Inadvertently used my ABDL Instagram account while my smartphone was connected to work WiFi.

[utjerry]

I corresponded with an online mommy via Instagram yesterday sending maybe 10 short messages back and forth. It was with someone that reached out to me to try and get me to probably pay to play type interaction. Not sure, because I didn't get to that part. She sent a few messages about how she could change my diaper and feed me. I was simply telling her i was a diapered boy that needed punishment and was wearing a diaper at work that day. I realized after a few messages that my phone was connected to the private work WiFi. Our company is pretty big and has sophisticated network and security including a full IT staff. It was messages, not images, but the info was NSFW. Though it was my private phone and I was on my lunch break, I doubt my company would care about that and let me go if they found out. How humiliating would that be? With all the people that likely use their Instagram, Facebook, etc on their connected personal phones I would think this one may slip by. Nevertheless I am worried. Rookie mistake, but I had no idea my personal phone was connected to the company private employee WiFi.

 

[BobbiSueEllen]

Well, that pay2play Mommy is a scammer, guaranteed. Hope you didn't give 'her' any personal info, like name, address, phone number, employer info or money info.

 

[Bearcatz]

They'll know you were using instagram, but not what you were doing there most likely.

I'd say there's just about a 100% chance no one will ever know exactly what you were doing or care if they did.

 

[tango79]

What Bearcatz said. Nobody has the resources to bother noticing and by default the username and password are encrypted as well as the actual connection so it 99.999% unlikely that anyone knows the content of your usage or the account on Insta.

 

[SparkyDog]

I'd be more worried you're getting scammed by an online mommy than your work finding out you went on Instagram

 

[LittleAndAlone]

Worst anyone will see is SSL/TLS 443 encrypted traffic to a social media web site that is apparently allowed anyway if they let you get to it.

Edit: seems Instagram messenger does not use encryption so you shouldn't even be using the platform at all.

Your work's IT security isn't that good if you are able to have a personal device on the internal WLAN anyway. If they were for real they would have it locked down to company assets with domain issued client certificates and stuff like that. You probably used a generic WAP login too so they have no way of even knowing who's device it was.

LTE exists for a reason. Don't ever mix work and personal. Ever. Especially in today's cancel culture where you could get flagged as an extremist just by going to the consuming the 'wrong' news web site. Do all that stuff on LTE.

 

[LittleAndAlone]

Well... maybe not. Seems Instagram messenger is notorious for not using encryption so they can monitor your messages and ban you for disfavored social views or content. You shouldn't even be using the platform at all. What hot garbage.

Were you messaging inside a https browser or an app? Direct peer to peer messaging seems to remain plain text end to end.

Web messaging is likely only SSL/TLS encrypted to Instagram and plain text as it transits Instagram internal before being encrypted again to the recipient's SSL/TLS session. So while your work can't see it, Instagram is still spying on you.

These apps and services are cancer. Get rid of them.

 

[utjerry]

Well... maybe not. Seems Instagram messenger is notorious for not using encryption so they can monitor your messages and ban you for disfavored views or content. You shouldn't even be using the platform at all. What hot garbage.

Were you messaging inside a https browser or an app? Direct peer to peer messaging seems to remain plain text. Web messaging is likely only SSL/TLS encrypted to Instagram and plain text as it tansits Instagram internal before being encrypted again to the recipient's SSL/TLS session. So while your work can't see it, Instagram is still spying on you.

Using instagram app on the phone. I do have a partitioned work profile installed on the phone for company email.

 

[LittleAndAlone]

Never use personal devices for work. Some naughty talk on Instagram is the least of your worries. All it takes is one picture or message or reply with something not politically popular and your career is over.

Even if this one transmission isn't a big deal someome could map your anonymous social media handle to you at work and start a witch hunt for any disfavored political views or drunken rants you posted over a decade ago, and your career is over just like that.

Keep your devices and personal and work business separated and isolated with an air gap.

 

[BobbiSueEllen]

Using instagram app on the phone. I do have a partitioned work profile installed on the phone for company email.

I gotta agree staunchly with the opinion that work tech is for work stuff and personal stuff is for personal tech. They just don't mix. All these years of people in civilian & US military joining sites like Ashley Madison, porn hubs, so on on work laptops...look at 'em now. The only good, real firewall is the person...and the will to enforce it.

Hopefully this is your motivation to divorce the two worlds from each other.

 

[Bearcatz]

Hmm, well, since you have company e-mail on that phone, it's actually not that hard for a sophisticated IT staff to have slipped in some extra stuff (adding a new trusted certificate authority to your device) that'd let them see the content of even encrypted traffic, but it's unlikely they care if you can get to instragram at all.

It's called "SSL Inspection". It's essentially a web filter terminating the encrypted connection from the server, seeing the content, then transparently re-securing and completing the connection between the client and web filter. Essentially a mass man in the middle attack that literally no one would notice because who really checks what certificate was used to secure the connection anyway?

I still wouldn't be worried, because the skill level of IT people these days is pretty low, and a lot wouldn't understand this concept if I explained it to them like they were 5.

 

[hotwheelsfan]

+1 to Bearcatz' take, I would avoid doing this in the future but not worry about this one incident. Technically not impossible that they have set up your phone so they can inspect traffic on their network, but Instagram messages are unlikely to stand out unless they have another reason to be watching you very closely.

 

[meowmind]

There is a good chance they just don't care. Especially if it was instagram traffic. I have to deal with web filter logs every day, and I only care when someone accesses really explicit sites, sites with a high security risk, or tries to bypass the filter with a personal VPN on the corporate network. Most IT folk are too busy dealing with cranky execuitives and obsecure bugs in their system to care about what people are browsing online.

Also.... get your personal phone off your works internal WiFi network. I'd imagine if they are serious about their security, they have a policy or access controls in place forbidding personal devices on the corporate network anyways. But if they don't have a policy against this, then I would make an educated guess that their security appliance / web filter is not super advanced.