'Home' Network setting: Public or Private?

spr_pseudo · May 23, 2024

Windows can be confusing relating to calling a 'home' network public when it's private. The misunderstanding comes from it being connected to ethernet (for example), which you know is on a private 'home' network, but is also connected to the internet, which seems to be appropriately 'public'. Can it truly be considered private with the internet having access to it (barring firewall restriction). When it's wifi, the problem is wifi signals are open to the public, but may connect to a local router with wifi, that is also connected to the 'public' space itself with it's emitting signal. So which setting is really appropriate since you're technically connected to a public internet or wifi public space? Is the difference really to do with whether there's a hardware firewall or wifi password in the way?

jumanji · May 23, 2024

Read this: Make a Wi-Fi network public or private in Windows - Microsoft Support
And also this: Security tip: Are you making this huge Wi-Fi mistake?

Senecio · May 23, 2024

Setting to the 'recommended' public setting means that the various devices on your network don't 'trust' each other, so it is a more secure setting. Imagine, for example, that you pick up a piece of malware on your mobile phone, and bring it into your home, if your network is set to 'private', then the malware has free rein to infect all the other devices on your network.
The downside comes if you have problems connecting devices, without going through the router - e.g. using your PC as a print server. That can be difficult to set up, depending on the software which comes with the printer. You can, of course, temporarily set your network as private to set up a device, and then change it to public after your devices are working properly.

NavyLCDR · May 23, 2024

My private IP address on my home network set as private is 192.168.1.120. Go ahead, try to connect to it. And of you really want to see all my files, go ahead and connect to my NAS at 192.168.1.15.

Senecio · May 23, 2024

NavyLCDR said:
My private IP address on my home network set as private is 192.168.1.120. Go ahead, try to connect to it. And of you really want to see all my files, go ahead and connect to my NAS at 192.168.1.15.

Did you miss the bit about having a compromised device INSIDE your network? Obviously nobody OUTSIDE the network can connect to your local ip addresses.

NavyLCDR · May 23, 2024

Senecio said:
Did you miss the bit about having a compromised device INSIDE your network? Obviously nobody OUTSIDE the network can connect to your local ip addresses.

A little bit of care and attention all but ensures that the standard home user's liile network of a few computers and printers won't be compromised from the inside.

steveg · May 23, 2024

I get my internet through the cellular network which uses CGNAT and assigns blocks of users the same IP address. Makes it even more difficult for someone on the outside to obtain entrance to my home network, regardless of built in firewalls and other such security. Sucks if one wants to use remote access cameras that need a dedicated public IP and for gaming. Forced to use a VPN or purchase an IP address from the carrier, if they have one available.

NavyLCDR · May 23, 2024

steveg said:
I get my internet through the cellular network which uses CGNAT and assigns blocks of users the same IP address. Makes it even more difficult for someone on the outside to obtain entrance to my home network, regardless of built in firewalls and other such security. Sucks if one wants to use remote access cameras that need a dedicated public IP and for gaming. Forced to use a VPN or purchase an IP address from the carrier, if they have one available.

DDNS - Dynamic Domain Name Service

steveg · May 23, 2024

NavyLCDR said:
DDNS - Dynamic Domain Name Service

I never got into that, really no big deal for me but a lot of folks complain about it. Cloud cameras work fine.

spr_pseudo · May 24, 2024

Senecio said:
Setting to the 'recommended' public setting means that the various devices on your network don't 'trust' each other, so it is a more secure setting. Imagine, for example, that you pick up a piece of malware on your mobile phone, and bring it into your home, if your network is set to 'private', then the malware has free rein to infect all the other devices on your network.
The downside comes if you have problems connecting devices, without going through the router - e.g. using your PC as a print server. That can be difficult to set up, depending on the software which comes with the printer. You can, of course, temporarily set your network as private to set up a device, and then change it to public after your devices are working properly.

I think the linguistics is troubling. It shouldn't be is the network private or public, but whether you want the win11 pc to be hidden on the network you're on or not. I'm thinking why would I ever say the local network is "public" when I see i and whether microsoft says it means other things that aren't told about. Then you have vpns with assigned alternate ips and then you have to figure out what it might mean if you say it's public.

spr_pseudo · May 24, 2024

here's a quote from jumanjis article. he understood exactly this linguistic problem:

When you are on your home network and have it configured as private on your computer, your PC is discoverable by other devices connected to the same network. So, in this case, the public Wi-Fi setting is more secure than the private one. Yes, you read that right!