Why an open network is different.
A network with no password, the kind offered free in most cafes, hotel lobbies and train stations, means anyone else connected to the same network is, at least in principle, on the same local segment as you. A password protected network still encrypts traffic between your device and the router; an open one often does not, which is the specific gap that matters here.
This is easy to overstate, since it sounds worse in the abstract than it plays out in practice for most visits. A short session checking a page or two carries a genuinely small risk; the habits below exist to close that small remaining gap rather than to suggest open networks are unusable.
What that gap actually allows.
On an unencrypted network, someone with the right tools and the same network access can potentially see unencrypted traffic passing over it. In practice, the modern web has closed most of this gap on its own: the vast majority of sites, ours included, use HTTPS, visible as a padlock icon beside the address, which encrypts the connection between your device and the site regardless of whether the Wi-Fi itself is open. The remaining risk sits mostly with older sites that still load over plain HTTP, and with a fake network set up deliberately to look like a genuine one.
The habits that actually help.
Check for the padlock before typing anything sensitive into a page, since a missing padlock on an important page is worth noticing regardless of which network you are on. Turn off automatic Wi-Fi joining for open networks specifically, so your device asks each time rather than joining a familiar sounding name without you noticing. A VPN, covered in our guide to when a VPN is useful, adds a layer that covers even the older, unencrypted sites.
Spotting a network that is not what it claims to be.
A fake network set up to mimic a genuine one, named something close to the real cafe or hotel network, is a more deliberate risk than the open network itself. Confirming the exact network name with staff before connecting, rather than picking the closest looking option from a list, closes this gap in under thirty seconds and is worth doing anywhere the network choice is not obvious.
A second sign worth noticing is a login page that asks for more than the network genuinely needs. A simple email address or a click through agreement is normal; a page asking for a password reused from another account, or for payment details just to join a free network, is a signal to disconnect and ask staff directly rather than continue.
Around Amsterdam specifically.
Cafes and public spaces around Amsterdam Centrum are busy with exactly this kind of open network, useful for checking our companions, including anyone filed under tall or slim, while out and about, provided the habits above are already in place.
A short routine before joining any open network.
Confirm the exact network name, decline any request for a password already used elsewhere, check for the padlock once connected, and switch on a VPN if one is installed. Four steps, each taking a few seconds, cover the overwhelming majority of what an open network can actually expose, without turning an ordinary coffee stop into something that needs careful planning.
Where this connects to a booking.
Arranging an evening booked as an extended arrangement or checking the rates page over a cafe or station connection works exactly the same as it would at home, provided the padlock is present and the network itself is the genuine one rather than a lookalike. None of this changes how quickly a booking is confirmed, it only changes what the network itself can see while you arrange it.
None of these habits require remembering anything complicated once they have been done a handful of times. Within a few visits to the same kind of cafe or station, checking the padlock and confirming the network name becomes as automatic as locking a phone screen, a small pause that adds no real friction to an otherwise ordinary visit, and one that stops feeling like a deliberate task within a couple of weeks of doing it consistently. The same short routine travels well too, useful equally in a station in Utrecht or a hotel lobby anywhere else, since none of it depends on the specific city it happens to be practised in, only on the same handful of open network habits carried from one place to the next.