Chap13 Security and Ethical Challenges

Chapter 13 Security and
Ethical Challenges
James A. O'Brien, and George Marakas.
Management Information Systems with MISource
2007, 8th
ed. Boston, MA: McGraw-Hill, Inc.,
2007. ISBN: 13 9780073323091

IT Security, Ethics, and Society
2Chapter 13 Security and Ethical Challenges
 IT has both beneficial
and detrimental
effects on society and
people
 Manage work
activities to
minimize the
detrimental effects
of IT
 Optimize the
beneficial effects

Business Ethics
 Ethics questions that managers confront as part
of their daily business decision making include:
Equity
Rights
Honesty
Exercise of corporate power

Categories of Ethical Business
Issues

Corporate Social Responsibility
Theories
 Stockholder Theory
 Managers are agents of the stockholders
 Their only ethical responsibility is to increase the profits of
the business without violating the law or engaging in
fraudulent practices
 Social Contract Theory
 Companies have ethical responsibilities to all members of
society, who allow corporations to exist
 Stakeholder Theory
 Managers have an ethical responsibility to manage a firm
for the benefit of all its stakeholders
 Stakeholders are all individuals and groups that have a
stake in, or claim on, a company

Principles of Technology Ethics
 Proportionality - The good achieved by the technology must
outweigh the harm or risk; there must be no alternative that
achieves the same or comparable benefits with less harm or
risk
 Informed Consent - Those affected by the technology should
understand and accept the risks
 Justice
 The benefits and burdens of the technology should be
distributed fairly
 Those who benefit should bear their fair share of the risks,
and those who do not benefit should not suffer a significant
increase in risk
 Minimized Risk - Even if judged acceptable by the other three
guidelines, the technology must be implemented so as to
avoid all unnecessary risk

AITP Standards of Professional
Conduct

Responsible Professional
Guidelines
 A responsible professional
Acts with integrity
Increases personal competence
Sets high standards of personal performance
Accepts responsibility for his/her work
Advances the health, privacy, and general
welfare of the public

Computer Crime
 Computer crime includes
Unauthorized use, access, modification, or
destruction of hardware, software, data, or
network resources
The unauthorized release of information
The unauthorized copying of software
Denying an end user access to his/her own
hardware, software, data, or network resources
Using or conspiring to use computer or
network resources illegally to obtain
information or tangible property

Cybercrime Protection Measures

Hacking
 Hacking is
The obsessive use of computers
The unauthorized access and use of networked
computer systems
 Electronic Breaking and Entering
Hacking into a computer system and reading
files, but neither stealing nor damaging anything
 Cracker
A malicious or criminal hacker who maintains
knowledge of the vulnerabilities found for
private advantage

Common Hacking Tactics
 Denial of Service
 Hammering a website’s equipment with too many requests for
information
 Clogging the system, slowing performance, or crashing the site
 Scans
 Widespread probes of the Internet to determine types of
computers, services, and connections
 Looking for weaknesses
 Sniffer
 Programs that search individual packets of data as they pass
through the Internet
 Capturing passwords or entire contents
 Spoofing
 Faking an e-mail address or Web page to trick users into
passing along critical information like passwords or credit card
numbers

 Trojan House
 A program that, unknown to the user, contains instructions that
exploit a known vulnerability in some software
 Back Doors
 A hidden point of entry to be used in case the original entry
point is detected or blocked
 Malicious Applets
 Tiny Java programs that misuse your computer’s resources,
modify files on the hard disk, send fake email, or steal
passwords
 War Dialing
 Programs that automatically dial thousands of telephone
numbers in search of a way in through a modem connection
 Logic Bombs
 An instruction in a computer program that triggers a malicious
act

 Buffer Overflow
 Crashing or gaining control of a computer by sending too much
data to buffer memory
 Password Crackers
 Software that can guess passwords
 Social Engineering
 Gaining access to computer systems by talking unsuspecting
company employees out of valuable information, such as
passwords
 Dumpster Diving
 Sifting through a company’s garbage to find information to help
break into their computers

