I’m an IT guy in a large US city, responsible for the Network and Internet security for a company with 240 employees. Pretty good gig, right?
WRONG.
It couldn’t be worse. What should be a six-figure-a-year walk in the park is a fracking nightmare. And the reason why my bitter disdain and migraine headaches are the end-users.
Or – more appropriately – the end-Lusers.
These are the people who turn on their computers, their Blackberries, their iPhones, iPad, iPods, Androids, and any other electronic device you can think of, ignore any and all logic and reason. And while you’re thinking What a bunch of idiots, hold on to your seat because you’re probably one of them.
Impossible, you say. I’m responsible with my computer! I don’t do dumb things that let the bad guys into the network!
WRONG, again.
Almost everyone opens doors for hackers, you just don’t know you’re doing it. So that’s why I decided to start this blog. To tell a few stories about the utterly moronic things people do while they’re remotely near anything connected to the internet or plugged into an outlet.
I’m not going to tell you who I am, mostly because I need my job to pay the bills. Self-sacrifice isn’t part of the deal. Suffice to say that everything in here will be truthful. No matter how crazy – it’s actually happened.
So here we go.
Since this is the first blog, I’ll keep it really simple. How about something like writing your password on a Post-It note and sticking to the bottom of your keyboard?
That’s ridiculous. No-one would do that.
Yes, they would. And they do. It’s the equivalent of heading to the beach and sticking your money in the toe of your shoe while you’re swimming. The bad guys will NEVER think of looking in my shoe. You can’t believe it when you run back up the sand to your towel and find your cash and passport missing. OMG, how did they ever find it? How? How?!
Believe it or not, people actually write their passwords on stickies and slap them on the bottom of their keyboards. This, is about as dumb as it gets. If you do this, well done – you are keeping the hackers very happy and prosperous.
Please tell me how I’m supposed to protect an entire network of computers filled with sensitive information when you give the hackers instant access to whatever they want?
Do I sound a little jaded? Well, no kidding! It’s tough to get out of bed every morning cringing at the thought that overnight, someone, somewhere, has left the keys to the vault hanging from the lock.
I know today’s blog was ridiculously simple. But trust me when I tell you that this is going to get a lot better. I have enough stories to fill a 3TB hard drive.
That’s it for this end-of-the-rope IT guy.
Keep coming back. I promise this will be entertaining.
