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The Ten Commandments of Ethical Computing

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The Ten Commandments of Ethical Computing

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1. Thou Shalt Not Use A Computer To Harm Other People.

2. Thou Shalt Not Interfere With Other People’s Computer Work.

3. Thou Shalt Not Snoop Around In Other People’s Computer Files.

4. Thou Shalt Not Use A Computer To Steal.

5. Thou Shalt Not Use A Computer To Bear False Witness.

6. Thou Shalt Not Copy Or Use Proprietary Software For Which You have Not Paid.

7. Thou Shalt Not Use Other People’s Computer Resources Without Authorization Or Proper Compensation.

8. Thou Shalt Not Appropriate Other People’s Intellectual Output.

9. Thou Shalt Think About The Social Consequences Of The Program You Are Writing Or The System You Are Designing.

10. Thou Shalt Always Use A Computer In Ways That Insure Consideration And Respect For Your Fellow Humans.

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The video below provides a very simplistic way of how students can prevent cyber-bullying from happening to them.

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What do you think could be done to reduce or eliminate such unethical behavior?

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What do you think could be done to reduce or eliminate such unethical behavior?

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I believe that educating students on the harmful impacts and effects of their cyber-crime would be a fantastic way to greatly reduce and eliminate these horrendous actions. If schools could create required classes purely for the sake of educating these students both the positive and harmful effects a computer has would be very beneficial for students to understand and maintain not only this commandment, but all of them. With that, making sure that students who get less than a B in the class will have to retake this course until they fully understand the harm they could impose on others by utilizing a computer. Another method to reduce/eliminate the violation of this commandment would be to impose stricter punishments for those who use a computer to harm others. For instance, students who engage in cyber-bullying, hacking, or any other cyber-crime to harm others should not just get detention. Some schools do not impose punishments for cyber-bullying, while others may have a lighter punishment. I believe that suspending students for a great amount of time (perhaps even indefinitely until reviewed by the Board of Education) would truly teach them a lesson on the severity of breaking this rule.

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Why do you think these violations  occur?

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Why do you think these violations  occur?

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I believe these violations occur for a multitude of reasons. First, students don't truly understand the ramifications they can impose on others based on their actions. For instance, by cyber-bullying, some students see it as a way to become popular and now have a platform to impose their harm on others. On top of that, they can even harm others without revealing their identity and, therefore, feel safe because they get to use a computer to verbally and digitally hurt someone. Students forget that their decisions to use a computer to harm someone - either by cyber-bullying or hacking, etc - can cause severe anxiety, depression, and even suicidal-thoughts on the victim. Students also believe that by using a computer to harm others, their identity won't be known if they choose not to disclose it; however, that is far from the truth because students get caught in these acts on various occasions. On top of this, students decide to commit cyber-crime for pure entertainment purposes. In the post titled "The Students who Hack Schools", they state that based on their peer group, students will commit cyber-crime "just for fun". This just truly goes to show that students are uneducated about the impacts computer impose on others, especially if they intentionally do so to harm others.

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Which of the Ten Ethical Computing Guidelines do you think students violate the most?

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Which of the Ten Ethical Computing Guidelines do you think students violate the most?

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I believe the Ethical Commandment that gets violated the most would be Commandment #1. With the digital age and social-media driven environment we live in now, we see many things that people post to harm and offend one another - also known as cyber-bullying. A lot of times, especially during the sixth-tenth grade period, students will go online and post something negative about an individual and constantly ridicule them. This even causes people to commit suicide. In fact, statistics show that students who have experienced cyber-bullying are nearly twice as more likely to attempt suicide. This rule covers a broad spectrum and is not just limited to cyber-bullying. Hacking is another example that students would do to harm others. To provide a personal example, while I was in high school, some students would hack the school district website and insert inappropriate pictures and comments.

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This video details how hackers can steal your data from your device without anyone even noticing. This is a great educational video to be more informed on how to be more cautious with your device!

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How Hackers Can Steal Your Data in Less Than 15 Seconds Using a USB Stick

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The article below provides an excellent description of these students who elect to hack schools and the reason they choose to commit this cyber-crime.

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Close your eyes and imagine what a juvenile cybercriminal looks like. You're probably picturing a super-tech-savvy, loner teen typing away in a basement.

But new research concludes that many young hackers tend to have the same qualities as other children who engage in more traditional troubled behavior out in the real, offline world.

What's more, male and female students have different motivations for hacking.

Society has the idea that "a hacker is a lone kind of sophisticated computer user," said Thomas Holt, a cybercrime expert at Michigan State University. He is the lead author of the study, which examines cybersecurity crimes within a broader pool of worldwide data on juvenile delinquency collected in 2007, the most recent year the data could be analyzed.

"But in reality," he said, "hacking doesn't have to be that complicated. It can be guessing someone's password to get into their email account. The entry points appear somewhat similar to traditional delinquency, which tells us that hacking may not be as unique as it's often thought to be."

That means when principals, teachers, and superintendents are trying to figure out which of their students may have the potential to get into trouble online, they may want to focus on not only the tech-savvy youths but also the kids who are getting into problematic behaviors at an early age, Holt said.

School district chief technology officers definitely grapple with the issue of student hackers, said Amy McLaughlin, the cybersecurity director for the Consortium for School Networking. And it's not necessarily a new phenomenon, she added, referencing "Ferris Bueller's Day Off," a 1986 movie in which the title character illegally enters his school's computer system to change his attendance record.

"A lot of the time it's not about being super clever, it's about being opportunistic," she said.

So if a student happens to be a teacher's aide during a free period, he or she may have access to a password and username and be tempted to use it-or be pressured by a peer to do so, McLaughlin said. What's more, there are times when a student might have only intended to have a little fun and break into a school's network without realizing the breadth of what they've gotten access to or what the consequence might be for changing or probing sensitive information.

"Students don't necessarily have all of the decisionmaking capabilities of an adult," she said. "That's why they are still in school."

Boys vs. Girls

Indeed, low self-control is one of the biggest predictive factors in whether students are likely to turn to cybercrime, Holt and his fellow researchers found. That was true for both boys and girls in the study.

Boys are more likely to become hackers if they use drugs, spend a lot of time watching television, or play a ton of computer games. And girls are more likely to turn to cybercrime if they hang out with peers who shoplift or engage in other types of petty theft. They're also more likely to become hackers if their friends like to frighten or intimidate people "just for fun."

That means, for girls, the pathway to cybercrime is "much more about their peer group," Holt said.

Boys are also more likely to hack if they have their own computer or smartphone. That kind of access to technology doesn't matter as much for girls, the study found. And in general, boys are more likely to turn to cybercrime than their female counterparts.

"There may be something unique about being a boy and having access [to a computer] that isn't necessarily there for girls," Holt said. That could be because, back in the 1980s and 1990s, using a computer was considered "boy-centric" behavior, he said.

"We've seen a very small representation of women in the hacker community, and in computer science," said Holt. "It's been a slow sea change."

McLaughlin agreed that educators shouldn't dismiss the potential of girls to engage in cybercrime. There "tends to be a bias that hacking is male activity, and it really isn't," she said. Girls "are just as capable and clever" and, in fact, more likely to "fly under the wire" because of the stereotype that they won't get into trouble online.

Environmental Factors

Other risk factors are environmental, Holt's study found. Student hackers of both sexes are more likely to have parents who are of higher socioeconomic status (meaning the family owns their own vehicle). Or the kids may have had additional involvement in piracy, for instance, obtaining movies online illegally.

Hackers may also be more likely to live in small towns or rural areas where there are fewer activities and less structured time, the study suggests.

Of course, students with little self-control might not be so great at cybercrimes that require a lot of time and effort beyond just guessing a password or finding one written on a Post-It note.

"They may hack; they may not be very good at it," Holt said. "If you're a low-impulse-control kid, you're not going to sit around and figure it out. Kids with high self-control might be more patient" and able to pull off more complicated cybercrimes.

One example of a disruptive cybercrime that didn't take much technical know-how to pull off: A 15-year-old high school student in Riverside, Calif., could face potential felony charges after he tricked teachers into handing over login details and passwords and then used that information to change his and other students' grades, The Press-Enterprise reported.

The student created an account that made it seem as though his emails were coming from a ranking school official. In the messages, he asked teachers for their usernames and passwords for school computer systems. Once the educators turned over the information, the student changed his own grades. He also lowered others' grades and added comments like "sleeps in class," the paper reported. His peers noticed the changes and alerted school officials.

So what can schools do to help mitigate the risks from teenage hackers? Holt suggests educating all students about the issue.

"Cyberawareness campaigns become important," he said. "Some of these simple hacks may be targeting their classmates."

What's more, there's "value in teaching kids that cybercrime will get you in trouble, and here's what you can do to protect yourself."

That advice goes for school staff, too, McLaughlin said. Chief technology officers should monitor their systems for unusual behavior, so they can respond quickly, she said. And they need to train staff to secure their passwords and lock their computers when they aren't in use.

Then there's the big question of what, exactly, to do with students who are accused of hacking their school's computers or other types of cybercrimes, especially of the more sophisticated variety. Cybersecurity experts urge schools to try to redirect these students to healthier and more productive online activities at any early age.

Danielle Santos, the program manager for the National Initiative for Cybersecurity Education, suggested that schools emphasize "the ethics piece" of hacking early on in students' educational careers. And she said schools should provide would-be juvenile cybercriminals with safe outlets to "explore that area of technical expertise that they already have and want to develop."

Schools should connect students who seem to have an interest in cybersecurity with mentors-in higher education and the workforce-who might be able to show them how they could channel their interest into a career, she said.

In fact, experts who study the future of work and technology trends expect that teenage hacking could continue to be a problem in the future. How big a problem? A recent report from the Cognizant Center for the Future of Work suggests that there will be a need for more "juvenile-crime rehabilitation counselors," who try to persuade student cyberhackers to put their technology talent to more productive use, in the not-too-distant future.

"For any student that is identified as engaging in those behaviors, there's an opportunity to help that student make different decisions," McLaughlin said. After all, cybersecurity professionals, with high-paying jobs, are trying to figure out how hackers think so they can thwart them. Students need to learn that "they can leverage and use those skills in a positive and legal way."

Published in Print: October 9, 2019, as Meet the Students Who Might Hack Your School District

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Meet the Students Who Might Hack Your Schools

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Close your eyes and imagine what a juvenile cybercriminal looks like. You're probably picturing a super-tech-savvy, loner teen typing away in a basement. But new research concludes that many young hackers tend to have the same qualities as other children who engage in more traditional troubled behavior out in the real, offline world.

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How To Ensure The Privacy Of Your Computer And Your Files

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How To Ensure The Privacy Of Your Computer And Your Files

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The article below talks about the steps we can take to ensure our files are secured and cannot be taken by other individuals.

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Dear Lifehacker,
After reading how easy it is for someone else to get onto my Wi-Fi network, and, similarly, thinking about how often I let my friends connect to my wireless network, I want to lock down the rest of my network so people connected to it can't go snooping around my computers-or at least secure my most super secret files and folders. What's the best way to go about this?

Thanks,
Insecure About Network Security

Dear Insecure,
We hear you. No one's stuff should be rifled through, whether you're protecting something as mundane as photos of you in a swimsuit or more sensitive information like your bank statements and tax returns. If you share your network with friends or neighbors or just want to take extra precautions, these steps can protect your most important data from prying eyes. Most of them, by the way, are similar to the settings tweaks you should make to stay safe on public Wi-Fi networks, because, basically, the concept is the same: If you have any doubt at all when it comes to connecting your computer(s) to others, take a safety-first approach.

Set Permissions on Files or Folders

You can password-protect important files or folders on your computer by editing the permissions settings, which control who can view or edit those items. By editing the permissions settings of a folder you can grant or deny access to specific users on your network (it's based on the computer accounts). Here's how to do it:

In Windows, right-click the folder, go to Properties, and open the Security tab. Then click the Edit button. You can then select a group or user name and choose to deny access to the folder. Someone trying to access it will be required to put in an administrator password.

In Mac, this works similarly. Go to the info properties of the folder and under Sharing & Permissions, you can set users' privilege (read only, read & write, no access).

Also don't forget to set up password protection on your network attached storage or any drives shared over the network on your computers.

Encrypt Your Drive or Folders

For extra security-and a less complex way to protect your files than on an account-by-account basis-, you'll want to protect the really private files on your network using encryption tools. Our favorite encryption utility can secure your entire system, a set of folders or files, or even external drives. It's also pretty easy to set up.

The built-in Disk Utility in Mac also is a great tool for protecting folders. Head to Applications > Utilities to find Disk Utility and create a new blank disk image which you can set to 256-bit encryption and add a password. Then drag files or folders onto the new .dmg drive you created to secure them.

Alternatively, if you have just a few sensitive docs you want to protect, use with its strong AES-256 encryption to zip up those files. Using 7-zip is just a matter of right-clicking to send files or folders to an archive or entering in the password to decrypt the zipped file.

Turn Off File Sharing and Network Discovery

If you're really concerned, look to your system's settings to turn off file and folder sharing, as well as network discovery. Ticking these options off makes your computer practically invisible to other computers on the network (at least to the lay person).

In Windows, this is under Control Panel > Network and Internet > Network and Sharing Center > Advanced Sharing Center. Turn off file sharing, printer sharing, public folder sharing, and network discovery.

In Mac, go to System Preferences > Sharing and uncheck all boxes. Then, under Security & Privacy > Firewall's advanced settings, check "stealth mode" to keep your computer from responding to requests to access it across the network.

Hide your Files

If you don't really need full-blown NSA-grade security, however, another option is to bury your files in hidden dot folders (e.g., ".hidden-folder") or, if you're so inclined, hide the file in an image, PDF, HTML or MP3 file via steganography. Neither are bulletproof, but they can add an extra layer of obscurity.

Enable or Setup a Guest Network

As many readers have pointed out below, if your router hardware supports it, you can set up a separate wireless network altogether for your guests to access, protecting your computers. This separate network can be open (unencrypted) or secured with a password. You can set it up with either a router that supports guest access or by using two wireless routers.

For some routers, all you have to do is go into the administration panel and select the guest networking option. Select that option and you have a convenient second network that doesn't allow access to anything on your network at all. (Guess access is just one of the features to look for when shopping around for a new router.)

If you have an older router without that option, however, all is not lost. You can just add another wireless router to your existing wireless network for a second wireless network.

For example, I have a wireless router/modem combo given to me by Verizon, to which I've attached a more advanced Netgear router (connecting these two via Ethernet cable and the LAN ports). Because these two routers are on different subnets (the Verizon router/modem has a 192.168.1.X subnet by default and the Netgear has a 10.0.0.X subnet by default) the information sent over each of these individual networks is separated and secured, so one network can be shared with guests and the other used privately.

Setup a Private VPN

If you want to share everything between two or more computers and encrypt everything in transit, you can set up your own private network using software like . The VPN, or virtual private network, securely connects your devices and encrypts all the data routed between them. So even if the info is intercepted, it can't be read-making VPN great for people who use unsecured networks or work remotely.

Lock Down Your Network

Finally, if you think there's an intruder on your Wi-Fi network, check your router's devices list to find out for sure. Regardless, if you haven't already, change the default router login and enable strong WPA2 encryption to prevent unauthorized users on your wireless network.

With the recently discovered Wi-Fi Protected Setup security hole, there are also some other considerations, which you can read about at the end of this article on hacking Wi-Fi using Reaver.

Also, since we've got our tinfoil hats on already, remember the good old security basics: enabling your system's firewall, creating strong passwords, and keeping your system updated. For a quick review, check out more low-hassle ways to secure your computer system.

Love,
Lifehacker

P.S. Got your own security tips or ideas? Let's hear them in the comments.

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How Can I Protect My Computers and Data When Someone Else Is Using My Network?

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Dear Lifehacker, After reading how easy it is for someone else to get onto my Wi-Fi network, and, similarly, thinking about how often I let my friends connect to my wireless network, I want to lock down the rest of my network so people connected to it can't go snooping around my computers-or at least secure my most super secret files and folders.