

What price for free wi-fi? - aDevilInMe
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-28525108

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mathattack
If we accept that nothing is free, then we have to ask what the best way to
pay for the so-called free product. In my mind it's either some sort of usage
data, or it's via taxes.

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jbuzbee
I would guess in almost every case, the purpose of free wifi is not to do any
sort of tracking, it's just to get you in the door. I know that I've picked
hotels and other establishments based on the availability of free wifi.

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mathattack
Yes, though this is now becoming an expectation. I haven't done much business
travel in the past few years, but now that it's ramping up again I notice how
important the free wifi is.

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roberjo
Is there any technical reason our Mobiles have to broadcast the MAC address?

Could we simply disable MAC address broadcasting?

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rmlewisuk
iOS8 randomises the MAC address to avoid tracking like this:
[http://venturebeat.com/2014/06/19/why-ios-8s-mac-address-
ran...](http://venturebeat.com/2014/06/19/why-ios-8s-mac-address-randomizing-
is-a-huge-win-for-privacy/)

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tombot
Yep, so glad that this feature exists. Hope everyone else follows suit.

Have nothing against collecting data of people which choose to join the
network, accept T&Cs etc but bulk connection of people passing by is not cool.

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Shivetya
I doubt it will be long before this randomization is of no real protection
against systems employed by the likes of the NSA and similar. If they can
figure it out then a private company could as well and market the managing of
free wi-fi services to localities and such all under the guise of better
understanding your customers, or worse protection from bad people.

This previous story should pretty much end the idea that even randomizing your
Mac address matters
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8094134](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8094134)

