TELECOM Digest OnLine - Sorted: Re: High School Student Charged in Computer Hacking Scheme

Re: High School Student Charged in Computer Hacking Scheme

hancock4@bbs.cpcn.com
20 Dec 2006 08:05:32 -0800

Korey Smith wrote:

> The same would be true for the corporate world and a school should be
> no different. If the IT department isn't doing their job in
> protecting the information about student's grades, then they need to
> held accountable.

The system had passwords so the IT department had done its job.

From the original article, it appears someone left their password
written out on a piece of paper and the student was able to find it.
Perhaps that particular worker shouldn't have written the password
down. It still appears the student had to rifle the desk; it wasn't
as if the password was prominently posted on a bulletin board.

Some organizations change their passwords regularly. This makes it
hard for people to keep remembering them and IMHO actually makes
things worse by encouraging written passwords.

As an aside, speaking of passwords and schools ...

Back in junior high we had two lockers, a hall locker and a gym
locker, with two combination locks. (Even with high tech it appears
the very same locks are in use today). For our hall locker it was
easy to write down the combination until it was memorized. But the
gym locker on the first time at gym presented a problem. We had to
take showers and there was no way or place to write down the number
(humans aren't equipped with pockets).

I understand schools have done away with showers after gym these days
and that's fine by me. It was embarassing for both boys and girls. (I
think that was the point -- to "toughen" us up.)

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