| Defending
BC's Computers During the attacks, the total number of e-mails handled weekly by the BC server jumped from 2 million to more than 13 million (this at a time when an estimated 73 percent of all e-mail worldwide was being generated by the SoBig virus). “Unlike a corporation, we can’t simply shut any of our systems down and work on them on our own time,” said Corcoran. “This is an institute of higher education, and the Internet is a big part of that.” The Student Learning and Support Center run by Corcoran’s office reported a 65 percent increase over last year in phone calls and visits from students experiencing computer difficulties. Some members of the IT staff stayed overnight in their offices, catching at best a few hours’ sleep on the floor, during the most intense phase of the effort to stabilize the BC system—pinpointing security breaches, creating new blocks and filters at the systems level, and assembling software patches for BC computer users. David Escalante, director of policy and security for IT, said that the University maintains a robust security system, including licensing agreements with companies that make anti-virus software, as well as blockers and filters on its e-mail and Internet servers, but even this system has weaknesses, and the biggest of these is also the hardest to address: There are more than 10,000 computers on the BC system, and a security breach in any one of them can potentially affect them all. The key to future virus protection lies in encouraging BC’s computer users to protect themselves, according to Escalante. Newly developed diagnostic tools will allow the IT department to identify student and faculty computers that lack essential anti-virus protection, and a campaign is underway to educate the BC community on the importance of keeping anti-virus protection up-to-date. The IT department will also be enforcing BC’s Internet user-agreement policies more strictly. Users who fail to make required upgrades in computer security will be removed from the BC system until they comply. But the fact is that new viruses will always appear. In the fall, as Escalante sat for an interview, things were calm again. But he intended to keep his guard up. “It feels like a Christmas cease-fire in a war,” he said. Tim Heffernan Photo: Members of BC’s Information Technology Services team. Front row (from left): Cristin Richard, Ann Murphy, Jay Brislin. Second row: Tricia Thomas, John Gary, Leo McCarthy, Joanne Niccolazzo, Tom Borel. Back row: Ken Noel, Dave Escalante, Kevin James, Mike Bowery, Michael Clasby, Brian David. By Lee Pellegrini |
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The
simultaneous computer virus attacks of late August—SoBig, Nachi,
Blaster—flooded e-mail inboxes and severely taxed Boston College’s
Internet infrastructure, according to Mary Corcoran, executive director
of support services in BC’s Information Technology (IT) department.