The Sassor worm 1

[sleipnir214]

The author of the original Sassor worm apparently claims to have released it to help his mother's PC repair business.

http://zdnet.com.com/2100-1105-5209099.html?tag=header.newsfeed

My question is:

Do computer technology curricula in your area require computer ethics training, and do you think it would have kept this kid on the straight and narrow?





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[sleipnir214]

edfair:
SHDTM (Stupid Hormone-Driven Teenage Machismo) probably serves the same purpose as the tail-feathers on the Bird of Paradise. It is a way of saying, "See all the risks I take any yet I survive! This proves I am strong and quick! My genes will make your offspring strong and quick! Mate with me! Mate with me!"


CajunCenturion:
We go back to the problem with jurors' being non-technical. Parents aren't technically savve enough, in general, to be able to address the ethical issues of IT, and training all parents would be expensive. Train a few handsful of teachers, and you can train tens of thousands to children at once.

And not all organized religions place the same emphasis on applying reason to faith, morality or ethics.



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[CajunCenturion]

That's all true. I just don't think that the Public school system should be responsible for teaching the basics of what is right and wrong.

What if the hacker went to Private School? Just kidding.

Good Luck
--------------
As a circle of light increases so does the circumference of darkness around it. - Albert Einstein

 

[dkediger]

An issue with teaching ethics in the public school beyond the right/wrong of the law hinges on moral judgments.

Which begs the question of whose moral judgment?

Which begins to drag philosophy and religion into the picture as foundations of certain moral judgments.

There ain't a public school district in the US going within 10 miles of that one.

 

[bluedragon2]

The sad thing is that in a lot of schools, the kids are being taought ethics (the wrong way). Like the student athlete who gets passed along because of his talents on the field...



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[sleipnir214]

Ethics can be taught without going into the rougher larger waters of general morality, particularly IT Ethics.

Start with the question of who has the right to make use of the computing resources provided by a computer and why. Then go through the thinking of whether it is ethical to make use of computing resources without permission. After that, lead discussion of what does and does not consitute unauthorized use of computer resources. End up at the consequences society places on those who use computer resources without permission, particularly if that use damages the resources.

You don't have to get any closer to morality than Lockean property theory.



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[rosieb]

sleipnir214
>SHDTM
You can't separate adolescents from their hormones, somehow you have to make playing with viruses unsexy or unadmirable by their peers. Preferably they should be made to seem boring and mainstream. (And I have no idea how.)

The comments by the press don't exactly help that - and I'm not sure that punitive sentances would either, kids that age just don't expect to be caught.

I don't think that ethics really apply to that age group, no matter how well taught, peer pressure is paramount.

An interesting question; At what age does the ethics "gene" really kick in? I'd guess closer to 20.



Rosie
"Never express yourself more clearly than you think" (Niels Bohr)

 

[sleipnir214]

rosieb:

An interesting question; At what age does the ethics "gene" really kick in? I'd guess closer to 20.

For me, about 23 or 24. It's the age where considered thought about the greater world ben regularly supercede the hormones. Or as an old First Sergeant of mine once said, "Sooner or later you have to give little head the controls."


You're right -- you can't separate the adolescent from the hormones. Probably by definition. But you might be able to train the mental muscles of adolescents so that they would recognize the stupidity of some of their own actions.



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[sleipnir214]

Correction. My First Sergeant's quote should have read. "Sooner or later you have to give big head the controls"



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[rosieb]

I think it tends to come, not at a specific age, but when they are forced to take full responsibility for themselves.

Flat/appartment, job, responsibilities - no parental cushion to rely on, no feeling that if it all goes pear-shaped you can just go home, and Mummy will kiss it all better.

In the developed world, ecomomics tends to mean that "kids" take on that kind of responsibility much later, 25 year-olds still living at home (and still essentially infantalised). Compare that with 9 year-olds selling postcards in Istanbul - I know which I'd see as the most "adult".

So maybe the gene kicks in with responsibility.

Rosie
"Never express yourself more clearly than you think" (Niels Bohr)

 

[willir]

Some things to ponder...

