Windows 10 will share your wifi password with your friends' Facebook friends

Wifi Sense will sync your wifi passwords with your contacts' Facebook friends

USEFUL feature or pointless security risk?

Windows 10 – which is available for free ltoday – includes an interesting new wifi setting, dubbed Wifi Sense.

The new addition shares your wifi passwords with your contacts.

Wifi Sense will sync passwords with your contacts on Outlook, Skype and – with an additional setting switched on – your contacts' Facebook friends, too.

It could be extremely useful and would allow you to distribute a new wifi password through the entire office in a matter of seconds.

The password is sent over an encrypted connection and stored in an encrypted file on a Microsoft server  

Microsoft

Wifi Sense, which debuted as a feature on Windows Phone 8.1, does not share the plain text password needed to access your wifi network.

Instead the service will connect your contacts using a password stored central on Microsoft's servers.

Microsoft clarifies: "For networks you choose to share access to, the password is sent over an encrypted connection and stored in an encrypted file on a Microsoft server, and then sent over a secure connection to your contacts' phone if they use Wi-Fi Sense and they're in range of the Wi-Fi network you shared."

However there are still some security concerns about the feature.

 

It would still be possible for someone who wanted to gain access to your home or company network to simply befriend a friend of a friend and then drive his or her car close enough to the building to be within wifi range.

Then – bingo! Thanks to Wifi Sense, he or she has gained access to your private network.

Wifi Sense will be enabled by default on all Windows 10 installations.

Microsoft will allow users to opt-out certain networks from the Wifi Sense system, but that requires typing _optout into the relevant SSID in your settings – which seems far from intuitive.

A Microsoft spokesperson told NewsNewsBlog.blogspot.com: "Wi-Fi Sense gives people choices and benefits.

"What it doesn’t do is reveal passwords, allow your friends to share your Wi-Fi with their friends, nor does it put your personal information at risk."

Its not all bad news though, Windows 10 fixes a slew of problems found in previous versions of Windows.