Re: need participants for an international study

"Monica" wrote:

> I'm conducting an international study on individuals' attitudes towards
> how computers should be used at work and views on how responsible
> employers should be when it comes to protecting our computers from
> spyware and viruses. I still need about 450 indviduals to complete the
> survey.
>
> I would really appreciate it if people could complete the survey, found
> here:
> http://weblab.org.uk/cgi-bin/surfcontrol/page1e.pl

I notice you ask about firewalls (why plural?) on work laptop, but
not desktop-PC. That question looked like you were talking about
so-called software firewalls so I answered "no". In fact my laptop is
only online when connected to the company LAN, and naturally that is
protected from the big bad Internet by a well configured hardware
firewall.

You would also get the impression from looking at my answers that my
desktop PC (actually it sits on the floor) is vulnerable to attack
because it's totally unprotected. In fact, it's only used for tests,
research, or for running specialist software which may require a
different operating system. It's a stand-alone PC, is not allowed
to be connected to the corporate LAN or the Internet, so is no risk
to anyone.

> Moreover, I thought it would be interesting for the list and for me to
> post your views on this on the list. Do you believe that workplaces
> need to change/write policies on computer usage?

My company has a very strict written policy already. The machines are
all managed/configured/updated/monitored from a central server when
connected to the LAN. Those that aren't part of the corporate
infrastructure, like my desktop PC, are not allowed to be connected
to external networks.