ramblings of a {sys,net}admin…

I teach a course entitled “Linux Networking/Security”. A few weeks ago we covered chapter seven, “Security, Ethics, and Privacy”. The homework for that class was a three-part assignment in which the student plays the role of system administrator for a fictional financial services company named Safety First Financial Services, Inc.

The last part of the assignment read as follows:

You came in to work at Safety First this morning and reviewed your system logs, only to discover that a cracker had broken into the retirement calculator Web site during the night and downloaded the registration details and retirement plan summaries of about 400 customers. What will you do today?

I got some good answers to that question, which we discussed in class. Responses included things like contacting HR and Legal, removing the server from the network, attempting to find the exploited vulnerability, etc. The best response I received came from a student who broke down her day into steps:

I decided to put this one into steps. Some steps will be going on at the same time and these are not truly in a specific order.

1. Really loudly say “AAH FUCK!”
2. …

I laughed when I first read that, then thought for a moment and decided to give her extra points for that. Honestly, it’s the first thing I’d do too. =)