Harringay, Haringey - So Good they Spelt it Twice!
If Virgin Media Provides your Wifi, Your Router is Available to the Public
I was surprised to learn today that for a while now our routers have been made part of Virgin's public wifi network. Yes, that's right the router in your living room is probably available to any passing Virgin customer as part of a wider public network.
It may be that our area is not yet included. If it is, perhaps Virgin informed me in a footnote of regular email or letter. Either way, I certainly have no memory of being sent any communication which flagged to me that my router is part of a public network.
As far as data security is concerned, Virgin say:
Virgin Media WiFi uses a separate connection on your Hub to access the internet than the one used by your home broadband network. This keeps the data from your home network completely separate from Virgin Media WiFi traffic.
I found a Which? article which seems to have bought into Virgin’s reassurances and concludes says that we shouldn't really be concerned.
But even if you trust Virgin's intentions, can we be sure that the technical skills of the company (or those of hackers) will keep us secure.
I'm happy to contribute to the public good, but I'm not sure quite how necessary it is for someone walking past my house to have wifi access. I'm certainly not sure how secure it is. So I've used Virgin's opt-out option. For the time being, until more is known, I'll stay opted-out. Read more about the opt-out option on Virgin's website here.
Tags for Forum Posts: virgin media
Replies to This Discussion
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Permalink Reply by Annabel Gregory on
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Thanks for useful info.
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Permalink Reply by 0l7ft44vlytse on
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BT do this also, you can disable it via your account: http://bt.custhelp.com/app/answers/detail/a_id/12958/~/how-do-i-opt...
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Permalink Reply by Jane on
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I HATE Virgin's websites - they make me want to change supplier. 'My profile' takes ages to find, now I can't find the option to opt out. Beyond frustrating, its so unintuitive. When I find it, I will opt out though so thanks for this information.
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Permalink Reply by Maddy on
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Thanks, Hugh - I've also opted out. To access my Virgin account I have to use my late husband's (defunct) email address with my own password - he's been dead for 14 years but apparently they are unable to change it....
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Permalink Reply by John McMullan on
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There are so many overlapping wifi networks around. With the whopping great 100Mbps that Virgin provide I'm sure we could do sever houses on one account. The trick would be to use the Virgin router in modem mode and attach a decent powered wifi router. Manage a network per household and get your internet for 1/5 the price, if you get on with your neighbours.
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Thank you for this information. I was informed about this by Virgin a couple of years ago but was not told that I had an option to opt out. I got a letter from them and they told me everyone was going to be added and I was also told that it would not affect my account. After several speed issues I noticed that on doing a WiFi check there appeared a separate my Virgin in the list. I contact them as I believed that this was causing my network issues. They denied this but again didn’t tell me I could opt out. Thanks to you I have now opted out as per your guide. Virgin Media should be more clear on this. I don’t pay for others to use my WiFi and certainly I don’t believe it can be 100% safe.
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Permalink Reply by Justin Guest on
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Thanks for that Hugh. I was completely unaware of this, and have opted out.
I cannot truly believe that the brains in Virgin are any better than those that are working out how to hack Virgin's routers in Russia/N Korea/China/Wood Green (take your pick). Good luck protecting themselves under the new GDPR regulation when the first cases of hacking surfaces...
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Permalink Reply by Jane Bain on
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Thank you for this valuable information Hugh. I have just opted out.
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