Preventing illegal use of wifi

Kerry-Phil0
Level 5
Healesville, Australia

Preventing illegal use of wifi

Apart from explicitly stating it in the house rules, does anyone have any suggestions to prevent guests using the WiFi for illegal purposes such as downloading movies or worse, accessing child pornography or something?

I'm really concerned that providing unlimited wifi will cause my husband and I some issues but at the same time understand how useful it is for guests to have free Internet access
26 Replies 26
Clare0
Level 10
Templeton, CA

@Kerry-Phil0 Many hosts have run into problems with guests over-using wifi and worse, downloading illegal content.  The only way to be secure that this doesn't happen is to contact your provider to see what alerts or limits you can set. 

David-and-Fiona0
Level 10
Panglao, Philippines

This can be done through your wifi router. If you are confident to play with the settings google the router name and access restrictions or user limits and you will find plenty of step by step guides. If you feel you are not 'geeky enough' reach out to a local tech service company and they should be able to do this for a feee. 

 

Good luck

 

D

Thanks for the suggestions!

 

I was hoping fellow hosts would say I was worrying for nothing but clearly not...

 

Will have a play around and see what  I can do. Ideally, I would like to set guests up on their own network if at all possible.

 

Thanks again

Ed-and-Hugh0
Level 10
Miami, FL

You can set your router to block peer to peer download. This will stop a lot, but not all, ilicit activity. You should definitely have a completely separate guest network for guests to use. They should never be on the same network as you. Most routers can be configured with a guest network. If you want to only allow "safe" sites, you can configure the router's DNS entry for OpenDNS. This is easy to do, and will only allow connections to family friendly sites. It's free too. Info at https://www.opendns.com/home-internet-security/ You may need a separate guest router for this to work, rather than just setting up a guest network on the same router that you are using, but it's not expensive, and easy to do.

 

 

Sherri31
Level 2
North Carolina, United States

Is there a specific router you recommend?  My guest suite only accommodates 2 people max.  It has a smart tv.

 

Thanks,

Sherri

Ed-and-Hugh0
Level 10
Miami, FL

You can configure your router's firewall to block peer to peer traffic. This will stop a lot of ilicit activity.

You can also configure the DNS entry on your router using OpenDNS. This will block any questionable sites. Instructions at https://store.opendns.com/setup/#/familyshield

Christine227
Level 2
Anaheim, CA

@Kerry-Phil0 - thank you so much for asking the question. We just ran into this issue for the first time after hosting for a year and half. Was really surprised by it (but shouldn't have been). 

 

Thanks to everyone else for all the suggestions. 

Danny9
Level 10
Palma, Spain

I am listing two independent housing units. I do not live on the premises of either unit. And indeed, both units are equipped with free, unlimited internet access. All of my guests are adults. Limiting their freedom to  the use of the family friendly sites would be hugely detrimental to my business. 

 

I have issued very clear House Rules banning downloading of illegal contents. I doubt that a host should go any further into limiting the freedoms and choices of their guests. 

 

Danny

 

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@Danna0

Are you joking? yes hosts should go further, I'm looking into this now because i just received a notice in my mail box today about an illegal file download "Secret life of Pets", download via p2p on Jan 4th.

If this keeps happening, hosts can get sued or your service provider can terminate your service.

And worse, if someone download child pornography on your network, and they are from some foreign country and left town already, then the host is left holding the bag, then you have to prove in court that you aren't a sicko.

I'm here now because i need to find ways to protect myself from this ever happening again.

Having this explicitly in my house rules didn't stop it, did it? Nope

Danny*

This just happened to me.  I received a notice from my provider of alleged copyright infringement.  Download via P2P on my IP address.  I am here too to figure out what to do because the consequences are severe!  I was completely naive about this wifi stuff!  thanks for sharing

Rarely do guests listen to rules, even when explained verbally they sometimes "forget."

 

It hasn't happened to you yet, but it's happened twice to me to the point that I've had to put restrictions on the wifi.

Shane15
Level 1
Marion Bay, AU

Setting up at a group of villas I manage and the safest way I have found is to install a GIS-R4 Hotspot Gateway to prevent these issues.

Shania0
Level 1
Vancouver, Canada

Hi there,

 

I have received an email notice regarding illegal download a movie from the copyright owner. I am urgently to know how I can stop guest download consent: movie or music. It is a necessary thing I need to be done in future prevent next case. openDNS can set up for restrict downloading movie or music?