McGraw-Hill/Irwin ©2008 The McGraw-Hill Companies, All Rights Reserved

ETHICS AND

INFORMATION SECURITY

Opening Case

Sarbanes-Oxley: Where Information

Technology, Finance, and Ethics Meet

CHAPTER 4

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Chapter Four Overview

• SECTION 4.1 - ETHICS– Ethics– Information Ethics– Developing Information Management Policies– Ethics in the Workplace

• SECTION 4.2 - INFORMATION SECURITY– Protecting Intellectual Assets– The First Line of Defense - People– The Second Line of Defense - Technology

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Organizational Fundamentals – Ethics and Security

• Ethics and security are two fundamental building blocks that organizations must base their businesses on to be successful

• In recent years, such events as the Enron and Martha Stewart, along with 9/11 have shed new light on the meaning of ethics and security

McGraw-Hill/Irwin ©2008 The McGraw-Hill Companies, All Rights Reserved

ETHICS

SECTION 4.1

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LEARNING OUTCOMES

1. Explain the ethical issues surrounding information technology

2. Identify the differences between an ethical computer use policy and an acceptable computer use policy

3. Describe the relationship between an e-mail privacy policy and an Internet use policy

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LEARNING OUTCOMES

4. Explain the effects of spam on an organization

5. Summarize the different monitoring technologies and explain the importance of an employee monitoring policy

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ETHICS

• Ethics – the principles and standards that guide our behavior toward other people

• Issues affected by technology advances– Intellectual property– Copyright– Fair use doctrine– Pirated software– Counterfeit software

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ETHICS

• Privacy is a major ethical issue– Privacy – the right to be left alone when you

want to be, to have control over your own personal possessions, and not to be observed without your consent

– Confidentiality – the assurance that messages and information are available only to those who are authorized to view them

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ETHICS

• One of the main ingredients in trust is privacy• Primary reasons privacy issues lost trust for e-

business

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INFORMATION ETHICS

• Individuals form the only ethical component of IT

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Information Has No Ethics

• Acting ethically and legally are not always the same

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Information Has No Ethics

• Information does not care how it is used

• Information will not stop itself from sending spam, viruses, or highly-sensitive information

• Information cannot delete or preserve itself

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DEVELOPING INFORMATION MANAGEMENT POLICIES

• Organizations strive to build a corporate culture based on ethical principles that employees can understand and implement

• ePolicies typically include:– Ethical computer use policy– Information privacy policy– Acceptable use policy– E-mail privacy policy– Internet use policy– Anti-spam policy

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Ethical Computer Use Policy

• Ethical computer use policy – contains general principles to guide computer user behavior

• The ethical computer user policy ensures all users are informed of the rules and, by agreeing to use the system on that basis, consent to abide by the rules

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Ethical Computer Use Policy

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Information Privacy Policy

• The unethical use of information typically occurs “unintentionally” when it is used for new purposes– For example, social security numbers started as a

way to identify government retirement benefits and are now used as a sort of universal personal ID

• Information privacy policy - contains general principles regarding information privacy

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Information Privacy Policy

• Information privacy policy guidelines1. Adoption and implementation of a privacy

policy

2. Notice and disclosure

3. Choice and consent

4. Information security

5. Information quality and access

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Acceptable Use Policy

• Acceptable use policy (AUP) – a policy that a user must agree to follow in order to be provided access to a network or to the Internet

• An AUP usually contains a nonrepudiation clause– Nonrepudiation – a contractual stipulation to ensure

that e-business participants do not deny (repudiate) their online actions

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Acceptable Use Policy

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E-Mail Privacy Policy

• Organizations can mitigate the risks of e-mail and instant messaging communication tools by implementing and adhering to an e-mail privacy policy

• E-mail privacy policy – details the extent to which e-mail messages may be read by others

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E-Mail Privacy Policy

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E-Mail Privacy Policy

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Internet Use Policy

• Internet use policy – contains general principles to guide the proper use of the Internet

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Anti-Spam Policy

• Spam – unsolicited e-mail

• Spam accounts for 40% to 60% of most organizations’ e-mail and cost U.S. businesses over $14 billion in 2005

• Anti-spam policy – simply states that e-mail users will not send unsolicited e-mails (or spam)

