Puzzle of the Day
You discover a security flaw in the operating system on your company's
computer. The flaw enables any user to read any other user's files, regardless
of their protection. You have several choices: you can keep quiet and hope
no-one else discovers the flaw, or tell the company, or tell the system vendor,
or announce it on the Internet.
- Suppose an exploitation of the vulnerability could be prevented by proper
system configuration. Which of the above courses of action would you take, and
why?
- If an exploitation of the vulnerability could be detected (but not
prevented) by system administrators, how would this change your answer to
question 1?
- Now suppose no exploitation of the vulnerability can be detected or
prevented. Would this change your answer, and if so, how?
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Department of Computer Science
University of California at Davis
Davis, CA 95616-8562
Page last modified on 2/17/98