Category Archives: Safe Computing

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ITS IA engages students with Cybersecurity Challenge

This year marked the 20th year that ITS Information Assurance (IA) has invited U-M students to take an online quiz to raise awareness about IT security issues and promote security and privacy best practices during October’s National Cybersecurity Awareness Month.  All U-M students on the UM-Ann Arbor (including medical students), UM-Dearborn, and UM-Flint campuses who scored 90% or… Read More »

SUMIT 2022: Safe Computing for Everyone

As part of this fall’s SUMIT series of weekly events, the Education and Engagement team of ITS Information Assurance (IA) presented on how they curate knowledge, develop training, and create awareness for U-M community members to protect themselves and the U. The team of Performance Support Analysts featured “Jen and the Matts” (Jen Wilkerson, Matt Ranville, and Matt… Read More »

Are you ready for Cybersecurity Awareness Month?

This fall, ITS Information Assurance (IA) continues the tradition of celebrating Cybersecurity Awareness Month with the annual SUMIT series of weekly events hosted by IA’s cybersecurity experts. SUMIT’s online sessions include: Cosign Retirement Drop-in Sessions: Unit IT who manage services that use Cosign authentication can learn how to smoothly transition from Cosign to Shibboleth (SAML or OIDC). Safe… Read More »

Remediation of insecure remote access protocols

Remote access protocols allow a computer to talk to remote systems. They allow system administrators to remotely configure, maintain, and manage systems, and provide individuals access to essential applications and data. Since the start of the COVID-19 pandemic, these protocols have provided needed convenience to users and system administrators who depend on off-site connectivity to campus resources.  However,… Read More »

New Data Protection 101 course – your shared responsibility to protect the U

U-M employees and community members all share in the responsibility to help protect U-M IT systems and data. However, some employees may not be aware of or sufficiently prepared for this responsibility. A new course in My LINC, Data Protection 101: Your Shared Responsibility, is now available to all faculty, staff, and students. It provides a brief overview… Read More »

Video: Protecting U-M from Cyberthreats

We live in a world of seemingly pervasive cyberthreats. From data breaches to ransomware disrupting business operations, to cyberattacks being a part of military operations, there are cyber incidents that make the news on an almost daily basis.  The Securing the University of Michigan video explores the cyberthreats we face and the actions the university takes to protect… Read More »

Catching up on The Feeling of Being Watched

On the day the U.S. Senate confirmed the nomination of the first Black female justice to the United States Supreme Court, four women of color engaged in an illuminating conversation about government surveillance. The conversation was part of an event, sponsored by Dissonance, Information and Technology Services (ITS), and Wallace House, that invited the U-M community to watch… Read More »

Transition from Cosign to Shibboleth Authentication

The ITS Identity & Access Management team (IAM) has finalized plans to reach key milestones that will remove dependencies on the Cosign authentication service by summer 2022. Cosign has been the university’s secure, single sign-on, web authentication system for more than 20 years. Originally designed at U-M, the open source software was once widely used across higher education.… Read More »

The Feeling of Being Watched virtual screening and discussion

Dissonance, Information and Technology Services and the Wallace House invite you to participate in a complimentary viewing of the film The Feeling of Being Watched, and accompanying post-viewing discussion.  Algerian-American investigative journalist, filmmaker, and Knight-Wallace Reporting Fellow Assia Boundaoui, grew up outside of Chicago, in an Arab-American neighborhood where most people believed they had been under surveillance for… Read More »

Log4J Zero-day Vulnerability and the U-M Response

In early December 2021, the world was faced with yet another massive zero-day vulnerability, when news broke that Log4j was being used to perform remote code execution and provide unauthorized access to servers. This vulnerability was quickly exploited to do everything from crypto-currency mining to ransomware installation.  Log4j is a piece of open-source software used by numerous vendors… Read More »

African Americans in cryptologic history

African Americans have served in the U.S. military since the revolutionary war, although the armed forces were not officially desegregated until 1948. Unfortunately, their service is all too often downplayed or not prominently known. One story that deserves highlighting is the cryptologic work done by William Coffee in the agency that would eventually become the NSA. Mr. Coffee… Read More »

Privacy Day keynote — Beyond privacy with Gabriela Zanfir-Fortuna

U-M celebrated Privacy Day for the fifth year through a month’s worth of programming co-convened by ITS Information Assurance and the School of Information. At U-M’s 2022 Privacy Day keynote presentation, Dr. Gabriela Zanfir-Fortuna, vice President for Global Privacy at the Future of Privacy Forum, walked her audience through the key concepts of privacy and data protection and… Read More »

Data Privacy Month: Privacy awareness in higher education

ITS Information Assurance kicked off Data Privacy Month with a presentation on Privacy in Higher Education by Autumm Caines, instructional designer at UM-Dearborn’s Hub for Teaching and Learning Resources. Autumm set the stage for an engaging Zoom session by using compelling examples to shine the light on inherent issues associated with algorithmic profiling and predictive technology. She introduced… Read More »

ITS Service Center uses Disaster Recovery Plan to adapt quickly

On December 7, due to an outage with AWS US-East-1, the Information and Technology Services (ITS) Server Center’s Amazon Connect call center software could not receive calls or chats, leaving callers getting only a busy signal and chatters getting no response at all. While multiple systems were impacted (including Canvas, MiVideo, and Code42 Crashplan), the Service Center turned… Read More »