The following is for a adult, not borderline adult but can legally drink 2x over in the US.
She lives in a apartment and as part of the deal has ‘free wifi’ I do not know of the legalities of that arrangement and do not want to discuss that here, but I do assume for the sake of this it is legal and the landlord has made sufficient arrangements to insure it is legal. It is a single house which as the homeowner and the single rental unit. If you wish to discuss any legal issues as to potential illegalities this please start another thread.
My suspicions is that they may employ some sort of child monitoring method on her connection. She has mentioned that the landlord seems to know things that they should not, but would if they monitored her online activity. I did consider this for future reference, but I really needed more info before considering this. She has set her home page to ‘Klove’, which is a christian radio station, she has recently found this blocked (yet to find details).
From that I suspect either some form of spyware/hijacking, but I find that unusual due to a christian radio station is not going to be a common hijack, and no alternate homepage was offered. Are pages being blocked by some child monitoring software? I can see anything taken with the word ‘love’ in it may be potentially taken as a porn site and blocked in such a case.
That second one has me concerned as it coincides with her initial observation, that they know things that they could only know by monitoring her online activity.
So I want to test it to see if it is indeed ‘child monitored’, but preferably not tipping our hand that is what is happening. One method I was considering is just seeing if typing in a hard core porn site address would go though, as a child blocking filter should not allow it, yet again I don;t want to tip my hand and assume that they may be able to get a list of her sites, and I don’;t want that showing up.
So how can I tell if such software is in use?
Also I know that she can get on another wireless network and see if that works, that is part of the plan, but would like something more then that.
That would be about it - if she can get to Klove or whatever else while using her computer on a different connection, such as a neighbor’s unsecured net, free wifi at McDonalds, or tethering with a cellphone, then you know something’s going on with the “house” network.
Usually, the idea behind monitoring software is that it’s not detectable by the subject user.
Similarly, trying logging on to the same ‘free wifi’ with a different computer/phone/tablet and going to Klove. If she can’t it may be on purpose. I say “may” because I had a old Linksys router that started randomly blocking websites for no reason. For example, at one point I couldn’t get to Samsclub.com for a while but everything else worked fine. It just needed to be power cycled to be fixed.
If it’s legit, she might just tell whoever’s providing it that she ‘can’t connect at all’ or her ‘connection has been really spotty lately’ and suggest they power cycle the router.
If it’s not, she might need to find another source or find away to hide her tracks (I don’t know how that works though).
But like I said, I would start by A)connecting somewhere else and B)connecting a different device to the same wifi and attempting to connect to Klove with both of those methods and see what kind of results they yield.
Also, it might not hurt to clear her cookies/cache, at least the ones related to Klove…just for kicks. Maybe even try a different browser, just in the name of troubleshooting.
Ah, good point on power-cycling the router. I’d forgotten how flaky my old Linksys router was, and that I wound up using a digital lamp timer to give it and the even less reliable DSL bridge a one minute power cycling at 3 AM every day.
Not that it helps the OP, but I’ve got Netgear and Cisco stuff now that doesn’t need a daily kick in the butt.
I never thought of using a timer. Back when I lived with a few other guys one of them insisted on having it in his bedroom. He never did figure out why his clock kept resetting. But if it flaked out at 2am I would power cycle his entire room via the breaker box. I felt bad (not really for his clock, but that meant his desktop crashed at the same time), but that’s what he got for keeping it in his room…I wanted it in my room :D.
Eventually I learned that when they got to that point it was time to replace them. After I replaced enough of them I made the move to Netgear and I’ve been much happier. I haven’t tried anything from Linksys since Cisco bought them. I don’t know if they brought over any of their technology or just bought them and left it alone.
If they know more than they seem to about her Internet activities, it’s also possible there’s a proxy involved. This may also be a means of filtering. You could try having her go to Am I Behind a Proxy, which – while probably not fool-proof – may reveal this to be the case.
Thanks all for the suggestions, I am awaiting the results for her to try it at McD’s
This is part of what I am concerned with, the wireless she connects with is ???. I don’t know what it is and she has never seen it. I don’t know if its a router or another computer. I have sent her a note and will see what the results are.
If she can afford the small monthly fee, tell her to get something like HotSpotShield or VyperVPN – these are (software) consumer VPN services that will encrypt traffic on the local net and let her browse from “someplace else.” They’re completely legal (in the US, anyway), and basically meant for situations exactly like this (or your local coffee shop)–you’ve got access to the internet, but you can’t trust the local provider for whatever reason.