Cyber Theft
 Many computer crimes involve the theft of
money
 The majority are “inside jobs” that involve
unauthorized network entry and alternation of
computer databases to cover the tracks of the
employees involved
 Many attacks occur through the Internet
 Most companies don’t reveal that they have
been targets or victims of cybercrime

Unauthorized Use at Work
 Unauthorized use of computer systems and
networks is time and resource theft
Doing private consulting
Doing personal finances
Playing video games
Unauthorized use of the Internet or company
networks
 Sniffers
Used to monitor network traffic or capacity
Find evidence of improper use

Internet Abuses in the Workplace
General email abuses
Unauthorized usage and access
Copyright infringement/plagiarism
Newsgroup postings
Transmission of confidential data
Pornography
Hacking
Non-work-related download/upload
Leisure use of the Internet
Use of external ISPs
Moonlighting

Software Piracy
 Software Piracy
Unauthorized copying of computer programs
 Licensing
Purchasing software is really a payment
for a license for fair use
Site license allows a certain number of copies
18
A third of the software
industry’s revenues are
lost to piracy
Chapter 13 Security and Ethical Challenges

Theft of Intellectual Property
 Intellectual Property
Copyrighted material
Includes such things as music, videos,
images, articles, books, and software
 Copyright Infringement is Illegal
Peer-to-peer networking techniques have
made it easy to trade pirated intellectual
property
 Publishers Offer Inexpensive Online Music
Illegal downloading of music and video is
down and continues to drop

Viruses and Worms
 A virus is a program that cannot work without
being inserted into another program
A worm can run unaided
 These programs copy annoying or destructive
routines into networked computers
Copy routines spread the virus
 Commonly transmitted through
The Internet and online services
Email and file attachments
Disks from contaminated computers
Shareware

Top Five Virus Families of all Time
 My Doom, 2004
 Spread via email and over Kazaa file-sharing network
 Installs a back door on infected computers
 Infected email poses as returned message or one that can’t be
opened correctly, urging recipient to click on attachment
 Opens up TCP ports that stay open even after termination of
the worm
 Upon execution, a copy of Notepad is opened, filled with
nonsense characters
 Netsky, 2004
 Mass-mailing worm that spreads by emailing itself to all email
addresses found on infected computers
 Tries to spread via peer-to-peer file sharing by copying itself
into the shared folder
 It renames itself to pose as one of 26 other common files along
the way

 SoBig, 2004
 Mass-mailing email worm that arrives as
an attachment
 Examples: Movie_0074.mpg.pif, Document003.pif
 Scans all .WAB, .WBX, .HTML, .EML, and .TXT files looking for
email addresses to which it can send itself
 Also attempts to download updates for itself
 Klez, 2002
 A mass-mailing email worm that arrives with a randomly named
attachment
 Exploits a known vulnerability in MS Outlook to auto-execute on
unpatched clients
 Tries to disable virus scanners and then copy itself to all local
and networked drives with a random file name
 Deletes all files on the infected machine and any mapped
network drives on the 13th of all even-numbered months

 Sasser, 2004
 Exploits a Microsoft vulnerability to spread from computer to
computer with no user intervention
 Spawns multiple threads that scan local subnets for
vulnerabilities

The Cost of Viruses, Trojans,
Worms
 Cost of the top five virus families
Nearly 115 million computers in 200 countries
were infected in 2004
Up to 11 million computers are believed to
be permanently infected
In 2004, total economic damage from virus
proliferation was $166 to $202 billion
Average damage per computer is between
$277 and $366

Adware and Spyware
 Adware
Software that purports to serve a useful
purpose, and often does
Allows advertisers to display pop-up and
banner ads without the consent of the
computer users
 Spyware
Adware that uses an Internet connection in
the background, without the user’s permission
or knowledge
Captures information about the user and
sends it over the Internet 25Chapter 13 Security and Ethical Challenges

