USB tethering to laptop safe?

Thanks everybody.
I occasionally have to do some banking while on the road and was wondering.

verizon hotspot....

4 years full time.. not one issue. banking and all.. just use 16 bit or higher passwords.

I use 32 bit passwords for bank stuff.

be more concerned with the "MASS" hacking.. like credit companies.. major banking... major Stores.

Chuck_thehammer wrote:
verizon hotspot....

4 years full time.. not one issue. banking and all.. just use 16 bit or higher passwords.

I use 32 bit passwords for bank stuff.

be more concerned with the "MASS" hacking.. like credit companies.. major banking... major Stores.

:h
32-bit passwords? That's only 4 characters. I don't think any sites accept a 4 character password.

Dave

magicbus wrote:

Chuck_thehammer wrote:
verizon hotspot....

4 years full time.. not one issue. banking and all.. just use 16 bit or higher passwords.

I use 32 bit passwords for bank stuff.

be more concerned with the "MASS" hacking.. like credit companies.. major banking... major Stores.

:h
32-bit passwords? That's only 4 characters. I don't think any sites accept a 4 character password.

Dave

It takes 7 or 8 ASCII characters to get 32 bits of entropy. There's a calculator here.

Ah, never saw it expressed this way before.

However your statement re: 32-bits for banking does beg the question why would you use that when their own chart says that is "weak"?

Password strength is determined with this chart, which might be a bit of a stretch for a non-critical password:

< 28 bits = Very Weak; might keep out family members
28 - 35 bits = Weak; should keep out most people, often good for desktop login passwords
36 - 59 bits = Reasonable; fairly secure passwords for network and company passwords
60 - 127 bits = Strong; can be good for guarding financial information
128+ bits = Very Strong; often overkill

First nothing on the internet is 100% secure. there are always to "Hack it" but the common Wi-Fi Sniffer can not hack a wire.. Only a radio.

So that is the MOST secure connection you can do.

bucky wrote:
I occasionally have to do some banking while on the road and was wondering.

Keep doing your banking. You'll be fine.

Chuck_thehammer wrote:
be more concerned with the "MASS" hacking.. like credit companies.. major banking... major Stores.

^ this is the real threat.

bucky wrote:
Thanks everybody.
I occasionally have to do some banking while on the road and was wondering.

Depending on what you are doing for banking. I pay most my bills directly via their specific app on my phone or directly in my banks app. Although there are some things that are easier from my laptop.

wa8yxm wrote:
First nothing on the internet is 100% secure. there are always to "Hack it" but the common Wi-Fi Sniffer can not hack a wire.. Only a radio.

So that is the MOST secure connection you can do.

Those packets are only secure on the journey to the first router. Beyond that you don't know what medium will be used to get the packet to the next router downstream and it could be wireless. Plus even on a wired network someone with access to the wire and knowledge can sniff or dump all the traffic. If you want a higher level of security you need to encrypt the packets end-to-end.

magicbus wrote:
Ah, never saw it expressed this way before.

However your statement re: 32-bits for banking does beg the question why would you use that when their own chart says that is "weak"?

Password strength is determined with this chart, which might be a bit of a stretch for a non-critical password:

< 28 bits = Very Weak; might keep out family members
28 - 35 bits = Weak; should keep out most people, often good for desktop login passwords
36 - 59 bits = Reasonable; fairly secure passwords for network and company passwords
60 - 127 bits = Strong; can be good for guarding financial information
128+ bits = Very Strong; often overkill

This is all greek to me. AKA, you lost me.