I finally checked my router settings after a neighbor's kid knocked on my door at 11pm, and yeah, I was the problem | Cybersecurity Tips - Opinions Matter
I finally checked my router settings after a neighbor's kid knocked on my door at 11pm, and yeah, I was the problem
I run a small pest control shop out of my house in Mesa, and for about two years I had my router set up with the default admin password because I figured nobody within range would bother. Then a 14 year old from two doors down knocked on my door at 11pm last Tuesday to tell me he could see my network name and that his tablet auto-connected to it, which meant it had no password at all. I logged in and found 7 unknown devices, a guest network I never turned on, and remote admin enabled from the factory. Took me 20 minutes to fix, but I still feel like an idiot. If you have not logged into your router since you got it, what did you find sitting in there?
The "no password at all" part got me because that's exactly what I found when I finally checked mine, plus some neighbor's printer showing up as a device. What worked for me was just writing the new password on a sticky note and taping it inside the router box, sounds dumb but I actually remember it now.