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TOP STORIES FOR FRIDAY, SEPTEMBER 02, 2005 Student Sues Online Term-Paper Vendors Colleges Dealing with Computer Security Concerns No Decision Yet from Judge on PATRIOT Act Case Massachusetts Ponders Going Open Source STUDENT SUES ONLINE TERM-PAPER VENDORS A graduate student has filed a lawsuit charging three online vendors of term papers with selling a paper she wrote without her permission. Blue Macellari is currently pursuing graduate degrees at Johns Hopkins University and Duke University. The paper in question, which was written when she was a student at Mount Holyoke College, was posted on Macellari's personal Web page in 1999 but turned up for sale on DoingMyHomework.com, FreeforEssays.com, and FreeforTermPapers.com, all of which are owned by an Illinois company called R2C2. Macellari said she did not give her permission to use the paper, which itself could violate honor codes at Johns Hopkins and Duke. John Palfrey, law professor at Harvard University and executive director of the Berkman Center for Internet and Society, said that the defendants will have difficulty prevailing if Macellari's complaint is accurate. On the question of whether the action would have an appreciable effect on the sale of papers online, Palfrey was less optimistic. Comparing Macellari's lawsuit to similar actions to limit spam, he noted that spam continues to grow unabated. "ItÂ’s hard to bring enough spam lawsuits to make a big difference," he said. Inside Higher Ed, 2 September 2005 http://www.insidehighered.com/news/2005/09/02/papers COLLEGES DEALING WITH COMPUTER SECURITY CONCERNS As the number of computers on college campuses rises, and as IT becomes increasingly rooted in campus activities, higher education officials find themselves facing expanding numbers and kinds of threats to vulnerabilities in computer security. According to the Privacy Rights Clearinghouse (PRC), 50 million people have been involved in data breaches over the past seven months, including more than 30 incidents on U.S. college and university campuses. Complicating the challenge to IT security staff is the historically open nature of academic settings, a characteristic often at odds with strong computer security. Another factor making life difficult for IT staff are the computers that students bring to campus with them, often with inadequate or poorly configured security features. Jack Suess, vice president of information technology at the University of Maryland Baltimore County, however, noted that of the 11,000 to 12,000 computers on his campus this year, "there's probably only 200 or 250 I'm really worried about." Christian Science Monitor, 1 September 2005 http://www.csmonitor.com/2005/0901/p12s02-legn.html NO DECISION YET FROM JUDGE ON PATRIOT ACT CASE U.S. District Court Judge Janet C. Hall has postponed deciding whether a Connecticut library may publicly disclose its identity as the institution whose records have been sought by the FBI under the PATRIOT Act. The act forces any organization whose records have been subpoenaed to be silent about the investigation, but the library in question and the American Civil Liberties Union have filed a suit, alleging that such restrictions are unconstitutional. Hall heard arguments from both sides this week but declined to issue a ruling until she hears more from the FBI. Observers noted that Hall seemed dubious of the government's claim that identifying the library would threaten the investigation. She said the FBI must demonstrate that risk, which it so far has not done. Pointing out that controversial provisions of the PATRIOT Act are under review by Congress, Hall suggested that allowing the public to see how the law is being applied could be an important factor in deciding whether the act will be extended. Chronicle of Higher Education, 1 September 2005 (sub. req'd) http://chronicle.com/daily/2005/09/2005090102t.htm MASSACHUSETTS PONDERS GOING OPEN SOURCE The state of Massachusetts is considering a proposal that would require all state documents to be compliant with the Open Document format rather than requiring proprietary software. The Open Document format is part of Open Office 2.0, a free software suite that is currently under development. Saying that the proposal is not "an anti-Microsoft initiative," Peter Quinn, chief information officer of the Commonwealth, pointed out that 200-year-old papers remain readable in their original format. He said he hopes that today's records will remain accessible far into the future, regardless of the comings and goings of various vendors and their products. Quinn said he hopes Microsoft will decide to support the format, which allows documents to be readable by any computer, similar to Adobe PDF. Microsoft's Alan Yates said the company would not agree to the Open Document format. He noted that Microsoft provides a free XML schema that allows users without Microsoft Office to read documents created by that suite of applications. Wall Street Journal, 1 September 2005 (sub. req'd) http://online.wsj.com/article/0,,SB112561152150829537,00.html ***************************************************** EDUPAGE INFORMATION To subscribe, unsubscribe, change your settings, or access the Edupage archive, visit http://www.educause.edu/Edupage/639 Or, you can subscribe or unsubscribe by sending e-mail to [EMAIL PROTECTED] To SUBSCRIBE, in the body of the message type: SUBSCRIBE Edupage YourFirstName YourLastName To UNSUBSCRIBE, in the body of the message type: SIGNOFF Edupage If you have subscription problems, send e-mail to [EMAIL PROTECTED] ***************************************************** OTHER EDUCAUSE RESOURCES The EDUCAUSE Resource Center is a repository for information concerning use and management of IT in higher education. 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