OHIO Cruncher busted for SETI

[ProviaFan]

There's another possibility; maybe he's just following Lewis Black's advice on how to stay in good health: "The good die young, but pricks live forever!"

 

[GeoffS]

Let's see... he's a 63 yr-old programmer earning 60k... does anyone else think his firing wasn't about running SETI? I wonder how much a fresh-out-of-college-still-wet-behind-the-ears programmer would need to be paid to fill his spot... guess who's the hero for cutting 25k off the department payroll... :roll:

[EDIT] Typo...

 

[DanC]

Lanman - Very well put.

Geoff, I think you're onto something. The punishment doesn't fit the "crime." If this poor soul is over 60 - it's pretty OBVIOUS what's happening. It has nothing to do with SETI either. I'm just amazed that he hadn't been canned for age before this.

Age discrimination runs rampant in I.T. If you've got grey hair, you're out -- replaced by an idiot who can't troubleshoot their way out of a wet paper bag, and doesn't know how to do squat at the command line. IMHO, it's a serious mistake to put those with the experience "out to pasture" just because the kiddies will work for less. It'll come back to bite them to be sure.

These kinds of things are never about what they purport to be about. Just ask Dave. Something's rotten in Denmark - and only one side of the story is being told. I wonder if we could find this guy....

 

[RaySun2Be]

DanC,
An ANYWHO lookup on Charles E. Smith, Columbus, Oh. returned 2 results.

 

[Robor]

Originally posted by: Engineer
"I understand his desire to search for intelligent life in outer space, because obviously he doesn't find it in the mirror in the morning," Hayes said. "I think that people can be comfortable that security has beamed this man out of our building."

That guy is a fvcking jerkoff!!! :|:|:|

He needs to look in the mirror to see NON-intelligent life and also an @sshole!!!

Regardless, he should have gotten WRITTEN permission to run SETI.

I agree 100% with every comment. That jerkoff sounds like one of the condescending @ssholes I used to work with/for. I'm sure he's never made a mistake or error in judgement. :roll: I hope he gets hit by a freaking bus. :|

I had verbal permission to run SETI on the work machines I admin'ed. When the guy who gave me that verbal permission moved to another dept the new guy said "nay" to SETI so I had to remove it.

 

[dmcowen674]

Originally posted by: DanC
Lanman - Very well put.

Geoff, I think you're onto something. The punishment doesn't fit the "crime." If this poor soul is over 60 - it's pretty OBVIOUS what's happening. It has nothing to do with SETI either. I'm just amazed that he hadn't been canned for age before this.

Age discrimination runs rampant in I.T. If you've got grey hair, you're out -- replaced by an idiot who can't troubleshoot their way out of a wet paper bag, and doesn't know how to do squat at the command line. IMHO, it's a serious mistake to put those with the experience "out to pasture" just because the kiddies will work for less. It'll come back to bite them to be sure.

These kinds of things are never about what they purport to be about. Just ask Dave. Something's rotten in Denmark - and only one side of the story is being told. I wonder if we could find this guy....

I wrote an E-mail to the Journalist of the article but have not gotten a response.

 

[dmcowen674]

Originally posted by: Robor

I had verbal permission to run SETI on the work machines I admin'ed. When the guy who gave me that verbal permission moved to another dept the new guy said "nay" to SETI so I had to remove it.

Horrible how "For the Good of Mankind and Science" takes a backseat to someone's whim.

Says a lot about the sad State of affairs in the United States.

 

[Robor]

Originally posted by: dmcowen674
Horrible how "For the Good of Mankind and Science" takes a backseat to someone's whim.

Says a lot about the sad State of affairs in the United States.

In many cases I think it has more to do with laziness. It's easier to just issue a blanket, "no non work-related applications allowed", rather than learn about the project and evaluate any possible impact on the equipment. Of course this decision was made by the same people who don't believe in spending $40 on a UPS for end user PC's.

