In June, European law enforcement agency Europol, backed by German ethical hacking company SySS, conducted an experiment in London. The experiment involved setting a mobile Raspberry Pi unit up as a wifi hotspot to allow connected devices access to the internet. It was set-up as a public hotspot so anyone could connect to it. They just had to agree to the terms and conditions… And therein lies the catch. The T&Cs contained a ‘Herod clause’ by which users agreed to hand over their first born child to the company. Although the company has no intention of enforcing it, of course, it does show that you should always be careful about what you sign up for. The hotspot also contained no encryption so anyone using it found their passwords were transmitted in plain text, according to this report from the Guardian.

The experiment was deployed in Canary Wharf and also near the Houses of Parliament.