Wi-Fi wants to be free.
And a growing number of companies and nonprofits are aggressively expanding the definition of “free Wi-Fi.” This has primarily involved complimentary wireless access at cafes, airports and other indoor venues.
But some are thinking bigger — much bigger.
Cable company Comcast, the Twin Cities’ largest broadband-Internet provider, is the latest to boldly expand its Wi-Fi reach — even extending it outdoors.
This week, the Philadelphia-based company detailed its nationwide plan to modify or replace its home customers’ wireless routers so that they broadcast two Wi-Fi signals: the private Wi-Fi network accessed by the homeowners, and a separate, public Xfinity-branded Wi-Fi signal accessible to all — neighbors and passersby.
In effect, this would make every Comcast Internet customer’s home a hotspot, potentially knitting together a Wi-Fi signal that could blanket a city, making accessing a signal similar to turning on the radio.
This effort is destined for the Twin Cities, but the company hasn’t said when it might happen. Roughly 100,000 New Jersey Comcast customers are now set up in a test phase.
Those who might think this is crazy haven’t been paying attention. Comcast is only the latest to make Wi-Fi a more pervasive amenity in U.S. cities.
A Spain-based company called Fon takes a similar approach with the wireless routers it makes available to its residential customers in the United States and other nations.
That $50 router also broadcasts private and public Wi-Fi signals. The purchase of a Fon router for home use entitles that residential customer to free Internet access via any other Fon router, anywhere in the world.
Fon coverage in the Twin Cities is sparse, though, compared with the metro areas of London, Paris, Lisbon and Tokyo. This gives Comcast, with its vast local footprint, an opening.
Another public-Wi-Fi initiative is being championed by San Francisco-based Electronic Frontier Foundation, or EFF.
The noncommercial Open Wireless Movement (openwireless.org) encourages everyone with a router to offer public Wi-Fi signals and envisions a future in which anyone with an Internet-enabled device can access no-cost wireless in a city.
The EFF says open, pervasive Wi-Fi is more private than cellular Internet networks and relieves users of wireless carriers’ steep fees.
The EFF does not yet track how many residential routers are now set up with “openwireless.org” hotspot IDs, so this project’s reach remains difficult to gauge.
In a somewhat similar vein, the City of Minneapolis has set up more than 100 free Wi-Fi hotspots via US Internet, the Twin Cities company responsible for that city’s commercial W-Fi network. A person using the hotspots needs a credit-card number for access but isn’t charged service fees.
Now Comcast seems poised to become the public face of this new free-and-open Wi-Fi movement — though its approach isn’t exactly free and open.
Only Comcast’s own, paying customers get unfettered, unlimited access to public Wi-Fi nodes. Others only get two free sessions per month, an hour per session. Additional access for such outsiders involves fees.
Comcast is making up with ubiquity where it falls short in openness.
Its plan to transform home routers into public hotspots is actually the third phase in a years-long effort to transform Xfinity-branded Wi-Fi into something akin to a public utility.
The first phase involves installing Wi-Fi equipment on outdoor broadband-Internet poles so that those in the vicinity can get online with Wi-Fi-capable phones, tablets and laptops. This is a bit like setting up a cellular-wireless tower.
The second phase involves Comcast’s small-and-medium-size business customers. Routers at those locations are configured to broadcast public Wi-Fi signals for use by anyone visiting these establishments, as well as by passersby.
It’s not altruistic. These two efforts, along with the home-router initiative, are intended to ratchet up the visibility of the Xfinity brand, thereby enticing more people to pay for its Internet, TV and telephone services at home and work, said Tom Nagel, the company’s senior vice president of development strategy.
“If you’re an Xfinity customer, I want you to stay with me longer,” Nagel said. “If you’re not, I want you to feel like you’re missing out on fantastic services.”
MAKE MY ROUTER PUBLIC? REALLY?
Residential Wi-Fi users may need a bit of time to wrap their heads around the idea of opening up their routers for public use while preserving their private access. Among the concerns they might raise:
Security. Properly configured, a router with public-access Wi-Fi should not represent a security risk for those on the router’s private and secure network. The technical reasons for this are a bit complicated; read an Open Wireless Movement explanation at openwireless.org.
Service degradation. Those using the slower public portion of a home router typically won’t degrade performance on the faster private side. Future routers would speed up public access when the private side isn’t being used and give the private network priority if required.
Legal liability. Those who fear being blamed for misuse of their public Wi-Fi signals are said to be protected under a “safe harbor” doctrine akin to that protecting Internet service providers. In other words, they’re likely not liable for the mischief of porn purveyors or music pirates.
Freeloading. Fear of freeloaders is misplaced, the Open Wireless Movement believes. “Sharing capacity helps everyone,” it says. “If you’ve ever been without Internet access and needed to check an email, you will remember how useful open networks can be in a pinch.”
— Julio Ojeda-Zapata
