School of Engineering and
Applied
Science Department of Computer Science CSci 1030 -- Technology and Society http://www.seas.gwu.edu/~mfeldman/csci1030/summer11 Prof. Michael B. Feldman, course instructor mfeldman@gwu.edu |
Every year, the term project in this course considers the social
impact of a technological issue that is "hot" that year. We've covered
Internet for all, electronic health records, election technologies, the
RealID Act, and so on. Each topic was chosen to study a
technology-society interaction that's "close to home" and directly
affects large numbers of Americans.
For 2011 we're going to look at Identity Theft. Merriam
Webster
online defines it thusly:
"the illegal use of someone else's personal information (as a Social Security number) in order to obtain money or credit"
and wikipedia says
Identity theft is a form of fraud or cheating of another person's identity in which someone pretends to be someone else by assuming that person's identity, typically in order to access resources or obtain credit and other benefits in that person's name. The victim of identity theft (here meaning the person whose identity has been assumed by the identity thief) can suffer adverse consequences if he or she is held accountable for the perpetrator's actions. Organizations and individuals who are duped or defrauded by the identity thief can also suffer adverse consequences and losses, and to that extent are also victims.
The term identity theft was
coined in 1964 and
is
actually a misnomer, since it is not literally possible to steal an
identity as such - more accurate terms would be identity fraud
or impersonation or identity
cloning but identity theft has become commonplace.
Recent
Occurrences (two of
many examples)
Now we quote briefly from an April 2011, article
in
Wired while similar
stories were all over the media:
The PlayStation maker said it believes hackers now have access to customers’ vital information, including names, birthdates, physical and e-mail addresses, and PlayStation Network/Qriocity passwords, logins, handles and online IDs.
Even closer to home: in February 2011, the following notice was
circulated to GW e-mail users, and posted on http://helpdesk.gwu.edu:
***TECHNOLOGY
UPDATE: Phishing Scam! WARNING!***
WARNING: An email phishing scam is currently circulating GW
email addresses
disguised as official correspondence from The George Washington
University,
including the GW logo, titled "Your Gwu Email Suspension
Notification...."
Please note that the Division of Information Technology (IT) is
actively taking
steps to address the recent increase in phishing attempts. In the near
future we
will be enabling account lockouts for excessive failed login attempts
in an
effort to better defend the security of your account.
This is a reminder that you should NEVER reply to email messages asking
for
personal information, even if it is security related. No such e-mail
will
EVER come from GW or the Division of Information Technology help desk
asking
users to reply with information such as NetID, password, birth date,
social
security number, GWid number, etc.
In this course we're interested in the overall
impact on society of ID Theft, including public perception.
Your assignment is to research the topic as individuals, discuss it
as a class, and design a survey to
examine public
attitudes about the subject. I'll assign each
student will be assigned to one of several groups; each group will
develop its own survey, and deploy it on Google docs website. You will
collate and analyze the data, and each group
will write a report of its findings. ONE final project paper per group
is expected.
Because of the compressed course schedule, this project must
progress at the rate of one stage per week! Sorry about the fast pace,
but this is the only way to get it done in 6 weeks overall!
Week 2 -- Research report (8 points, due
Sunday,
5/29): Each student will
gain some background in the subject and write an individual report
(approximately 1000-2000 of your own words) that will discuss the
overall subject as you've learned about it. This is the only individual
phase of the project -- it's an individual deliverable because I want
to ensure that all students learn as much as they can about the subject
before jumping into the group work.
The Blackboard Discussions area for this course has a forum you can
use to discuss the subject, suggest references, and so on. You're encouraged to use the forum for
discussion, but your actual research report must be your own work.
Week 4 -- Survey Instruments due and deployed (due Sunday, 6/12): Each group will deploy its survey on Google docs. Be sure you recruit as many as you can of your own family, friends, etc. to take your survey! :)
Week 5 -- Preliminary Report on Survey Results
(8 points, due Sunday, 6/19): Each
group
will
collate, examine, and analyze its survey data and submit a report
providing
preliminary results. As in the draft, one member of each group will
submit the report via Blackboard; all members of a given group will
receive the same score (out of 8 points).
Week 6 -- Final Social
Impact Analysis Report (8 points, due SATURDAY, 6/25. NOT Sunday
--
Saturday is the last day of class!): Each
group will write a report
based upon
the data that contains an abstract, introduction to the subject,
discussion of
the research protocol, presentation of the findings, conclusions and
bibliography. Once afain, one member in each group will submit the
group's report.
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