater ranges, the problem is that radio frequency spreads out as it goes. Think of it like ripples in a still pool of water. While the cans would inhibit the spreading, it’d only happen until the end of the can. I think a 100 metre long can leading from your house to your mate’s might be a bit of a giveaway too ;o)

But if you’re located not too far away from your freewan mates, you could try running lan cables buried just under the ground. According to the cat5 specs I found on the net, ethernet cables have a max rated distance of 100 metres from end to end. So you could have a chain of ppl connected by lan cables hooked up to their own switches or routers, and everyone in the chain could be up to 100 metres apart.

As long as nothing breaks (or chews on!) the cables you’d be right, and since lan cables are designed to reduce leakage (being buried would probly help too) they should be harder for anyone to detect from any kind of distance away. It’s just the expense of several hundred metres of lan cables would be considerable. Most computer stores don’t stack premade cables much more than 10m long, so you might have to get it from a wholesaler.

Hmmm tho I just found a link to a website called tigerdirect.com which sells a 500ft roll with 50 connectors that you could make a few very long cables out of, for only $59, tho I guess that’s probably US pricing. I guess you’d have to compare it to buying wireless transceivers to see how it works out for you, and if you’re no longer spending money on net access I guess it would pay for itself eventually.

Here’s the direct link to the page if you’re interested, tho I recommend you keep some limited net access, just to visit this website if nothing else ;o)

Wouldn’t want to put poor Jon out of a job would you?

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First they ignore you, then they laugh at you, then they fight you, then you win
- Mohandas Gandhi

See:-
FreeWan – FreeWans: highways to the future, September 24, 2005

This entry was posted on Sunday, September 25th, 2005 at 5:45 pm and is filed under Uncategorized. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.

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