Worldwide Wi-Fi password database on your mobile

    Those of us who travel a lot have probably found themselves in this situation more than once: in the city where you arrived, there are many wireless networks, but they are all with passwords (which you do not know). You don’t have a local SIM card, and you have roaming internet as the engine of the plane you arrived on.

    But it would be great if at least some of these passwords were known to you. Let's look at how exactly such a system could work.

    For simplicity, let's assume that all users have Android phones (or tablets), and everyone has root access to the device. Naturally, in practice it’s worth developing such a system with a view to a wider audience, but since this introduces significant technical complications, let's first look at just such a user category.

    So, our user (let's call him Sveta) sits at home and drinks cocoa. Cocoa is warm, good mood, everything is fine. But then Sveta recalls that she needs to go to town on business, and that she will most likely need the Internet, but she does not have mobile Internet. Therefore, she launches an Android application (let's call it hsdb - hotspot database), which carefully informs her that 137415 new Wi-Fi networks (with passwords!) Have appeared in the database, and Sveta, of course, clicks on “Update” . The program shows her a progress bar and a rough estimate of the time required to update the local database. At the same time, hsdb also displays a message stating that new entries appeared in the /data/misc/wifi/wpa_supplicant.conf file (it is in this Android device that writes passwords to the wireless networks to which the user connects), and clarifies with Sveta if she wants to upload them to a common database. Sveta ticks off 3 of the 4 new entries - she connected to two networks in cafes, she is connected to one (hotel) right now, but the network that she did not mark is at her friend’s house, and Sveta does not want the password to it was available to anyone who wants it - and clicks “Publish”. The three selected networks almost instantly end up in a common database (of course, without any information about the Light).

    A couple more minutes pass, and the database update is completed. Satisfied, Sveta goes to the city, knowing that now she doesn’t have to worry so much about the Internet: don’t need to ask the waiters these absurd questions in the spirit of “Excuse me, could you please tell me the password for your Wi-Fi?”, Yes and, frankly, most likely she will be able to use the Internet on the street (near the same cafes, for example). Sveta simply opens hsdb, and sees a list of those networks to which there is a signal and for which there is a password in the locally stored database.

    In principle, in the simplest version - this is quite enough. But if you complicate and implement the connection using hsdb (and not using the standard menu), you can also record the BSSID. Because, firstly, the name of some networks can change periodically, and secondly, it is often possible to determine the location by BSSID . Yes, and, in principle, you can immediately at the same time write down the coordinates - it can turn out more accurately than checking the BSSID against a public database. In addition, in this case, the need to read /data/misc/wifi/wpa_supplicant.conf disappears, and the application starts working everywhere, and not only where there is root access.

    Of course, if the database stores information on the physical location of networks, then the possibility of showing a map (with the possibility of preliminary caching of selected cities), on which you can at any time see where there are such networks nearby, for which a password is known, is stored itself.

    It would also be useful if the database (and possibly even the map) was accessible through the website. To make it convenient to add and view passwords from a computer. And, of course, such a system should have a good open API with high-quality documentation - so that anyone can write an application for any platform.

    I would be happy for your comments and ideas. Happy New Year to you, and less difficulty in finding wireless networks while traveling.

    Only registered users can participate in the survey. Please come in.

    Would you install such an app?

    • 84.5% Yes 2805
    • 15.4% No 513

    Would you add wireless networks to the database for which you have a password?

    • 71% Yes 2310
    • 28.9% No 940

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