Blocking Adult Content on Public WiFi

As the manager of a venue that offers Free WiFi, you want to make sure that it is fast, reliable, and secure.  You also want to make sure that your patrons have a comfortable experience.  You want them to choose to come back again and again. One of your visitors accidentally or intentionally looking at adult content while using your Public WiFi is a tricky situation.  This behavior can make your other guests uncomfortable.  This sometimes leads to your internet service provider (ISP)…


Cloud Managed vs Cloud Analytics

When discussing wifi hardware options with customers, sometimes they become confused about whether or not they need a Cloud Managed access point solution to use a cloud based WiFi Analytics access point solution. There are also customers with security concerns about their “local network data being in the cloud” when it comes to WiFi Analytics. So let's start at the beginning. Cloud Managed vs On-Premise Solutions Cloud Managed hardware shouldn’t be confused with a Cloud based WiFi Analytics…


Privacy in the era of Big Data

Your identity is your most precious asset. This includes the decisions, emotions, and thoughts that make you unique, ground your perspectives and connect you with like-minded people. It has also become the hottest commodity in the world.  How to maintain the privacy of your identity while still providing useful services to you as a customer has become a heated debate. Big data creates stories we couldn’t see before; subtle patterns formed from trillions of gigabytes of data sifting through…


The 4 Best Ways to Discover Devices on an IPV4 Network

After deciding to monitor WiFi Usage to collect insights into your business or organization, you’ll be faced with the choice of how to actually retrieve the device information from your network. It’s obvious that you can always log in to your wireless router or access point and see the IP addresses and MAC addresses.  However, this type of one time, manual process does not allow for insights or intelligence to be gathered from the changing dynamics of which devices are on the network over…


2018 WiFi Analytics Buyer's Guide

WiFi Analytics is an exploding industry, full of opportunity and misinformation.  With any new technology, it's easy for customers to feel confused about what they’re buying.  We’ve put together this buyer's guide on what you need to consider when getting started with WiFi analytics.  Who’s On My WiFi has been creating WiFi analytics solutions since 2015 and we've listed what hardware, software, or web services you might consider. WiFi Analytics is used to track the visitor activity at a…


smart city

5 Top Smart Cities Have This in Common

The internet has an uncanny history of tiny companies disrupting behemoths of industry. It turns out, it’s not just startups flipping corporate superpowers on their head. Small, rural cities in the United States are proving they can not only compete with major cities like Vienna and Paris, they can beat them. It’s easy to see why cities want to be “Smart Cities”. The promise of efficient utilities, quick transit, and disaster recovery options are compelling economic advantages. Smart cities…


What is PING? And what does it do?

The trusted PING command that has been available for years used to be the de-facto standard for seeing if a computer was up and running or if it was down. Simple example of how to use PING. In the following example, I have 2 computers connected to my computer network. The first is a computer at IP Address 192.168.1.102.  It is connected to the network and is currently powered on. The 2nd computer is at IP Address 192.168.1.101.  It is also connected to the network, but the power is currently…


What is the difference between an IP Address and a MAC Address?

What is the difference between an IP Address and a MAC Address? What is an IP Address? An IP Address is a numeric representation of a device (computer, game console, etc.) on a computer network that uses TCP/IP to communicate (the logical connection of most of the internet). What is a MAC Address? A MAC Address is a numeric representation of a device (computer, game console, etc.) on a computer network that uses Ethernet to communicate (the physical connection between most computers and…


Happy Librarian Using Library Calendar Software

Why do computers need both MAC Addresses and IP Addresses?

We know from previous posts that each computer has both an IP Address and a MAC Address assigned to it. But, why is this? If every computer in order to communicate with each other needed to be physically connected to each other, all networks either would become complicated very quickly or they would stay small. Imagine if in order to go to google.com you had to have a physical wire connecting your computer out to Palo Alto California, just to see their website.  Now imagine, you also needed a…