- Apparently, the "kid" may also have created the netsky virus. The latest scoop on the guy...

http://www.globetechnology.com/servlet/story/RTGAM.20040510.gtibsasserb10/BNStory/Technology/

- He is 18 - old enough to drive a car, old enough to get drunk (in Germany), old enough to be a soldier, old enough to carry a gun, and in some countries, old enough to vote. He is old enough to have killed somebody. And he is old enough to realize that what he did was wrong.

- Numerous papers have reported the cost of the recent plague of viruses. They cost business money.

http://www.globetechnology.com/servlet/story/RTGAM.20040402.gtjackvirusapr2/BNStory/Technology/

And they can cost lives - hospitol, traffic lights, power plants, nuclear plants. (The North American black out in August 2003 apparently caused by a company that had previously been infected in Jan 2003 by the Slammer virus. Hmmm..., their power grid system takes a dump about the time the blaster virus goes ballistic -- just speculating, just being paranoid)

http://www.theregister.co.uk/2003/08/20/slammer_worm_crashed_ohio_nuke/

http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2003/08/14/national/main568363.shtml

http://www.cnn.com/2004/US/04/05/blackout.report/

- Next, we live in a global community. This is what the Internet has done to us. However, the laws and ethics are light years behind. Somebody writes a virus in a third world country -- it is unlikely "we" can not touch them. It may be unlikely there are the necessary laws in place to address the situation in all countries. What makes up the culture and ehtics in North America or Europe does not neccessary apply in other countries.

From my perspective, it will be a long, long time before we have the legal and cultural infrastructure in a global perspective to keep up with the cyber space crime which has been global for years.

I also believe that virus are a very serious threat, and should be treated as such where ever possible. A joke virus can be modified to a more sinister entity. You may lean to the left or to the right, but when it comes to something that can hurt many people, and cost million / billions, then it has to be treated seriously.

What to do...
I have always thought it was the developers of the applications to take on this responsibility. I have never been a big fan of bells an whistles software "you have mail ;-)". And I am hopefully that Microsoft and others will heed their PR and promises, and favour security and "meat" over the pizzaz and flash.

And hopefully, we as consumers, will have choices in buying secure vs flashy software.

What will happen to the Sasser Kid?
Probably get a light sentence.... and then will be hired by a software company to develope secure software.

 

[OhioBill]

As to the Great North American Blackout, that was FirstEnergy Corp. I worked for them as a contractor for several years, and the blackout was caused by human error.

It isn't the punishment, it's the surety of being caught that drops the crime rate. In this case the government may hang the little honor student out to dry, but I'm betting it won't slow the others down.

I maintain that a good virus deterrent is to switch to Linux and avoid the Micro$oft fiasco altogether.

 

[willir]

OhioBill

Thanks for the skinny on the power outage. I was just being paranoid -- it was quite a coincidence for the power outage to follow so closely to the balster virus with a company that got hit pretty bad by the Slammer virus. As an FYI, I really don't like to use company names outside of the large IT companys - especially one that caused millions in damage.

Nonetheless, I feel it is important to realize that it could happen.

Bang on with being caught as the best deteramt. Example: Nobody like photo radar.

I agree Linux is an alternative, but as it grows in popularity, crafty people will pay attention to the new OS.

 

[SemperFiDownUnda]

I don't believe that most kids that could design and write these worms can't understand the damage they can do.

I don't believe kids that spray paint walls don't understand they are doing something wrong.

I don't believe the 2 kids one town over from me that killed a retarded boy with baseball bats after luring him to the woods and tried to hide the body didn't know what they where doing was wrong.

Because people under 30 don't tend to have fully developed frontal lobs doesn't mean they should not be held accountable. People most often know they are doing something wrong they just don't exercise the self control not to do it and instead reach for the instant gratification.

Anyone that has sympathy for kids like this and believe that they could write the worm and know its local implication but not know the global implication need to pull their head out. These people that create these viruses just get their hands slapped. With billions of dollars lost because of these viruses I hope MS, IBM, HP, Oracle, etc support the capture of these people and start getting heavy sentences pushed out. 5 years jail for causing hundreds of millions or billions dollars of damage....is that reasonable? I'm not for lesser sentences for first offenses of serious crimes. If the sentances where more drastic then some of these people would think first.

Hope I've been helpful,
Wayne Francis

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[sleipnir214]

I don't think this is a matter of knowing right from wrong. It's a matter of having a screwed up deontic hierarchy.

If a person places too much emphasis on the wrong levels of his ethical responsibilities, then even if he knows the act is wrong (releasing a virus into the wild), another ethical responsibility (furthering the family's interests) will be too heavily outweighed, leading to the wrong action.

Nor am I advocating that this wackadoo be allowed off scot-free, with his screwed up view of ethical responsibilities as the excuse. Often, a trauma is just the thing to get someone's head screwed on straight, and some jail time sounds like just the trauma this kid could use.

Could some kind of formal education in IT ethics have made a difference?




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[dkediger]

Not knowing the guy's background, I'll add a few more hypotheticals - supposing IT ethics education is available:
[ul]
[li]If ethics is mandatory, and he's predisposed to sociopathy, do we push him further into that realm by, according to his view, attempting to make him conform?[/li]
[li]If ethics is mandatory, and he's naive; we've probably accomplished something.[/li]
[li]If ethics is optional, and he's antisocial, will he seek out ethical training?[/li]
[li]If ethics is optional, and he's naive, how do we convince him to participate.[/li]
[/ul]

Just furthering the discussion, no point I'm trying to argue here.

 

[carrr]

Could some kind of formal education in IT ethics have made a difference?

Dunno.

But maybe indentured servitude cleaning up several large networks that've been hosed by his handiwork might have a lingering effect.


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[edfair]

Probably not. Kids at that age are always wanting to test the limits. Throw a limit at them, they want to verify for themselves that it really is a limit they should accept.

I did it. My kids did it. My grandkids are doing it.

One problem is the lack of understanding on the part of the parents. Great that the kids have developed a passion for understanding computers, that can lead to a great career. But parents also need to dig to the heart of the issue and see if it is healthy.


Ed Fair
Give the wrong symptoms, get the wrong solutions.

 

[EBGreen]

Could some kind of formal education in IT ethics have made a difference?

Since it didn't occure, we will never know, however since the education didn't happen we do know that there was no possibility of affecting this individual's decisions.

[blue]"Well, once again my friend, we find that science is a two headed beast. One head is nice, it gives us aspirin and other modern conveniences,...but the other head of science is BAD! Oh, beware the other head of science, Arthur; it bites!!" - The Tick[/blue]

 

[sleipnir214]

TomThumbKP:
I don't know if your last post was an ineffective attempt at humor or that you did not understand my question. In either regard, I will rephrase.....


Can formal education in IT ethics have a positive effect on whether future virus and worm writers will release their creations into the wild, or should we just accept the damage these products do as a given part of doing business on the internet and rely on prosecution and punishment after-the-fact to be a deterrent?



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[EBGreen]

It was not an attempt at humor, although I realized after I posted it that what I was trying to say made more sense in my head than it did when I wrote it. I think it was Bohr that essentially said "Never express yourself better than you understand a concept" or something to that effect. I rarely have that problem. Sorry for the confusion.

What I was trying to get acrros is that we will never know if education would have made a difference in this case so it really isn't a debatable topic IMO. As for directly addressing the effect of education on future virus writers, I would take the second part of your last question first:

or should we just accept the damage these products do as a given part of doing business on the internet and rely on prosecution and punishment after-the-fact to be a deterrent?

I would liken this to driver's education. Teenagers are the worst drivers in the world. No amount of education will overcome their inherrant invicibility complexes. However, we have shown over many years that a teenager that is exposed to safe driving instructions from a trained instructor is safer than one taught by Mom or Dad. The punative penalties for porr driving are the same for both categories, so this can't be seen as the reason for the differences in safety.

[blue]"Well, once again my friend, we find that science is a two headed beast. One head is nice, it gives us aspirin and other modern conveniences,...but the other head of science is BAD! Oh, beware the other head of science, Arthur; it bites!!" - The Tick[/blue]