Kevin Fitchard of GigaOm comments:
The cities of San Francisco and San Jose are merging their two municipal Wi-Fi networks; at least on the virtual level. The two cities are using a new technology – Hotspot 2.0 – to let smartphones automatically connect and roam between their two networks as well as provide a layer of security on what wouldn’t normally be available in wide-open public hotspots.
Hotspot 2.0 is a bit of a strange technology to highlight because when it’s working you never notice anything happening. The public Wi-Fi network behaves very much like the cellular network and your phone automatically connects to the nearest hotspot access point with a secure WPA2 connection — just as it would connect to your home router.
It’s exciting to see Hotspot 2.0 being deployed widely in Silicon Valley and San Francisco. This technology have been discussed at several Wireless Field Days, but seeing it in production means we’re getting that much closer to the future.
Read more at: San Francisco, San Jose combine their Wi-Fi networks using Hotspot 2.0
