Windows 10: How safe is the Windows 10 Wi-Fi sharing feature?

Source

 

I have WiFi sense turned on on my phone, but never seen the point of it

my home network tells me its secure and not sharable
the same with public wifi hotspots I have set up, they are not shareable

:)

 

Internet sharing doesn't work

Give this method a try:

https://4sysops.com/archives/how-to-share-wi-fi...

References Windows 8, but should work for Windows 10, too.

 

WiFi Sense is a security risk

http://windows.microsoft.com/en-us/windows-10/wi-fi-sense-faq

To share Wi‑Fi network access with your contacts

• 
  Go to Start
  
  , then select
  Settings > Network & Internet > Wi‑Fi >
  Manage Wi‑Fi settings.
  
• 
  Turn on Connect to networks shared by my contacts.
  
  When this option is turned on, you'll be able to do two things—automatically get connected to password-protected Wi‑Fi networks your contacts share with you, and select Wi‑Fi networks to share with your contacts by using Wi‑Fi Sense.
  
• 
  Select one or more of these check boxes—Outlook.com contacts,
  Skype contacts, or Facebook friends—depending on which groups of contacts you want to share networks with.
  
• 
  When you connect to a password-protected Wi‑Fi network later on, select the
  Share network with my contacts check box if you want to share that network.
  
  For contacts in the group or groups you chose, Microsoft will share access to that network if they're using Wi‑Fi Sense on a PC that’s running
  Windows 10 or phone that’s running Windows 10 Mobile. It can be a few days between the time you share the network and the time your contacts get connected to it.
  
  To share Wi‑Fi network access with Outlook.com contacts, they need to be in your address book and you need to be in theirs.
  

 

Hmm, I am not sure I totally understand the connecting it does.

Is the article saying, it is going to connect to any open wifi network without your knowledge?

One the local news a person got in trouble for using a restaurants wifi by sitting in the parking lot and not ordering anything to eat. He was charged with unauthorized access or something to that effect.

Is there a way to disable Microsoft Sense, without having to disable wifi device?

 

The ISPs in my area can charge such an action as theft of services and both the legitimate subscriber and the "hijacker" could be charged. A motel in my town had to secure their wireless router with a password when they found people were setting on the off-ramp beside their building/parking area and using Internet services.

 

The legitimate subscriber could be charge how would that be possible or even legal? Unlike here in the forums there are some people that don't know much about computers. I could see issues with Microsoft Sense causing problem by connecting to any wifi network. I figured how to disable it. As added protection since I don't use wifi, I disabled the wifi driver in device manager.

 

I've had this on my phone and see no benefit to this feature as I have wifi or LTE available at all times. If my friends come over and they deserve to know my wifi password, they'll get it.

It's probably just best to leave it off unless you need the features it provides, but it's of no concern or risk to me as an option for those that do.

 

The issue isn't with sharing your WiFi access with friends. The issue is that MS will store your access point's password on their server and gives the password to people on your contact lists in Outlook, Facebook, etc.. While this requires your friend to have the WiFi Sense and location services on the Windows Phone, I am not certain for the requirement for Windows 10 OS. At the very least, they'd need the location service enabled on their laptop/tablet to get the password from MS to connect to your WiFi router.

Why this is actually an issue? Because of this:

The default settings as always...

This quote from the article made me laugh:

Really? *Roflmao2*Roflmao2*Roflmao2 After turning Windows 10 cloud based, deep integration with Bing/Cortana, soon to be followed by Office 2016, you are going to worry about what MS will learn from WiFi sharing? You've got to be kidding... *sarc*sarc*sarc