Most of the questions on this topic related to folks connecting to somebody else's wireless network when their own was available and could remedy the situation by going to their connections and unchecking the "connect automatically" box. See this: " Avoid automatically connecting to wireless network on windows 7 " as an example.
In my situation, I've noticed that Win 7 will automatically connect to any unsecured wifi network – even if I have never connected to it in the past. If I am traveling and boot Win 7, it will start and connect to what appears to be the best signaled unsecured network without prompting me for confirmation (note: in the above link, "Naveen" seems to have same problem). Obviously, that is a security concern to me.
Further, when I open "Network and Sharing" and "Manage wireless networks" the network is not displayed (probably because I labelled it a public network). Again, these are new, never connected with before, wireless networks. I always promptly disconnect from them but don't want to have to be on constant guard for an auto connection to a malicious network.
This began about a month ago, as I recall, Win 7 did not behave like this in the past, I didn't monkey with wifi settings, and don't use a 3rd party connection manager. I did have to download some internet security certificates for army website access but I don't think that should mess with network settings.
Any ideas how I can tell Win7 cease automatically connecting to networks or, at least, to prompt me for a confirmation before connecting?
Best Answer
The OP's issue is indeed very frustrating since I get the same problem. I had to spend quite some time to find a solution. I realized that this only started occuring after I updated my Intel drivers. So, try this it worked for me: