[Year 12 IT Apps] Data security

[Mark Scott]

“We must be as stealthy as rats in the wainscoting of their society. It was easier in the old days, of course, and society had more rats when the rules were looser, just as old wooden buildings have more rats than concrete buildings. But there are rats in the building now as well. Now that society is all ferrocrete and stainless steel there are fewer gaps in the joints. It takes a very smart rat indeed to find these openings. Only a stainless steel rat can be at home in this environment...”




Mark Scott
Daily Administrator
Luther
Plymouth Road
Croydon Hills Victoria 3136

Luther
Telephone (03) 9724 2000
Direct Line (03) 9724 2023
www.luther.vic.edu.au<http://www.luther.vic.edu.au/>
        [cid:luther_college_email.png] <http://www.luther.vic.edu.au/>

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From: itapps-bounces at edulists.com.au [mailto:itapps-bounces at edulists.com.au] On Behalf Of Roland Gesthuizen
Sent: Friday, 17 April 2015 2:50 PM
To: Year 12 IT Applications Teachers' Mailing List
Subject: Re: [Year 12 IT Apps] Data security

During 2008, I briefly amused myself with a price-checking terminal in a popular department store in the States whilst my wife was happily buying jeans that were on sale. Lacking a smart phone, I poked around the various menu option, the application halted and suddenly crashed. I suddenly found myself in a security hole where I could drop to a file explorer window. To my surprise, the device was running WIndows-Lite, a similarly primative OS. I could walk up and down the entire file tree, looking at the folder names. I could not see the contents but did have the odd privilege of making folders. From memory, I created a root level folder called “Please Secure Me”, took some souvenir photographs and departed when I was handed an armful of freshly purchased jeans.

I was trying to remember a remark that Harry Harrison once made about Stainless Steel Rats that live in technologically advanced civilisations.

—
Roland GESTHUIZEN
http://about.me/rgesthuizen

On 17 Apr 2015, at 12:42 pm, Mark <mark at vceit.com<mailto:mark at vceit.com>> wrote:

Found in my travels. This is from 2014, which makes the story even more chilling in 2015.

Banks everywhere are in a race against time to upgrade their ATMs before they become hot targets for hackers.

An estimated 95% of American bank ATMs run on Windows XP, and Microsoft is killing off tech support for that operating system on April 8 [2014]. That means Microsoft (MSFT) will no longer issue security updates to patch holes in Windows XP, leaving those ATMs exposed to new kinds of cyberattacks.

http://money.cnn.com/2014/03/04/technology/security/atm-windows-xp/

--

>> Witty sig goes HERE <<

Mark Kelly
mark AT vceit DOT com
http://vceit.com<http://vceit.com/>


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