A wireless network makes life more comfortable because you can access the Internet from virtually every corner of your home without any cables.

The downside is obvious - you can’t stop the radio signals from going out of the house. That means, if you haven’t enabled security of your wireless router, someone in the neighborhood can easily piggyback on your WiFi connection.

Home WiFi and Unintentional Copyright Infringement

Sharing WiFi can create two problems. One, your own network gets exposed to potential hackers, and second, if the other person does something illegal on the Internet through your network, you could be land into a legal soup.

That’s what happened in Germany recently according to an AP report.

The house owner was on vacation and someone else used his WiFi network (it wasn’t password-protected) to download music files from the web illegally. The musician in turn sued the house owner because his wireless connection was used for copyright violation and the courts too pronounced him guilty.

Yet another reason to secure your WiFi network. Comic courtesy Brad Colbow