Commentary by Wayne Lee
Last weekend my next-door neighbor came knocking on my door asking for help with a problem he was having. Dan (not his real name) had a television in his bedroom that finally gave up the ghost and died. He had sound, but no picture. A quick trip to Walmart brought home a replacement, and this is where it gets interesting.
Many, many years ago there was this young man in high school who had struck up a friendship with my beloved Susan. He had a personality that would light up a room, but he wasn’t the brightest bulb in the chandelier as they say. He eventually dropped out of school, got his girlfriend pregnant, and the three of them (it was a baby girl) moved into an apartment in my complex. This is how I got to know him.
Unbeknownst to me, Susan gave him our Wi-Fi password to use, and without asking, he passed it along to everyone he could. In any event, he and the girlfriend went their separate ways. He was eventually evicted and last I heard was working for a carnival that travels up and down the west coast.
This also explains why there used to be teenagers hanging around my unit. It was so bad I had a police officer at my door asking if I had any teenagers living with me. The answer was no but I did find a young man standing outside my humble abode. I asked him what he was doing there and he replied, “this is a Wi-Fi- hot spot.” After all these years, I now know why.
Which brings me back to neighbor Dan. It seems the young man had given him my Wi-Fi info and password, and he had been using it for years to access various cable systems via Roku. Now he was here at my front door wanting my Wi-Fi password. Noticing the confused look on my face, he related the story of how he had acquired my Wi-Fi info years earlier and was wondering if I could help him with his new TV.
Now Dan is a nice guy, and he’s helped me out a couple times when I needed assistance. So, the two of us old farts went to work trying to read the Wi-Fi info on my router. It took reading glasses and a magnifying glass just to read the password. Having written it down (several times as we kept getting it wrong), we went back to his place to set up the new television.
Roku is a major pain in the posterior. I had to enter all types of personal info including my email address among other things but after several failed attempts, the words, “welcome back Wayne” magically appeared on the screen. Success!
We went on to program all the various channels he prefers, and soon he was up and running once again. Now it’s got me wondering who else near me might be piggybacking off my Wi-Fi without my knowledge?
