Free McDonald's WiFi beginning in 2010[

[zorba anton]

Free McDonald's WiFi beginning in 2010

Written by Nicholas Huber
Saturday, 19 December 2009 04:49

Source:

http://www.geeksmack.net/internet/898-free-mcdonalds-wifi-beginning-in-2010.html

Beginning in 2010, McDonald?s fast food restaurants will be removing the fee for WiFi Internet access nationwide, thus making it one of the largest providers of free WiFi access in the United States.Research shows that customers have ?constantly asked for? the free access, said one of the fast food chain?s officals, and those customers spent more on food.

A rough estimate of 11,000 of the 13,000 plus U.S. locations will begin to offer the free WiFi service under a partnership created between McDonald?s and AT&T.

"We're excited about it," said David Groom, McDonald?s chief information officer in the U.S.. "One thing our customers have told us is: 'We like your Wi-Fi, but would you make it free?' This is one thing they've consistently asked for. It's just another reason to come to McDonald's."


The best part about receiving the free WiFi service is that you do not have to buy anything from McDonald?s. "Free is free," Groom said in a statement with The Dallas Morning News.

Groom told the newspaper publication that research financed by his company showed that consumers would spend more on food if they could surf the Web.

As of right now, the AT&T already offers free access to its WiFi network at public hotspots like Starbucks, McDonald?s and several other places.

The U.S. currently has more public WiFi hotspots than any other country and the figures are still increasing every day, with more users from smartphones than actual laptop computers.

While I do not advocate eating out at fast food restaurants, I do advocate the use of free WiFi. So go use it! But make sure you wait until the first of the new year, because McDonald?s currently charges you $2.95 for 2 hours of access.

Source:

http://www.geeksmack.net/internet/898-free-mcdonalds-wifi-beginning-in-2010.html

[ianmac]

McDonald's WiFi has been free in the UK, for a long time..

--- Ian ---

[zorba anton]

McDonald's WiFi has been free in the UK, for a long time..

--- Ian ---

Really? I was wondering how it would work at McDonald's here. I don't use my WiFi much when I'm out of the house, except when I'm doing repairs.

[HoTTDubbER]

never mind mc ds alot of our BT phone boxs have free wifi also

[tshirtman]

your obliged to buy something at macs to use free wi-fi, because macs change the wap key daily you have to ask at the counter for new key.

[opsmonkey]

i'm on O2 with an iPhone.. so i get free wifi from The Cloud which is in every McD's

[ianmac]

never mind mc ds alot of our BT phone boxs have free wifi also

Didn't know that, how does that work out m8?

[HoTTDubbER]

Didn't know that, how does that work out m8?

the phone boxs have a wifi zone sticker on them

they used 2 be free , u just get near phone box and pick up the unsecured network

they are only in the Nottingham city centrer where i live
not sure about other places ,

ive just read up and it appears they're starting to charge for it now

but when they was trialling it was 100% free

heres the details
Premium hotspots

Get BT Openzone Wi-Fi access as and when you need it in premium locations throughout the UK.

With BT Openzone you can connect at over 700,000 UK and Ireland locations including those provided by the BT FON Wi-Fi Community. We've partnered with many high street names to bring you wireless internet access in many locations including: hotels, caf?s/coffee shops, railway stations, conference centres, exhibition venues, law courts, shopping areas, airport lounges and terminals and motorway service stations.
UK wireless internet access

[HoTTDubbER]

no i just looked its still free but you have to register for it

It doesn't cost a thing for BT Total Broadband customers to become members of BT FON. Joining the community is simple and within moments you'll have access to hundreds of thousands of Wi-Fi Hotspots worldwide.

From the middle of December '09 all new and recontracting BT Total Broadband customers will be automatically opted into BT FON meaning you can use your Wi-Fi minutes as soon as your Broadband is set up. Existing customers who have taken the service since March 2009 will already be members of BT FON unless they have opted out.

https://www.bt.com/wifi/secure/index.do?s_cid=con_FURL_btfon

hope this helps

[HoTTDubbER]

i thought this was interesting also thought id share
Thursday 29 October 2009 16.18 GMT
Watchdog finds public Wi-Fi hotspots open to hackers

Connections provided by the UK's top three Wi-Fi networks - BT Openzone, The Cloud, and T-Mobile - are all vulnerable to attack by hackers, leaving people at risk of fraud, according to BBC's Watchdog.

