Week3 - Computer Forensics

Identity theft is a very important thing to pay attention to for people and companies. People need to make sure they are doing everything they can to keep their private data from getting into the hands of the wrong people. There are many easy steps people can take to limit the chances of identity theft, but they are rarely attempted. Companies, on the other hand, have a much bigger obligation to keep their information private because they store information from many people including employees and customers. There are always stories of companies' credit card databases getting compromised and this information going public. There was also a cade of University of Wisconsin where their Social Security Number database got hacked.

For my company, it is crucial that all the company's information cannot be accessed but unauthorized people. If there is a website associated with my high tech house key and people order the keys from the website then credit cards numbers are going to be transferred. This MUST be secure, whether they are kept for easy access at another point for the buyer or if they need to be processed once. Also, we need to guarantee the customers that if they leave this website that their numbers will not be stored and will not be able to be accessed at a later. Although we learned that this is only possible in extreme measures, the computers will have maximum protect until it is time for them and their hard drive to be destroyed.

In the last blog, I talked about the company's use of spreadsheet for the customer and employees' information. This spreadsheet should not be accessed by anyone unauthorized. The computer needs to be password protected and excel needs to be as well if possible. It is always better to have too much security than too little. In the main version of the spreadsheet it might be smarter if the credit card number only showed up as the last four digits and the full credit card could only be accessed if someone is authorized.