BT Fon - is it safe?

Tazzfalcon · 10 Feb 2013 at 17:07

I've just moved into a new place and am having to resort to using BT Fon (crazy prices) for a week or so. I'm already logged on so the damage is probably done BUT...

Does anyone know if BT Fon is generally safe?

Any quick and free precautions I should take. I'm using Windows 8 PC and android phone & tablet primarily.

Cheers

Deleted member 77746 · 10 Feb 2013 at 17:15

Safe as in what?

Tazzfalcon · 10 Feb 2013 at 18:20

Secure, BT suggest using a VPN for openzone but the free one they offer apparently won't work with FON.

bertles86 · 10 Feb 2013 at 18:21

As safe as any other public network.

Performance wise its crap too, it drops connection 24/7.

teenwolf · 10 Feb 2013 at 18:23

i have used it before.
speed is slow but never any security issues.

KIA · 10 Feb 2013 at 18:23

Anyone can snoop on your traffic if it isn't encrypted. BT access points don't use encryption.

Scotty123 · 10 Feb 2013 at 19:01

Been using it for two months now to play guild wars 2 whilst I wait for my infinity. It's been okay. Get about 300k/sec download speeds. It goes laggy when the owner of the router is downloading. Fortunately there's about 6 networks around here, so I hop onto another

.

I use the BT VPN thing they recommend. It works with BTWiFi and BTWifi with Fon networks for me.

englishpremier · 14 Jul 2013 at 11:29

How does Fon work when it's people connected to your router? Can they see your shared files and networked computers?

KIA · 14 Jul 2013 at 11:44

englishpremier said:
How does Fon work when it's people connected to your router? Can they see your shared files and networked computers?

Nope. It's a separate network.

englishpremier · 14 Jul 2013 at 12:09

Every BT router has this turned on, so randoms can connect with their Fon, openzone or other credentials.

So router somehow separates out the fon/openzone stuff, from my home connection. Does that mean that the router has two external IPs?

House · 14 Jul 2013 at 13:39

Don't know, but I turned it off when my neighbours all started using my network over theirs when I got fibre. I heard one of them saying they could get faster connection on my router than their own, free loading *******s. I didn't even know about it being on by default

KIA · 14 Jul 2013 at 17:44

House said:
Don't know, but I turned it off when my neighbours all started using my network over theirs when I got fibre. I heard one of them saying they could get faster connection on my router than their own, free loading *******s. I didn't even know about it being on by default

I tried my neighbours Infinity FON and was limited to 1.5Mb/s.

kh85 · 14 Jul 2013 at 18:19

House said:
Don't know, but I turned it off when my neighbours all started using my network over theirs when I got fibre. I heard one of them saying they could get faster connection on my router than their own, free loading *******s. I didn't even know about it being on by default

got the bt infinity home hub 4, can you disable bt FON in there, or do you have to call BT directly?

TheVoice · 14 Jul 2013 at 18:31

kh85 said:
got the bt infinity home hub 4, can you disable bt FON in there, or do you have to call BT directly?

You need to log-in to the BT Fon website, opt-out, wait a few hours (or a day) and then reset your HomeHub to factory settings. That should disable it.

kh85 · 14 Jul 2013 at 18:47

TheVoice said:
You need to log-in to the BT Fon website, opt-out, wait a few hours (or a day) and then reset your HomeHub to factory settings. That should disable it.

ah, does every BT subscriber automatically have BT FON enabled then?

englishpremier · 14 Jul 2013 at 21:31

If you disable Fon, then you won't be able to take advantage of using Fon site when out and about in the world.

Brummies · 14 Jul 2013 at 22:00

kh85 said:
ah, does every BT subscriber automatically have BT FON enabled then?

Yes

I'm also pretty sure you can disable/opt out BT FON via the homehub settings directly.. I did mine this way.

KIA · 15 Jul 2013 at 15:17

englishpremier said:
If you disable Fon, then you won't be able to take advantage of using Fon site when out and about in the world.

I have it disabled and I'm able to use BT WiFi & FON.

englishpremier · 15 Jul 2013 at 21:02

Freeloader

I tried installing the Cicso VPN that BT recommend but i keep getting error 51 on my mac