Cybersecurity
Introducing the information assurance and cybersecurity series
February 2, 2021
One fascinating thing about studying Informatics at the University of Washington is I have the opportunity to take special topics courses that teach me how technology is at play in the world.
I am currently enrolled in a class called Emerging Topics in Information Assurance and Cybersecurity where we read, write, and present on some of the cutting-edge aspects in this space. One cool part of this class is we get to choose a global corporation to be our "client" to analyze in this context. I chose Microsoft as my client and will be writing weekly reflections about their involvement in information assurance and cybersecurity as well as a long paper at the end of the quarter.
I decided it would be fun to publish my writing every week. Right now, I'll provide an overview of the prompt for each reflection:
Identify the global corporation or institution that you have chosen to research this quarter, and say why you chose it.
Most large U.S. corporations that do business globally adhere to the GDPR regulations. Look at one of the rights granted by GDPR in the context of prior data handling practices of your client. How have those practices changed?
Pick an appliance connected to the internet. (If your client is an IoT manufacturer, please pick one of its devices to do this assignment.) Do a thorough investigation to find out if its privacy settings can be configured; if its ownership can be changed; and whether or not it can be set to configure other devices in your environment.
From the readings and your own research, who are the three key nation-state players in cyberspace? Why did you choose them? Does your client operate in any of these nations?
From our readings, your research and our discussions, should there be an AI governance policy or law? Does your client engage in AI work? Does that firm have a corporate policy on AI?
Based on our readings and discussions, where will we find the best implementations of blockchain? If your client uses blockchain, please describe how it is used.
This is different from most of my blogging--which usually involves some code. But I'm excited to learn more about Microsoft holistically and maybe it will help you learn something, too!