Hotel Wi-Fi Susceptible to Hackers, FTC Official Says

Security vulnerabilities in hotel Wi-Fi networks are being exploited by hackers to steal people’s passwords and other sensitive information, Carol Kando-Pineda, counsel for the FTC's Consumer & Business Education Division, wrote in a blog post Wednesday. If using a public network is necessary, Kando-Pineda recommended taking precautions such as ensuring personal information or login information is used only on websites that are fully encrypted, using a different password on different websites, logging out once leaving a website, paying attention to Web browser alerts and keeping browser and security software up to date. “If you regularly need to access online accounts through public Wi-Fi networks, you may want to use a virtual private network,” she wrote.