Recently, cyber security on campus was highlighted for St. Edward’s University students, who were prompted to change their passwords for their online accounts.

In order to take all precautions to prevent the university network from being accessed and abused by computer hackers, officials said that the password changes were made in an effort to protect personal information by limiting the amount of time a hacker can have access to an account.

Everyone, including faculty and staff, with an account at the university provides sensitive information such as employment information, health information and payroll information, all of which are protected by a password.Changing a password on a regular basis makes it more difficult for hackers to break into accounts using computer programs.

“As a network, there is a shared responsibility to protect valuable information,” said David Waldron, vice president of Instructional Technology.

However, students’ e-mail addresses are available to the public through the St. Edward’s Web site directory.

Many students have taken note of an additional Internet access requirement this year. Over the summer, the I.T. Department implemented the Enterasys NAC Assessment Agent, which forces computers in the network to meet certain requirements such as internet antivirus. The program helps protect the St. Edward’s network, as well as university’s resources and sensitive information.

In previous years, the university used Clean Access Agent, but switched to NAC this summer after Cisco Systems decided to discontinue Clean Access Agent. Waldron said that NAC has the capability to increase the university’s bandwidth.

“Our new NAC has all the functionality of Clean Access plus many additional security features,” he said.

Waldron said that in 2003, a worm was released into the university’s network. Students brought their infected computers to campus and the worm spread “like wildfire.” This made the network that the university depends upon unusable and inaccessible.

The university’s I.T. Department focuses on preventing such incidents from occurring by implementing the NAC agent, and forcing students to occasionally change their passwords.

“The university wants people to know that no one from I.T. will ever ask for a password or user name,” Waldron said. “You should always be suspicious of an e-mail if it asks for sensitive information.”

A universal guideline and precaution that any internet user should always consider when checking their e-mail is to never provide personal information to an e-mail without verifying the request, Waldron said. If you need to contact a company, such as a bank that sent you the request, Waldron suggested doing it through a personal route, such as visiting the original Web site and seeking a telephone number.

As phishing becomes a growing issue, internet abusers are becoming increasingly talented at mocking professional or corporate graphics, allowing victims to believe the e-mail is legitimate, Waldron said.

Waldron also said phishers are after accounts to send out spam messages. If the St. Edward’s network becomes a victim of phishing, it runs the possibility of being blacklisted. To be blacklisted is the consequence of other organizations and companies no longer accepting e-mails from the university.

St. Edward’s is always looking for ways to improve internet security so that the internet and resources are available and safe to use, Waldron said.