Journal #1

I would want to focus my career on roles such as Systems Architecture (cloud) that allow me to be creative. I feel like these kinds of roles would be more enjoyable to me because of the challenge they present on a day-to-day basis. These, I feel, would be most engaging and I would never get bored on the job. The roles that least interest me are the auditing jobs. These are typically monotonous  and I feel like I get bored being stuck on auto pilot.

Journal #2

There are many relationships between science and cybersecurity. First, there is always observation of an issue. In cybersecurity, that may be an unexpected increase in network activity or a decrease in system efficiency. The same scientific method comes into place when it comes to coming up with solutions to observed problems, testing those solutions, and communicating the results.

Journal #3

Privacyrights.org gives a visual representation of known data breeches across all major industries. It gives insight into which states have reports have the most reports breeches and how frequently breeches occur in industries such as finance and medicine. Researchers can use such information when looking into motivations behind why these attacks occur. Banks may be hacked for economic gain whereas hospitals may be hack with the purpose of exposing sensitive information such as social security numbers.

Journal #4

Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs states that human needs can be organized in a hierarchical structure. The first is psychological needs. This includes food, water, and shelter. Technology has helped me fulfill these needs in interesting ways such as Doordashing food to keep myself alive. The next need would be safety needs. This could also be thought of as needing a sense of security. I personally pay my bills online which give me a level of security and comfort that my payments will be received and that my basic necessities will be protected. The next need is love and belongingness. I use technology to communicate with family and friends to fulfill this need. Next, there is the need to feel esteem. I like to use technology to help me reach my personal goals which increases my self esteem. The final need is self-actualization, which can be thought of as self improvement. Reading ebooks is an example of how I use technology in this regard.

Journal #5

Motives ranking:

1. Political
2. Money
3. Recognition
4. Revenge
5. Entertainment
6. Boredom
7. Multiple reasons

I ranked political and money one and two because money and power are what the world is built on. Recognition is third because fame is a great motivating factor. Revenge is fourth because it would take an initial action for someone to retaliate, but it is above entertainment and boredom because these are less powerful motivating factors that power, money, and recognition.

Journal #6

The first fake website I found was joebiden.info. This website is designed by supporters of Donald Trump and is meant to spread negative information about Joe Biden. The real site would not have any negative information about the president. The next fake site I found was zapatopi.net. This site has a bunch of made up information about a tree octopus that does not exist. The real site would have verifiable information. The third fake site that I found was a webpage from abcnews.com that says Obama banned the pledge of allegiance in all public schools. It was easy to spot the misinformation on this site and render it fake. The real abcnews.com would not contain such blatantly false information.

Journal #7

It seems like they all are using technology to share and spread information. The pictures in the module seem to relate to the human factors engineering aspect of HSI in that technology allows humans to overcome limitations. In one picture, someone was snapping a pic of a fun moment that would otherwise be lost in time. The picture could then be shared so that others can experience the same joy.

Journal #8

After watching the video, I think the media influences our idea of cybersecurity in a positive way. Often times, in movies, it depicts hackers as the protagonists in the plot. They often show where the bad actor gets his or her motivation, which is usually never from a good place. Most importantly, the media shows what happens when hackers get caught. Not that this would keep people from hacking, but it is a good thing that the message is sent that hacking is bad.

Journal #9

I personally scored a 1.0 on the social media disorder scale. The items on the survey included failing to spend less time on social media when attempting to, having conflict with family and/or friends about social media use, and using social media to escape negative feelings. I feel that all of these could be characteristics of somebody who is addicted to social media. Outcome may be different in parts of the world where there is less to do outside. You could assume that those living in these area would have more screen time on social media apps and, in turn, would lead to an increase of people addicted to social media.

Journal #10

While traditional cybersecurity is in place to protect IT systems from being hacked, this article focuses on social cybersecurity. Countries such as Russia and North Korea attempt to hack people by spreading propaganda and misinformation to control what people think about certain issues. Something similar to this was popular with the ISIS militant group in the middle east who used propaganda to recruit people to join their cause. In fact, they were able to sway many American-born Muslims into becoming Islamic extremists, and some even carried out attacks on US soil. Information warfare is not going away anytime soon and actually has been ramping up as tensions increase overseas. Countries must understand social cybersecurity in order to defend itself from information warfare that could turn its own citizens against it.

Journal #12

The five most serious offenses from the list are:

1. Sharing passwords, addresses, and photos of others – this is an outright violation of someone’s privacy
2. Using other people’s Internet Networks – this could lead to their sensitive information being stolen
3. Using torrent services – it is always bad to steal a paid program
4. Collecting information about children – children are always a touching subject and should always be protected at all costs
5. Faking your identity online – usually this is deeper than just catfishing and it is to steal sensitive information or to gain unauthorized access

Journal #13

The speaker took an interesting path into digital forensics. He started out in the finance industry and seized the opportunity to jump into IT when it presented itself. I had a similar start to my IT career. I was working in a warehouse when a former military guy told me that they were hiring for help desk positions on the Norfolk Naval Base. Much like the speaker, I did not flinch or hesitate when the opportunity presented itself. A lot of the times, it is not what you know, but who you know and how you leverage what you have to get to where you are trying to go.