Imagine Your Friend Gets a Couple of Emails (Just Like the Ones I Received)

2781 - Homework #1

Imagine your friend gets a couple of emails (just like the ones I received):

What are 3 important pieces of advice you would give them:

1 ______

______

2______

______

3______

______

2781 - Homework #2

Read the following article (from stuff.co.nz)

Hackers invade department website

19 January 2006 By REUBEN SCHWARZ

The Labour Department sent nearly 3000 virus-infected e-mails to unsuspecting members of the public after its website was breached by a hacker.

The e-mails, all with the subject line "Important Update Information", asked people who subscribed to newsletters published by the department to download a security program from a link in the message.

However, the program was a virus that infected computers, allowing hackers to steal information.

The department said the hackers guessed an administrator's password to hack into its website and steal its e-mail subscription lists.

"Basically, someone deliberately trying to enter the website got lucky," acting corporate deputy secretary Raewyn Pointon said.

Nick Bolton, director of Christchurch security firm Firetrust, identified the virus in the e-mail as a "trojan horse" program. Such programs hide themselves and allow hackers to take control of a computer.

In this case, the virus seemed to take pictures of computer screens to steal information to send to a computer in Beijing. This information could include passwords to online bank accounts and credit card details.

Mr Bolton said the virus looked "reasonably sophisticated".

Many major anti-virus programs did not detect the virus, so anyone who did download the file might not realise their computer was infected.

The department did not know whether anyone downloaded the file. The department contacted the 2900 recipients of the e-mail yesterday to apologise and advise them to delete it.

Ms Pointon said the guessed password had since been "significantly changed" but no other major changes would be made to the security of the department's website.

Andy Prow, managing director of Wellington firm Aura Software Security, said it was extremely difficult to guess a good password without a "brute force" attack that used special software to bombard a website with random attempts tilltill one worked.

The Labour Department did not believe such software was used in this case.

"The possible combinations of usernames and passwords are immense and the possibility of guessing a password is remote," Mr Prow said.

"For a password to be guessed, it would normally suggest a weak password policy."

What are three good rules to apply when choosing a password:

1 ______

2______

3______

What are three things to avoid when choosing a password (indicate reason)

1 ______

______

2______

______

3______

2781 - Homework #3

Read the following article (from stuff.co.nz)

Viruses spell doom for some providers

31 January 2004 By MICHAEL HERMAN

New Zealand's internet service providers (ISP) are disagreeing over whether the number of emails carrying the latest viruses has decreased, but all are warning users to be on the lookout.

Xtra said it blocked more than 2000 emails a minute carrying the new mass-mailing Windows worms on Tuesday, but that this had dropped to 1000 since then.

Telecom spokeswoman Katrina King said the attack figures for the latest viruses had not increased noticeably in the past 24 hours, but security experts had warned it would continue to place a strain on networks for some time to come.

"Traffic related to the virus has been reasonably steady since its peaks earlier in the week," King said. "We haven't had evidence of any particular spike in the last day or so."

But Ihug, New Zealand's first ISP to introduce email filtering almost three years ago, said its system was blocking record numbers of viruses as MyMail and MyDoom continued to blaze their way across the internet.

Duncan Shand, general manager sales and marketing at Ihug, said January 2004 had been an "awesome" month for viruses.

"We have stopped twice as many viruses as in our previous biggest month," Shand said.

Ihug blocked about 300,000 infected mails during September/ October when volumes of the Blaster worm and Sobig email viruses peaked, but Shand said MyMail and MyDoom were already a much bigger problem.

"This month we have done 600,000 and yesterday we blocked 200,000," he said, adding 423,000 of the month's total were MyMail infected items but that MyDoom, the newer variation, was speeding ahead with more than 100,000 items blocked in just one day.

King said users needed to clean up infected systems but warned that it was not always easy to tell if a computer was infected.

Most ISPs have published information on their websites on how to treat the viruses.

Can we rely on ISP’s to block all viruses? What responsibility do we have as computer users/PC owners?

______

2781 - Homework #4

A day in the life of Mr Daft

Mr Daft works at the Lickity-split ice-cream company as a research technician.

This morning, Miss Trouble has lent Mr Daft a floppy disk containing the latest computer game. Mr Daft copies it to his PC and plays it for 15 minutes.