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ETHICS IN THE WORKPLACE

• Workplace monitoring is a concern for many employees

• Organizations can be held financially responsible for their employees’ actions

• The dilemma surrounding employee monitoring in the workplace is that an organization is placing itself at risk if it fails to monitor its employees, however, some people feel that monitoring employees is unethical

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Monitoring Technologies

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Monitoring Technologies

• Monitoring – tracking people’s activities by such measures as number of keystrokes, error rate, and number of transactions processed

• Common monitoring technologies include:– Key logger or key trapper software– Hardware key logger– Cookie– Adware– Spyware– Web log– Clickstream

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Employee Monitoring Policies

• Employee monitoring policies – explicitly state how, when, and where the company monitors its employees

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OPENING CASE QUESTIONSSarbanes-Oxley

1. Define the relationship between ethics and the Sarbanes-Oxley Act

2. Why is records management an area of concern for the entire organization and not just the IT department?

3. Identify two policies an organization can implement to achieve Sarbanes-Oxley compliance?

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OPENING CASE QUESTIONSSarbanes-Oxley

4. What ethical dilemmas are being solved by implementing Sarbanes-Oxley?

5. What is the biggest roadblock for organizations that are attempting to achieve Sarbanes-Oxley compliance?

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INFORMATION

SECURITY

SECTION 4.2

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LEARNING OUTCOMES

6. Describe the relationship between information security policies and an information security plan

7. Summarize the five steps to creating an information security plan

8. Provide an example of each of the three primary security areas: (1) authentication and authorization, (2) prevention and resistance, and (3) detection and response

9. Describe the relationships and differences between hackers and viruses

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PROTECTING INTELLECTUAL ASSETS

• Organizational information is intellectual capital - it must be protected

• Information security – the protection of information from accidental or intentional misuse by persons inside or outside an organization

• E-business automatically creates tremendous information security risks for organizations

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PROTECTING INTELLECTUAL ASSETS

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PROTECTING INTELLECTUAL ASSETS

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THE FIRST LINE OF DEFENSE - PEOPLE

• Organizations must enable employees, customers, and partners to access information electronically

• The biggest issue surrounding information security is not a technical issue, but a people issue

• 33% of security incidents originate within the organization– Insiders – legitimate users who purposely or accidentally

misuse their access to the environment and cause some kind of business-affecting incident

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THE FIRST LINE OF DEFENSE - PEOPLE

• The first line of defense an organization should follow to help combat insider issues is to develop information security policies and an information security plan– Information security policies – identify the

rules required to maintain information security– Information security plan – details how an

organization will implement the information security policies

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THE FIRST LINE OF DEFENSE - PEOPLE

• Hackers frequently use “social engineering” to obtain password

– Social engineering – using one’s social skills to trick people into revealing access credentials or other information valuable to the attacker

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THE FIRST LINE OF DEFENSE - PEOPLE

• Five steps to creating an information security plan:

1. Develop the information security policies

2. Communicate the information security policies

3. Identify critical information assets and risks

4. Test and reevaluate risks

5. Obtain stakeholder support

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THE FIRST LINE OF DEFENSE - PEOPLE

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THE SECOND LINE OF DEFENSE - TECHNOLOGY

• There are three primary information technology security areas

1. Authentication and authorization

2. Prevention and resistance

3. Detection and response

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Authentication and Authorization

• Authentication – a method for confirming users’ identities

• Authorization – the process of giving someone permission to do or have something

• The most secure type of authentication involves:

1. Something the user knows such as a user ID and password

2. Something the user has such as a smart card or token

3. Something that is part of the user such as a fingerprint or voice signature

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Something the User Knows Such As a User ID and Password

• This is the most common way to identify individual users and typically contains a user ID and a password

• This is also the most ineffective form of authentication

• Over 50 percent of help-desk calls are password related

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Something the User Knows Such As a User ID and Password

• Identity theft – the forging of someone’s identity for the purpose of fraud

• Phishing – a technique to gain personal information for the purpose of identity theft, usually by means of fraudulent e-mail

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Something the User Knows Such As a User ID and Password

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• Smart cards and tokens are more effective than a user ID and a password

– Tokens – small electronic devices that change user passwords automatically

– Smart card – a device that is around the same size as a credit card, containing embedded technologies that can store information and small amounts of software to perform some limited processing

Something the User Knows Such As a User ID and Password

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Something That Is Part Of The User Such As a Fingerprint or Voice Signature

• This is by far the best and most effective way to manage authentication

– Biometrics – the identification of a user based on a physical characteristic, such as a fingerprint, iris, face, voice, or handwriting

• Unfortunately, this method can be costly and intrusive

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Prevention and Resistance

• Downtime can cost an organization anywhere from $100 to $1 million per hour

• Technologies available to help prevent and build resistance to attacks include:

1. Content filtering

2. Encryption

3. Firewalls

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Content Filtering

• Organizations can use content filtering technologies to filter e-mail and prevent e-mails containing sensitive information from transmitting and stop spam and viruses from spreading.

