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Airline safety procedures for high-tech high flyers...
You'll find your AV software under your seat - now listen to the cabin crew tell you about VPNs...

By silicon.com

Published: Monday 04 August 2003

Safety on airlines has been a big issue ever since Wilbur and Orville successfully launched themselves skyward some 100 years ago.

But alongside physical safety on planes and at airports, we are increasingly wondering about the security of our information. At times there are crossovers. Just about everyone who has been told to turn off their mobile phone when boarding a plane must have wondered what kind of threat they really pose to cockpit instrumentation. But that's a subject for another time.

Instead, with the proliferation of laptops among business travellers, and major carriers seemingly on the verge of rolling out in-flight wireless LAN services - based on the 802.11b Wi-Fi standard - we now consider data security. There are options out there to secure wireless networks, not least those that will be used on planes.

As well as service provider measures, we can all learn to be responsible - using VPNs, personal firewalls, up-to-date anti-virus software and encryption of files and emails in cases.

An article today also notes the problem of 'shoulder surfing'. It sounds blindingly obvious but working on a document within the view of someone else can be dangerous.

The word from the experts - security vendors and location owners (in today's case TruSecure and Boeing) alike - is to be vigilant. In short, don't work on anything in public that should be kept utterly private.

But how many times have we overheard mobile phone conversations, the speaker seemingly oblivious to people in addition to the person on the other end of the line gleaning information? (One silicon.com columnist even famously tells the story of once upon a time 'hacking' someone by listening to them talk openly about their spouse, mortgage and other details on a mobile at an airport.)

The problem of shoulder surfing isn't limited to wireless connectivity, of course. But the point remains that when working at a coffee shop or hotel lobby it is possible to get and up and move about. Working on a plane, such mobility is rare.

It is right that a range of vendors are scrutinising what is going on in various locations. IT departments shouldn't want it any other way. At the same time it is good to hear - as silicon.com recently did - that people like Boeing are doing thorough checking of systems before they are rolled out.

Never assume anything is 100 per cent safe - nothing ever is - but there is now an established history of checking and quality assurance that seeks to make things 'good enough'. And the Wright brothers would have welcomed that.