Unauthorised Wireless Network Access Attempts in Western Australia

Free and legally accessible wireless networks around metropolitan areas of the world are becoming a common occurrence. This is theoretically enabling end-users to conform to "always-online" societal behaviours, whilst reducing the financial burden of using their purchased data. The availability of freely accessible wireless networks may encompass a number of security questions such as, can the wireless network be trusted, is the transmitted data stored or compromised, and do freely accessible wireless networks set a precedence for end-users to consciously attempt to connect to any or all wireless networks in their vicinity? This ethically approved research project was a proof of concept study aimed to assess end-users who would consciously disregard unauthorised access notifications in favour of connecting to an open wireless network. The results of this research indicate that despite the repeated notifications and warnings, end-users still attempted to connect to the wireless network and would immediately attempt to access third party websites or services.