Spyware Problems
 Spyware can steal private information and also
Add advertising links to Web pages
Redirect affiliate payments
Change a users home page and search settings
Make a modem randomly call premium-rate
phone numbers
Leave security holes that let Trojans in
Degrade system performance
 Removal programs are often not completely
successful in eliminating spyware

Privacy Issues
 The power of information technology to store
and retrieve information can have a negative
effect on every individual’s right to privacy
Personal information is collected with every
visit to a Web site
Confidential information stored by credit
bureaus, credit card companies, and the
government has been stolen or misused

Opt-in Versus Opt-out
 Opt-In
You explicitly consent to allow data to be
compiled about you
This is the default in Europe
 Opt-Out
Data can be compiled about you unless you
specifically request it not be
This is the default in the U.S.

Privacy Issues
 Violation of Privacy
 Accessing individuals’ private email conversations and
computer records
 Collecting and sharing information about individuals gained
from their visits to Internet websites
 Computer Monitoring
 Always knowing where a person is
 Mobile and paging services are becoming more closely
associated with people than with places
 Computer Matching
 Using customer information gained from many sources to
market additional business services
 Unauthorized Access of Personal Files
 Collecting telephone numbers, email addresses, credit card
numbers, and other information to build customer profiles

Protecting Your Privacy on the
Internet
 There are multiple ways to protect your privacy
Encrypt email
Send newsgroup postings through
anonymous remailers
Ask your ISP not to sell your name and
information to mailing list providers and
other marketers
Don’t reveal personal data and interests on
online service and website user profiles

Privacy Laws
 Electronic Communications Privacy Act
and Computer Fraud and Abuse Act
 Prohibit intercepting data communications messages, stealing or
destroying data, or trespassing in federal-related computer
systems
 U.S. Computer Matching and Privacy Act
 Regulates the matching of data held in federal agency files to
verify eligibility for federal programs
 Other laws impacting privacy and how
much a company spends on compliance
 Sarbanes-Oxley
 Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA)
 Gramm-Leach-Bliley
 USA Patriot Act
 California Security Breach Law
 Securities and Exchange Commission rule 17a-4

Computer Libel and Censorship
 The opposite side of the privacy debate…
 Freedom of information, speech, and press
 Biggest battlegrounds - bulletin boards, email boxes, and
online files of Internet and public networks
 Weapons used in this battle – spamming, flame mail,
libel laws, and censorship
 Spamming - Indiscriminate sending of unsolicited email
messages to many Internet users
 Flaming
 Sending extremely critical, derogatory, and often
vulgar email messages or newsgroup posting to other
users on the Internet or online services
 Especially prevalent on special-interest newsgroups

Cyberlaw
 Laws intended to regulate activities over the Internet or via
electronic communication devices
 Encompasses a wide variety of legal and political issues
 Includes intellectual property, privacy, freedom of
expression, and jurisdiction
 The intersection of technology and the law is controversial
 Some feel the Internet should not be regulated
 Encryption and cryptography make traditional form of
regulation difficult
 The Internet treats censorship as damage and simply
routes around it
 Cyberlaw only began to emerge in 1996
 Debate continues regarding the applicability of legal
principles derived from issues that had nothing to do with
cyberspace

Other Challenges
 Employment
 IT creates new jobs and increases productivity
 It can also cause significant reductions in job opportunities, as well as
requiring new job skills
 Computer Monitoring
 Using computers to monitor the productivity and behavior of employees as
they work
 Criticized as unethical because it monitors individuals, not just work, and is
done constantly
 Criticized as invasion of privacy because many employees do not know
they are being monitored
 Working Conditions
 IT has eliminated monotonous or obnoxious tasks
 However, some skilled craftsperson jobs have been replaced by jobs
requiring routine, repetitive tasks or standby roles
 Individuality
 Dehumanizes and depersonalizes activities because computers eliminate
human relationships
 Inflexible systems

