[aaron1o5]

Came across this article the other day was wandering if a more educated member could shed some light on this topic in terms of difficulty and plausibility. Looking forward to hearing your guys' responses!

https://blogs.mcafee.com/consumer/chameleon-wifi-virus/

[Megan]

Easy, strengthen the wifi, change the default user / pass, people should educate themselves more.

My router doesn't have the default user / login, it's not hard to change it, that being said some of them now have specifically generated passwords printed on the back of the router now rather than a default. (at least in the UK)

[m0dem]

It is cool. But it doesn't sound like much new. The "Chameleon" is just their test project, not a wild virus, but, experienced hackers have probably known about (been doing) this for years past.
Like they say in the article...

Protect your Wi-Fi network with a password.

Most of all the routers I have seen in public (not tons tho) are secured networks anyways. (not to say they don't just have a default password)

It is kind of limited though, because, if there isn't overlapping WiFi networks, the Chameleon is toast.
This type of virus should scan (somehow) for vulnerable phones and then infect those few... when the people drive/walk around, your virus is spread in more unreachable places.

[mothered]

It just seems like another way to get Into an encrypted network with a vulnerable AP. As for open wireless networks, It speaks for Itself.

Unless I've missed It completely, there's no mention of the "methodology" used to access such APs.

[pastezilla]

routers use to be the best things to target hacking wise, if you think about it logically mobile phones are what you want to attack, people connect to any wifi they can on there phones, have no idea of the processes they allow and or have already running in the background and give up all their personal information and bank details on these unsecure machines.

[Nil]

routers use to be the best things to target hacking wise, if you think about it logically mobile phones are what you want to attack, people connect to any wifi they can on there phones, have no idea of the processes they allow and or have already running in the background and give up all their personal information and bank details on these unsecure machines.

True. Everyone talks about running a VPN on their laptops and desktops and being safe, but never about actually running a VPN on your mobile phone and changing privacy settings. Isn't the default setting on iPhones to connect to nearest open wifi if possible? I still think there's a lot of ignorance with mobile devices and due to it not getting much publicity, people assume they're safe to connect to and login wherever and whenever.