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Is WiGLE a thing people know about? How does that work, its a service that listens to all publicly available wifis in the country? I understand how it could be

Is WiGLE a thing people know about? How does that work, its a service that listens to all publicly available wifis in the country? I understand how it could be possible in theory but how is it actually practical?

arcfour 3y ago
It's crowdsourced... You drive around and collect data for it and send it in.
SushiHippie 3y ago
It's data comes from people who do "Wardriving" https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wardriving https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wardriving
Deathmax 3y ago
Data is crowdsourced and contributed by users. On a much larger scale, Apple and Google collect data from iOS and Android devices to power their WiFi/mobile tower based geolocation services. Android's Location Services: https://support.google.com/android/answer/3467281#location_accuracy https://support.google.com/android/answer/3467281#location_a... iOS's Location Services: https://support.apple.com/en-gb/102515 https://support.apple.com/en-gb/102515 In fact, Google provides it as a paid API: https://developers.google.com/maps/documentation/geolocation/overview https://developers.google.com/maps/documentation/geolocation..., but you require BSSID's and not just SSID names to try to curb abuse.
- chatmasta 3y ago
  Mozilla also has such a service although I believe they're deprecating it. You can still query it today, but as a privacy measure you need to include the MAC of 3+ SSIDs to get location info, since otherwise you could check the SSIDs from probe scans of passerby to locate their homes.
- Brybry 3y ago
  Google street view cars also collect WiFi data (or at least used to): https://europe.googleblog.com/2010/04/data-collected-by-google-cars.html https://europe.googleblog.com/2010/04/data-collected-by-goog...
dzhiurgis 3y ago
It's obviously not public data, but satellites have been wardriving WiFi for over a decade.
dougdonohoe 3y ago
One of the guys behind the project, bobzilla, worked for me in a previous life. Great guy; fond of tea.
ssl-3 3y ago
Wigle is not a thing that people know about. It isn't a secret (at all) -- in fact, it was created in part to raise awareness about the problems associated with open-by-default consumer wireless routers. But, like (say) RIPE Atlas, it just isn't very commonly known. Data in Wigle is collected mostly by wardriving, which (in a nutshell) is just driving around and passively recording the information that WiFi access points are shouting about themselves to whoever is listening. The data is collected by volunteers, but it is not strictly free. The way that the project is funded is by selling the data to companies who use it for geolocation services. Regular folks can do some basic searches on the dataset without cost, though, which is what the author has done here.

arcfour 3y ago

It's crowdsourced... You drive around and collect data for it and send it in.

SushiHippie 3y ago

It's data comes from people who do "Wardriving" https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wardriving https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wardriving

Deathmax 3y ago

Data is crowdsourced and contributed by users. On a much larger scale, Apple and Google collect data from iOS and Android devices to power their WiFi/mobile tower based geolocation services. Android's Location Services: https://support.google.com/android/answer/3467281#location_accuracy https://support.google.com/android/answer/3467281#location_a... iOS's Location Services: https://support.apple.com/en-gb/102515 https://support.apple.com/en-gb/102515 In fact, Google provides it as a paid API: https://developers.google.com/maps/documentation/geolocation/overview https://developers.google.com/maps/documentation/geolocation..., but you require BSSID's and not just SSID names to try to curb abuse.

chatmasta 3y ago
Mozilla also has such a service although I believe they're deprecating it. You can still query it today, but as a privacy measure you need to include the MAC of 3+ SSIDs to get location info, since otherwise you could check the SSIDs from probe scans of passerby to locate their homes.
Brybry 3y ago
Google street view cars also collect WiFi data (or at least used to): https://europe.googleblog.com/2010/04/data-collected-by-google-cars.html https://europe.googleblog.com/2010/04/data-collected-by-goog...

dzhiurgis 3y ago

It's obviously not public data, but satellites have been wardriving WiFi for over a decade.

dougdonohoe 3y ago

One of the guys behind the project, bobzilla, worked for me in a previous life. Great guy; fond of tea.

ssl-3 3y ago

Wigle is not a thing that people know about. It isn't a secret (at all) -- in fact, it was created in part to raise awareness about the problems associated with open-by-default consumer wireless routers. But, like (say) RIPE Atlas, it just isn't very commonly known. Data in Wigle is collected mostly by wardriving, which (in a nutshell) is just driving around and passively recording the information that WiFi access points are shouting about themselves to whoever is listening. The data is collected by volunteers, but it is not strictly free. The way that the project is funded is by selling the data to companies who use it for geolocation services. Regular folks can do some basic searches on the dataset without cost, though, which is what the author has done here.