After he has finished, he notices that many of his files seem to be missing. Mr Daft decides to e-mail the help-desk to come and fix the problem. While looking for the e-mail address, Mr Daft comes across a file containing the employee wages. “I’d love to know how much Miss Number, the accountant is making”, he says as he looks. “$65,000 a year, my goodness, I should have been an accountant!” he exclaims.

Mr Daft joins his colleagues for lunch.

“There’s fresh strawberries and cream on the menu today”, say Miss Number to Mr Daft. “How sad that you won’t be able to have any since you are allergic to strawberries.”

“How do you know that?” asks Mr Daft in surprise.

“I printed out the file listing staff illnesses to pin on the wall of the sick bay this morning for Mrs Nightingale. You never know when information like that may come in handy”.

“I don’t think I like everyone knowing about my medical problems” grumbles Mr Daft.

Mr Daft has been working on a new ice-cream formula that stops ice-cream from melting too quickly. He opens the file and is shocked to see that the last time the file was accessed was at midnight last night. “Someone must have read this file last night after I went home!” Mr Daft continues working on the formula for the next 20 minutes. Suddenly the lights in the office go out and the PC stops. After a couple of minutes, the lights come back on and Mr Daft starts his PC. When he opens his formula file he is disappointed to find that he has lost some of his work.

Mr Daft starts again! As afternoon tea approaches he smells smoke. He discovers that part of the building is on fire. He leaves the building.

After reading this list five (5) breaches of ethics involved in this story.

1 ______

______

2 ______

______

3 ______

______

4 ______

______

5 ______

______

2781 - Homework #5

A day in the life of Mr Daft

Mr Daft works at the Lickity-split ice-cream company as a research technician.

This morning, Miss Trouble has lent Mr Daft a floppy disk containing the latest computer game. Mr Daft copies it to his PC and plays it for 15 minutes.

Mr Daft joins his colleagues for lunch.

“There’s fresh strawberries and cream on the menu today”, say Miss Number to Mr Daft. “How sad that you won’t be able to have any since you are allergic to strawberries.”

“How do you know that?” asks Mr Daft in surprise.

“I printed out the file listing staff illnesses to pin on the wall of the sick bay this morning for Mrs Nightingale. You never know when information like that may come in handy”.

“I don’t think I like everyone knowing about my medical problems” grumbles Mr Daft.

Mr Daft starts again! As afternoon tea approaches he smells smoke. He discovers that part of the building is on fire. He leaves the building.

After re-reading this story, imagine you are a computer consultant for this company. What are five (5) changes (and/or rules) you would make to improve the computer network? (Include your reason why)

1 ______

______

2 ______

______

3 ______

______

4 ______

______

5 ______

______

2781 - Homework #6

John devises a program for a computer game. He shows it to Haley, and they spend many carefree hours enjoying the game, playing over their modems. One day, Haley shows the game to Kirsty, who asks Haley for a copy of it. Haley copies the program and gives it to Kirsty. He does not ask John first.

Answer these questions:

Is the game copyright? Why do you think so? If so, who owns the copyright?

______

Should Haley have given the game to Kirsty? Give a reason for your answer.

______

Has Haley committed software piracy? Give a reason for your answer.

______

Has Kirsty committed software piracy? Give a reason for your answer.

______

2781 - Homework #7

Identify the issues

For each task, choose ONE issue from the list that best applies to that situation. Write the corresponding letter (A to E) in the box.

Corporate Confidentiality
Individual Privacy
Software Piracy
Copyright.
None of the above.

Ryan is writing a book. He gives it to Susana to look at. Without asking Ryan, and without identifying her source, Susana uses an extract from his book in an article she is writing under her own name.

Stacey buys a new toaster from Tyler’s Appliances. Without asking her, Tyler gives her name to his sister Stephanie, who sells cosmetics door-to-door. Stacey is annoyed because she does not wear makeup, and Stephanie is a persistent salesperson.

Aaron is told by his boss that he is going to be made redundant. He obtains the latest product plans from the Research division and photocopies them, sending copies to all his firm’s competitors.

Todd is studying music at school. To make it easier to do his composition at home, he loads the composing software on to disks and takes it home to put on his computer.

Sarai goes to visit Jason, where they play a new computer game. Jason offers Sarai a copy, telling him it is OK because it is shareware. Sarai copies the game and takes it home.

Arama is in advertising. Whilst at work, he writes a jingle for a toothpaste advert. He likes the tune so much, that he brings it home, adds words and more verses, and gets his mate’s band to record it. The song is a great success, and sells millions.