– Content filtering – occurs when organizations use software that filters content to prevent the transmission of unauthorized information

– Spam – a form of unsolicited e-mail– Corporate losses caused by Spam

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Encryption

• If there is an information security breach and the information was encrypted, the person stealing the information would be unable to read it

– Encryption – scrambles information into an alternative form that requires a key or password to decrypt the information

– Public key encryption (PKE) – an encryption system that uses two keys: a public key for everyone and a private key for the recipient

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Encryption

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Firewalls

• One of the most common defenses for preventing a security breach is a firewall

– Firewall – hardware and/or software that guards a private network by analyzing the information leaving and entering the network

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Firewalls

• Sample firewall architecture connecting systems located in Chicago, New York, and Boston

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Detection and Response

• If prevention and resistance strategies fail and there is a security breach, an organization can use detection and response technologies to mitigate the damage

• Antivirus software is the most common type of detection and response technology

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Detection and Response

• Hacker - people very knowledgeable about computers who use their knowledge to invade other people’s computers

– White-hat hacker– Black-hat hacker– Hactivist– Script kiddies or script bunnies– Cracker– Cyberterrorist

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Detection and Response

• Virus - software written with malicious intent to cause annoyance or damage

– Worm– Denial-of-service attack (DoS)– Distributed denial-of-service attack (DDoS)– Trojan-horse virus– Backdoor program– Polymorphic virus and worm

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Detection and Response

• Security threats to e-business include:– Elevation of privilege– Hoaxes– Malicious code– Spoofing– Spyware– Sniffer– Packet tampering

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OPENING CASE QUESTIONSSarbanes-Oxley

6. What information security dilemmas are being solved by implementing Sarbanes-Oxley?

7. How can Sarbanes-Oxley help protect a company’s information security?

8. What impact does implementing Sarbanes-Oxley have on information security in a small business?

9. What is the biggest information security roadblock for organizations attempting to achieve Sarbanes-Oxley compliance?

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CLOSING CASE ONEBanks Banking on Security

1. What reason would a bank have for not wanting to adopt an online-transfer delay policy?

2. What are the two primary lines of security defense and why are they important to financial institutions?

3. Explain the differences between the types of security offered by the banks in the case

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CLOSING CASE ONEBanks Banking on Security

4. What additional types of security, not mentioned in the case above, would you recommend a bank implement?

5. Identify three policies a bank should implement to help it improve information security

6. Describe monitoring policies along with the best way for a bank to implement monitoring technologies

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CLOSING CASE TWOHacker Hunters

1. What types of technology could big retailers use to prevent identity thieves from purchasing merchandise?

2. What can organizations do to protect themselves from hackers looking to steal account data?

3. Authorities frequently tap online service providers to track down hackers. Do you think it is ethical for authorities to tap an online service provider and read people’s e-mail? Why or why not?

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CLOSING CASE TWOHacker Hunters

4. Do you think it was ethical for authorities to use one of the high-ranking officials to trap other gang members? Why or why not?

5. In a team, research the Internet and find the best ways to protect yourself from identity theft

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CLOSING CASE THREEThinking Like the Enemy

1. How could an organization benefit from attending one of the courses offered at the Intense School?

2. What are the two primary lines of security defense and how can organizational employees use the information taught by the Intense School when drafting an information security plan?

3. Determine the difference between the two primary courses offered at the Intense school, “Professional Hacking Boot Camp” and “Social Engineering in Two Days.” Which course is more important for organizational employees to attend?

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CLOSING CASE THREEThinking Like the Enemy

4. If your employer sent you to take a course at the Intense School, which one would you choose and why?

5. What are the ethical dilemmas involved with having such a course offered by a private company?