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I just bought a new Nexus 5 after using a Nexus 4 for about a year.

After turning it on and using it at work, I go home and as soon as I turn the WiFi on the phone it connects to my home network without having to insert any password.

I have never used it before at home and I did not insert the password on that phone. To verify I went to a friend of mine's place where I had used the old Nexus 4 and tried again and voila' the phone connects to the network again.

Does anybody know if it's an expected behaviour or does it sound strange to you as well?

What could be the reason? The only thing I could think of is that Google is storing details about the WiFi you connect to on your Google account. Can anybody confirm? Is this even legal?

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  • I think you are confused about what "cookies" are. They're data stored on your device by websites you visit.
    – Dan Hulme
    Jul 22, 2014 at 8:18
  • @DanHulme - I meant the equivalent of cookies applied to this case. Probably not the best use of the word but I think you got the point!
    – Matteo
    Jul 22, 2014 at 8:28

3 Answers 3

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Did you backup/restore your settings to/from Google? If so, that's why you can connect to these wireless networks. One of the things that gets backed up is the wireless network passwords so when you restored them back on your new device it is able to connect.

Android has built in backup functionality. It offers to backup settings (including wifi settings) automatically from each device. When you go through the set-up on a new device it then gives you the option to restore these settings. If you had this configured (I think it's enabled by default) then your wifi settings would have automatically been backed up on your Nexus 4 and restored to your Nexus 5.

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  • I did a backup of the address book and messages with this application: play.google.com/store/apps/… but I have not done a back up of my settings
    – Matteo
    Jul 22, 2014 at 8:09
  • Sorry, i didn't make it clear that i meant the built in backup. Google offers to backup settings (including wifi settings) automatically. When you go through the set-up on a new device it then gives you the option to restore these settings. If you had this configured (i think it's enabled by default) then your wifi settings would have automatically been backed up on your Nexus 4 and restored to your Nexus 5.
    – bmdixon
    Jul 22, 2014 at 8:13
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    I believe it might be this. I did use the default options. But this means that google is storing password info of things not related to google on your google account.
    – Matteo
    Jul 22, 2014 at 8:29
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    @Matteo Google might be a bit invasive, but in this case, android backup is related to Google. It's a service you can configure on or off as referenced in the answer. If you don't want the information on the phone backed up to Google (as a service) you'll have to turn it off/disable it.
    – L. D. James
    Jul 22, 2014 at 9:20
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    And you might wish to do this from the beginning. Once the data got out, no way to get it off again. Though there's a "delete" option, that doesn't seem to do a thing (see heise.de/-1922971 – German, but you can run GoogleTrans on it).
    – Izzy ♦
    Jul 22, 2014 at 13:25
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To add to bmdixon's answer, go into Settings on your old Nexus 4 or current Nexus 5, select "Backup & reset" and have a look at the top option there:

Backup & reset window

Back up my data
Back up application data, Wi-Fi passwords and other settings to Google servers

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You can connect to your wifi even if it has password with the WPS(Wi-Fi Protected Setup). if WPS is currently pressed or on in your modem other device could connect to the network without using the password..

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  • With a laptop I need to use the password so I don't think it's that. Thanks for the answer though
    – Matteo
    Jul 22, 2014 at 8:07
  • still you can connect even if it is with a laptop. you're welcome tho.
    – Ker p pag
    Jul 22, 2014 at 8:09
  • @user3818605 To connect to a network with WPS you have to press the WPS button on the phone, so it's unlikely to be that in this case.
    – Dan Hulme
    Jul 22, 2014 at 9:08
  • thanks for that @DanHulme. but i tried it one time and it works. that why maybe it just happened to him also.
    – Ker p pag
    Jul 22, 2014 at 9:11

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