[unisog] Open access wireless service

[Peter Van Epp]

On Thu, Jan 22, 2009 at 11:06:40AM -0700, Trevor Odonnal wrote:
> My superiors are interested in gathering some data concerning what other universities are providing open access guest wireless services on their campuses.  It would be helpful to us if we could enlist your input on the following questions.
> 
> 1. Does your university provide an open access Wifi system for guests on campus?
> 

	No. We do offer an Eduroam SSID however so if your home campus (any
where in the world) supports eduroam then you can log in via your home site
credentials and get guest access. Alternately someone on campus can sponsor 
a temporary guest account (although idengines, who makes the software was 
sold to Nortel and their future is uncertain so I don't know the current 
status of that going forward). 

> 2. If so, does it have encryption of any kind setup?
> 

	Eduroam uses several flavors of WPA.

> 3.  Do you use a third-party subscription service such as Boingo, or do you have your own subscription service, or no subscription required?
> 

	No, although we have had discussions with a hotspot provider (more for
hotspot access for our community but it would have gone both ways).

> 4. If you don't require any authentication/subscription, how does your University feel about the risk of providing an anonymous platform that can be used for illegal activity?  Have they accepted the risk?  Do they not feel the risk is great enough to mitigate?
> 

	Thats why we don't offer unauthenticated services, we have enough 
excitment with authenticated users getting copyright complaints (although it
is easier in Canada as the RIAA et. al. haven't managed to successfully sue
anyone as far as I'm aware).

> Many thanks in advance to those who respond.
> 
> ---------------------------------
> Trevor O'Donnal CISSP, CCFE, GREM
> Security Analyst
> Brigham Young University
> trevoro at byu.edu
> 

Peter Van Epp / Operations and Technical Support 
Simon Fraser University, Burnaby, B.C. Canada