Health Issues
 Cumulative Trauma Disorders (CTDs)
Disorders suffered by people who sit at a
PC or terminal and do fast-paced repetitive
keystroke jobs
 Carpal Tunnel Syndrome
Painful, crippling ailment of the hand
and wrist
Typically requires surgery to cure

Ergonomics
 Designing healthy
work environments
 Safe, comfortable,
and pleasant for
people to work in
 Increases
employee morale
and productivity
 Also called human
factors
engineering
Ergonomics Factors

Societal Solutions
 Using information technologies to solve human
and social problems
Medical diagnosis
Computer-assisted instruction
Governmental program planning
Environmental quality control
Law enforcement
Job placement
 The detrimental effects of IT
Often caused by individuals or organizations
not accepting ethical responsibility for their
actions

Security Management of IT
 The Internet was developed for inter-operability,
not impenetrability
Business managers and professionals alike
are responsible for the security, quality, and
performance of business information systems
Hardware, software, networks, and data
resources must be protected by a variety
of security measures

Security Management
 The goal of security
management is the
accuracy, integrity,
and safety of all
information system
processes and
resources

Internetworked Security Defenses
 Encryption
Data is transmitted in scrambled form
It is unscrambled by computer systems for
authorized users only
The most widely used method uses a pair of
public and private keys unique to each
individual

Public/Private Key Encryption

 Firewalls
A gatekeeper system that protects a
company’s intranets and other computer
networks from intrusion
Provides a filter and safe transfer point for
access to/from the Internet and other
networks
Important for individuals who connect to the
Internet with DSL or cable modems
Can deter hacking, but cannot prevent it

Internet and Intranet Firewalls

Denial of Service Attacks
 Denial of service attacks depend on three
layers of networked computer systems
The victim’s website
The victim’s Internet service provider
Zombie or slave computers that have been
commandeered by the cybercriminals

Defending Against Denial of Service
 At Zombie Machines
Set and enforce security policies
Scan for vulnerabilities
 At the ISP
Monitor and block traffic spikes
 At the Victim’s Website
Create backup servers and network
connections

 Email Monitoring
Use of content monitoring software that scans
for troublesome words that might compromise
corporate security
 Virus Defenses
Centralize the updating and distribution of
antivirus software
Use a security suite that integrates virus
protection with firewalls, Web security,
and content blocking features

Other Security Measures
 Security Codes
 Multilevel password system
 Encrypted passwords
 Smart cards with microprocessors
 Backup Files
 Duplicate files of data or programs
 Security Monitors
 Monitor the use of computers and networks
 Protects them from unauthorized use, fraud, and destruction
 Biometrics
 Computer devices measure physical traits that make each
individual unique
 Voice recognition, fingerprints, retina scan
 Computer Failure Controls
 Prevents computer failures or minimizes its effects
 Preventive maintenance
 Arrange backups with a disaster recovery organization

Other Security Measures
 In the event of a system failure, fault-tolerant systems have
redundant processors, peripherals, and software that provide
 Fail-over capability: shifts to back up components
 Fail-save capability: the system continues to operate at the
same level
 Fail-soft capability: the system continues to operate at a
reduced but acceptable level
 A disaster recovery plan contains formalized procedures to follow
in the event of a disaster
 Which employees will participate
 What their duties will be
 What hardware, software, and facilities will be used
 Priority of applications that will be processed
 Use of alternative facilities
 Offsite storage of databases

Information System Controls
 Methods and
devices that
attempt to
ensure the
accuracy,
validity, and
propriety of
information
system
activities

Auditing IT Security
 IT Security Audits
Performed by internal or external auditors
Review and evaluation of security measures
and management policies
Goal is to ensure that that proper and
adequate measures and policies are in place

Protecting Yourself from
Cybercrime

Chap13 Security and Ethical Challenges

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