In a programme due to air on Thursday night, it claims that the thousands of hotspots available nationwide - in hotels, trains, airport lounges and high street food outlets - are less safe than they appear.

Watchdog said that it

used equipment readily available on the internet to hijack wireless traffic at a variety of hotspots, while experts working with the programme-makers could have been able to take control of other hotspot users' internet accounts. Once inside these accounts, malicious hackers would have then been able to harvest masses of personal data which could enable them to access the users' accounts on a variety of websites, including those for shopping and banking.

The form of the attack has not been specified, though it may be what is known as a "man-in-the-middle" attack, where a hacker sets up a personal hotspot and gives it the same name as the official one, while routing traffic through it to the official system. As the internet traffic is transmitted through the hacker's hotspot, the details it contains - including credit card and other information - can be captured.

According to Tom Illube, chief executive of internet security firm Garlik, over the last year there has been a tripling in "account takeover fraud, where criminals try and access existing accounts rather than using stolen identities. In light of this he thinks the vulnerability of Wi-Fi hotspots is worrying.

Illube said: "I think a lot of people don't realise that using public Wi-Fi that's insecure is pretty much like writing your bank details onto a postcard and popping it in the post and being surprised that someone's read it."

Watchdog asked 'Crimewatch' presenter and former policeman Rav Wilding to set up an email account on a laptop at a wireless hotspot. The 'Watchdog' team was able to access Rav's email within seconds before freezing him out of his account altogether. So although Rav was no longer able to use his email, the team still had full access to it.

The Watchdog team was also able to access the email accounts of two members of the Watchdog audience, viewing everything the users were doing online, including their email and social networking activities.

Illube said: "You don't have to be a super hacker to get into this sort of information and therefore it's becoming more widespread and we as consumers need to be more careful about how we use them and what we use them for."

One way to protect Wi-Fi connections at public hotspots is to use a Virtual Private Network or VPN, which creates an encrypted "tunnel" between the source computer and the destination site. That prevents any tapping of the data en route. Although BT Openzone, The Cloud and T-Mobile all suggest using VPNs, only T-Mobile offer them as a software download when users log on.

The three providers told the programme that they would do more to encourage the use of VPNs to protect Wi-Fi users.

BT Openzone said they were reviewing their "proactive approach to providing secure and user friendly authentication". T-Mobile have now revised the wording on their hotspot homepage to emphasise use of VPNs and The Cloud say that they will make their information on security more easily accessible and are looking at how VPN technology can be developed in the future.

[.neo.]

Hmmm... Interesting post HotDubber.
Me personally.... WiFi should be supplied free by local councils.... but then again I aint even got a wheelie bin here in Brum so free anything is FAR off!!!

[johnboy1974]

its got nothing to do with what their customers want. burger king has been rolling out free wi-fi in their scottish restaurants for the past year.

[ianmac]

Thanx for all the info "HoTTDubbER", I will have a good look @ the info & see if it is in my area,

I too am the same as "opsmonkey" on O2 with an iPhone.. & get free wifi from The Cloud + McD's ect, but I also use my laptop outside McD's in the summer, so will be looking into the security issues that you pointed out,
I do have a good firewall that can put the public WiFi points into it's "public network setting mode" & will have to look @ how secure my data is in that mode.

Thanx again

-- Ian--

[chroma]

The McDonnalds near me doesnt use any encryption, its only 2 miles from my froont door and i can access it wth a homebrew antenna.

Asda uses WEP, as does Tesco's and Morrisons for their guns, WEP is easy to work around though, the downside is the connection is really slow 128k isdn.

Ive not seen a phonebox in years, so ive not tinkered with their wifi yet.