The intative promises to be privacy-friendly with no tracking. Stating:

Your privacy is important. The WiFi4EU app ensures a private online experience with no tracking or data collection. Simply connect and enjoy free public Wi-Fi without concerns.

Source: https://digital-strategy.ec.europa.eu/en/policies/wifi4eu-citizens

Will be interesting to see how this spans and plays out in reality. Looks promising too, did a quick scan of their builtin permissions and trackers and looks good too. (Scanning tool is called Exodus)

  • vane@lemmy.world
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    56 minutes ago

    I like how they wrote no tracking and then provided tracking link at the end.

  • TWeaK@lemmy.today
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    2 hours ago

    Not only are they monitoring everything you view in their network, but you have to install their app on your device.

    Good to see Exodus giving it a pass, but if it’s not open source it’s still something to be wary of. I literally can’t think of any good reason for the app to be required, a splash page that you log in to is more than sufficient.

    Yay, the app isn’t required!

    On connecting to the free Wi-Fi network for the first time, you will be redirected to a secure login page (a captive portal). You will be able to sign in with a simple click-to-connect functionality.

      • TWeaK@lemmy.today
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        2 hours ago

        You’re right, I was just going on the post saying “With the WiFi4EU app, you can access…”, implying that you need the app to access it. But on their webpage it spells it out more clearly:

        On connecting to the free Wi-Fi network for the first time, you will be redirected to a secure login page (a captive portal). You will be able to sign in with a simple click-to-connect functionality.

  • A_norny_mousse@feddit.org
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    3 hours ago

    Why an app at all?

    How safe would it be to just provide access points with one password for all?

    I’m not a cryptosis but I don’t see a problem there.

    Also, where’s the source code? Oh, here but it hasn’t been touched in 7 years and there’s no builds.

    Something’s fishy.

    • Sips'@slrpnk.netOP
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      17 minutes ago

      the github link you attached is to a github user called wifi4eu. Its not related at all to this initative.

    • TWeaK@lemmy.today
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      2 hours ago

      The app is just a map, the WiFi connection uses a standard SSID and login portal.

    • kebab@endlesstalk.org
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      2 hours ago

      Can they actually if the chats run via HTTPS? Isn’t the whole point that they can’t read any data that’s going through but instead only what server it’s going through? As long as it goes over an encrypted connection, but I think all of our chats use encrypted connection nowadays

      • plyth@feddit.org
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        6 hours ago

        just like border-free travel

        Is this new? If they write this despite recent border checks the analogy has not the intended meaning.

        Vpns don’t hide mac addresses from phones that pass the access points.

        • loudwhisper@infosec.pub
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          21 minutes ago

          That tracking is done in a much more effective and capillary way by tracking cell towers. I think MAC tracking is a much better option, assuming there are enough of these APs to track.

        • IsoKiero@sopuli.xyz
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          3 hours ago

          Vpns don’t hide mac addresses from phones that pass the access points.

          Pretty much every phone can use random MAC addresses, so you can’t be tracked that way. Obviously there’s a ton of other ways to achieve that, like via that app.

  • gressen@lemmy.zip
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    12 hours ago

    93k may seem a lot, but I’m on holiday in EU right now and the closest hotspot is 40 minutes away. Still impressive initiative, I hope it gets more coverage.

    • Microw@piefed.zip
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      1 hour ago

      I just checked the map and it looks like they put these hotspots all around of my city to the countryside, but none inside the city

  • devfuuu@lemmy.world
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    10 hours ago

    It’s almost like going back in time where there was a Fonera hotspot everywhere.