If any of you poor saps are using Virgin for your interwebby experience, you might want to check the password on your Virgin installed wireless router. When I joined the lovely Indian firm I asked the installation guy, who I recall had terrible b.o. btw, to change the default password to one of my choosing. He either forgot or didn't bother. Yesterday, while installing B's new birthday prezzie laptop on our network, I discovered that the default settings were still there. After wondering why I couldn't log on to my network on the laptop with my password, I spent half an hour trawling forums to find out how to re-set the modem, when by chance I found out that Virgin's default settings are User Name "virgin", Password "password", so I tried those to log on to 198.68.1.1 and bingo - it worked.
My password has now been changed, but it means that any unscrupulous type in our street who is aware of Virgin's default password (and that could be any Virgin subscriber who's tried to install a laptop or other device on their home network, so a fair few I'd guess) could have been using my network for the past 18 months without my realising it.
If it had not been for the fact that I was installing a new piece of hardware on my network, this security lapse would have remained undiscovered. It wouldn't surprise me if this "oversight" applies to other ISPs too, so. if I were you I'd check your wireless router password now!
Forward this to any of your friends who do not have the good fortune to read my nonsense!
Yours - a weary consumer
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