UNLOCKING FREE WIFI ON BRITISH AIRWAYS

Summary from the TLDR InfoSec newsletter

British Airways offers free “messaging” WiFi to frequent flyer members, limited to whitelisted messaging app domains via SNI (Server Name Indication) filtering in TLS handshakes. By simulating traffic to approved domains, researchers found they could tunnel general web activity through the free tier. The method relies on customizing TLS connections and proxying traffic, demonstrating how SNI leaks destination domains even when content is encrypted and how service restrictions can be bypassed with technical knowledge.