Timothy Paul Cronan
Abstract
Who commits software misuse? Knowing the answer to this question will help organizations protect their information systems.
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Index Terms
- Piracy, computer crime, and IS misuse at the university
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Reviews
Steve Mahaney
Misuse of computer software and data is a pressing issue for all types of organizations. It puts at risk ethics, liabilities, and confidentiality. This article reports on a survey of misuse by college students and the rates of misuse by academic level (underclassmen, upperclassmen, graduate students), age, experience with computers, gender, and familiarity with campus usage policy. The article shows that misuse increases with time in college, age, and experience with computers. Misuse is more common among males. Surprisingly, misuse is more prevalent among those who have read their campus computer usage policies. The question asked was whether they had engaged in software misuse or data misuse in their lifetime. Since once innocence is lost, it stays lost, we would expect that lifetime misuse increases with time in college, age, or experience. Had the study asked about misuse in the "last year," might we learn that more experienced people misuse computers less each year as their age and experience grow__?__ The increase in lifetime misuse is consistent from underclassmen to upperclassmen, but decreases for students at the master's level. Advanced students are not a random sample of the younger groups; selection and retention may be strongly affected by ethics and commitment to academic integrity. In some cases, the data comes from very small samples; for example, 100 percent of students with less than one year of experience with computers have not misused software. However, the sample size is nine respondents. The article would be immensely more valuable with error estimates. The observation that misuse is more prevalent among those who are familiar with usage policies is the most intriguing. This could possibly be explained by other factors, such as when the respondent read the policy, whether familiarity with policy increases a respondent's ability to identify misuse, or sampling issues. The article acknowledges that this finding is at odds with other research. The article closes with recommendations about usage policies in universities and other organizations and some suggested research questions. For upperclassmen, the sample size appears large enough (on casual inspection) to suggest that misuse is higher among those who acknowledge reading the policy. This does suggest that further research to understand and increase the effectiveness of user education and policy is merited. Online Computing Reviews Service
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