4 easy hacks to get free Wi-Fi at any airport
There’s nothing worse than having a 90-minute layover and being forced to decide whether to twiddle your thumbs, go into Hudson News to buy the new issue of People National Geographic, or shell out $7.95 to check your email and pull up an article or two about your destination. OK, fine — even during a longer layover, none of us want to pay for Wi-Fi.
Despite the common outcry of travelers, a lot of airports still don’t offer complimentary web access for all passengers (unless you're in Spain), but fear not. There are quick and easy hacks to bypass paywalls and surf the web – no loitering outside of airport lounges (not that we're above that) or hi-tech programming necessary. We don't really want to advocate cheating the system, but as the UN declared, internet access is a human right.
Here are a few tricks you can try, and if these don't work, we'll see you loitering outside the airport lounge:
The URL trick: Try adding ?.jpg at the end of each URL; for some sites, that's all it takes. This is the simplest way, but it only works on WI-FI networks that allow images without redirecting. For more complex sites, this is a long shot. But if the website you want is rather basic, it’s worth a try.
The Boingo bluff: Boingo offers complimentary websites, including banking, shopping and news, and perhaps what you need may be accessible for free. If not, there’s a weakness in Boingo’s hotspot that could be your lucky break to surfing. Connect to the network and instead of clicking “Get Online Now," choose “The Good Stuff." Go ahead and click on any of the free sites offered, then open a new tab. Sometimes, that’ll fool the paywall and allow unlimited access.
The “developer tools” maneuver: A lot of paywall sites, like Boingo, stop users from getting on the web just by blocking the address bar, but you can get on the browser without an address bar by using web developer tools. Here's how:
1) In Firefox, click on “Tools” then “Web Developer." (In Chrome, web developer tools can be accessed through “View” then “Developer” then “JavaScript Console." In Safari, go to “Preferences” then “Advanced” then “Show Develop menu in menu bar." It’ll give you a new tool bar called “Develop." Click there and then to “Show Error Console.”).
2) Type in the address you want, using the following format (let’s use our site as an example): window.location.href="https://www.roadwarriorvoices.com
The FourSquare share: Users often upload wireless passwords for airports and even VIP lounges on the popular social network site. Typing “free wifi airports” into the search engine turned up passwords for Amsterdam Schiphol Airport’s KLM Lounge and easy hacks for getting internet at Cape Town International Airport, Copenhagen Airport and more.