Company could be responsible for clandestine file-sharing
PC owners have long been plagued by viruses and other malicious software that slow down PCs and annoy users with frequent crashes and loss of data. Businesses, especially, are too often burdened with cleaning up infected PCs because of employees who thoughtlessly download infected software for entertainment purposes.
One of the riskiest things employees can do is to download and set up peer-to-peer networks for free downloading of copyrighted music, videos, and games.
Peer-to-peer (P2P) networks are special networks designed to share data. A P2P network can be as simple as two PCs connected by a simple wire, or as complex as thousands of computers connected across vast wired and wireless networks spanning the Internet.
The main goal with a P2P network is the sharing of some, or all, of the data on a computer’s hard drive, which is legal, in and of itself.
There are many ways and reason for setting up a P2P network. Often businesses and individuals have legitimate needs for file-sharing, like word processing or spread sheets. In recent years, P2P networks have appeared, spanning the Internet for less wholesome purposes like swapping copyrighted material, including music, movies, and games.
The half-baked thinking of many implementers of P2P networks is that if it’s legal to share part of their computer with others, then it’s also fine to actively share and swap any file, even copyrighted material.
Organizations like the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA) don’t take kindly to expensively produced songs being ripped from CDs and made available to large groups of music lovers for free. Nor does the Software Publishers Association, which represents companies like Microsoft and Adobe.
According to Bob Marichak, account executive for Next Step Systems Integration (www.nextstepsys.com) located in Scranton, “It’s one thing to make one backup copy of a piece of music or software, it’s something quite different and 100-percent illegal to make copyrighted music, movies and computer software easily available to tens of thousands of others through a broad, worldwide P2P network. And if employees are doing this at work, even if the employer doesn’t know it, the employer can be in for some real trouble.”
The list of trouble or problems can be long: Virus infections, spyware infections, hindered productivity (employees playing games instead of working), losing the supporting an ISP (Internet Service Provider) (which means losing Internet access and all e-mail correspondence and having to find a new provider and then changing to new e-mail addresses).
The biggest trouble of all is serious -vigorous prosecution from the entertainment and software industry.
So what can businesses do to stay out of trouble? Marichak and his company, Next Step, have a lot of experience in this area and have some valuable tips (see box):
First, be aware of P2P software, which is readily available on the Internet.
Second, inform your employees with official policies that prohibit use of and participation in this sort of file-sharing.
Third, implement technologies that will prevent file-sharing, including special network software that doesn’t let users install anything on their desktop, closing specific communication “ports” on computers to prevent rogue connections with a P2P network, software that can inspect “packets” of data flowing in and out of a computer to determine P2P networking activity, and special filtering software like “IPCop” that stop undesirable P2P networking activities on large and small networks.
For small networks or individual computers, configure the built-in fire walls that often come with computers.
By: Andrew Ohrman
NEPA Business Journal