Slashdot Mirror
Do IT Pros Abuse Their Power?
An anonymous reader writes "I have noticed that many airports and hospitals I've visited have some kind of internet usage policy in place. Some use software similar to Websense, which effectively blocks sites based on blacklisting them by category. A commonly used blacklist prevents users from accessing 'forums or discussion boards,' yet I find that often these networks allow users to access sites like Fark, Slashdot, Digg and other message boards that appeal to the technical culture one might find in the IT world. In your experience, do IT administrators abuse their supervisory powers? Has there ever been a backlash from users or management for doing so?"
In your experience, do IT administrators abuse their supervisory powers?
No. I want to be able to read about the latest threats, vulnerabilities, and news applicable to my job. I don't want an end user seeing that there is a new hack or proxy available for making my job harder. Likewise, at the college I work at, law enforcement students are provided classes on online threats, sexual predators, and human trafficing - they require access to websites and services that we would normally block - having a web proxy/web scanning solution that allows for group based access lists is an absolute requirement.
Has there ever been a backlash from users or management for doing so?
No. Typically if an IT admin is in charge of the web proxy, he's white listed his laptop/workstation's static IP (or DHCP reserved IP) so that the relaxed rules are only applicable to him/her.
I am IT the security guru for my company. We use whitelist based security across the board. If it doesn't provide a direct benefit to the company it isn't allowed. It simply isn't worth the risk. Our company has 0 malware infections in 15 years. Yes there are complaints from users but opening up to any level of risk to make them happy when it provides no company benefit is ridiculous. There is enough risk from legitimate business uses of the internet.
Digital is, by definition, imperfect. Analog is the way to go.