This week's blog focuses on internet safety and the security systems that help provide it. I will also discuss any areas of concern that I have with the district's protocol for preventing malicious activity or hacking.
All students must first receive permission from a parent/guardian before they can use the internet at school. Furthermore, a copy of the district's "Internet Safety Policy and Acceptable Use Procedures" is given to all parents and students at the beginning of each school year. This ensures that everybody is informed of the district's rules and guidelines for using the internet.
Limiting Malicious Activity:
My district has a blocking/filtering software installed entitled "X Stop" which prevents students and faculty/staff from visiting inappropriate or potentially harmful websites or web pages. For example, if I were to open a web browser like Internet Explorer or Mozilla Firefox and type www.facebook.com in the URL box, an error message would be displayed saying, "X Stop: Your District Has Blocked This Page!"
By using this blocking/filtering software, the district ensures that students are visiting only educational sites and not wasting instructional time by exploring social networking or other non-educational pages.
Avoiding Hackers:
"X Stop" also prevents outside sources from invading or attacking the network in which students and faculty/staff use for internet browsing. This is vital because it allows those using the internet to browse safely without worrying about hackers stealing important data, files, or other information.
All internet users must log in on the district's network before accessing the internet. This also helps limit hacking because an authorized user name and password must be submitted before visiting the World Wide Web. Furthermore, all students and faculty/staff must make "strong" passwords, meaning they are fairly lengthy and include upper-case letters, lower-case letters, and numbers, and they are required to change their passwords every 30 days.
Requiring students to login before browsing the internet may prevent one from doing malicious things because administrators and moderators can trace each user's internet activity. This is also why the district stresses that passwords are not shared among co-workers or other people in the school.
Areas of Concern:
One main concern I have with these internet safety procedures is that younger students, like my fourth graders, aren't very organized and can sometimes be forgetful. These traits don't bode well when students are encouraged to make passwords that are hard to decipher. I fear that my students will make passwords that are too "strong" so that no other student will figure them out. Then, if my students happen to forget the password, we will have to go through the password-changing process and thus waste instructional time.
Another concern I have is that students may forget to log out of an internet session. This could allow other students with bad intentions to act maliciously in order to prank or bully the student whose user name is still logged in. However, I feel this could be a non-issue with proper teacher supervision.
Lastly, I'm concerned that "X Stop" blocks too many pages and can sometimes be a nuisance to an internet browser. For example, my personal classroom website was blocked at school when I first created it. In order for my students to view it, I had to contact my media specialist and have her add the site to the allowable websites list. I have also tried to view other websites and web pages that were blocked in the past. I feel this issue could be resolved by allowing teachers to control which pages his/her classroom can view.
Overall Reaction:
I feel the district has all the proper guidelines and procedures in place to make internet browsing a safe and enjoyable experience for students and faculty/staff. My concerns are minimal and I never have second-thoughts after allowing my students to explore the net. Though "X Stop" and constantly typing different user names and passwords can be annoying at times, it definitely helps out and allows our educational community to utilize one of the greatest resources available: the internet.
No comments:
Post a Comment