 

[Assimilator1]

Originally posted by: Moltres
Tom Hayes did what he was supposed to do. We do have a progressive disciplinary system in place that limits what offenses merit immediate termination. Everyone in every department at the State of Ohio is required to read and sign a disclosure that clearly states that such activity is grounds for 15 day suspension or termination. I suspect his "no big deal" attitude bought him the harsher of the two.

This issue has come up time and again. There is no justification for using a public resource for something it was not intended for. We have 3 newspapers here that would love to report such a misuse of funds. It is understandable how Mr. Hayes wants to make sure there is no sanction of this type of behavior by the State. I suspect they will withhold criminal charges and restitution unless Mr. Smith grieves his termination or the federal CMS department conducts an audit.

Are you nuts? ,whilst I can understand him being disciplined for running SETI without permission (it doesn't say he was at any point) ,sacking him is just plain stupid & totally excessive.

Its yet another witchhunt :|

"I understand his desire to search for intelligent life in outer space, because obviously he doesn't find it in the mirror in the morning

This cheap insult just shows his arrogant & unprofessional attitude......a jerkoff in other words!

NWM
but also because most of the users may also unwittingly be allowing access to the network for virii, spyware, etc. that can compromise the network and other attached resources.

Surely that could avoided be installing only DC projects from an 'approved list' (assuming of course that any were allowed in the 1st place)
Though I understand that would take more than 5 seconds of time from the admin

 

[networkman]

Well, since I'm not the one who gets to make the call, I really don't have too much to say about it, Assimilator1.

 

[iwantanewcomputer]

i think it's a bad thing to do but he shouldn't have gotten fired. they weren't using the puters and it is a good cause.

 

[Insidious]

I understand the emotion shown in this thread. I'm angry at the callouse way this guy handled the situation... but think about it...

Do you KNOW what SETI or any other DC program is REALLY doing in your PC? Do you know what your DC program is REALLY sending and receiving over the internet? IF your answer is yes.... how much work did it take you to get those answers. I am NOT talking about just taking some internet web sites word for it either.

This is serious stuff guys. Industrial espionage, sabotage, etc... is SERIOUS business. What company in it's right mind would allow this unproven computer activity behind their firewalls? While I have chosen to trust these DC apps to run on my personal computer, why in the world would you expect a company or a state government to open themselves up to these risks? Or to spend time and money proving any DC application was safe? Yeah that's a big one guys... proving the safety of these applications and the constant monitoring that would be required to make sure they stay safe is a BIG deal...

They tell their employees not to misuse the computers... not to run unapproved software... the employees in THEIR arrogance decide the rule doesn't apply to them and violate it willingly... then complain when they get fired for it!!!! I don't get it.

(With all due respect)

-Sid

 

[Assimilator1]

I still say it was a total over reaction by his company to fire him (assuming its a 1st offence & no warnings were given)

I take your point about proving a DC app though (I vaguely hinted at that to NWM) ,I can quite understand that no company or goverment would want to spend time or money investigating if a DC app is 'real' ,'official' & safe.
What DC really needs (if they really want this spare power that is) is an industry standard 'approved list' where thay have to complie to certain security standards to obtain this certificate.Naturally this needs to be ratified by IT security bigwigs of some sort.
Once on the list then companies (who don't require 'ultra high security standards') could just look at the list & add it to their 'approved software' as & when someone wants to run it.

.........I guess that's just asking far too much for these various people to do

NWM
I was just curious to your opinion seeing as your an 'insider'
I take it that your place doesn't allow downloading at all then if they'd be worried about users unwittingly allowing access to the network for virii, spyware, etc?

 

[Insidious]

**************

What DC really needs (if they really want this spare power that is) is an industry standard 'approved list' where thay have to complie to certain security standards to obtain this certificate.Naturally this needs to be ratified by IT security bigwigs of some sort.
Once on the list then companies (who don't require 'ultra high security standards') could just look at the list & add it to their 'approved software' as & when someone wants to run it.

**************

I'd love to see the publishers of the DC software working to make this happen. I realize these are hospital and University students/staff, but the responsibility would probably have to fall on them to create a "panel" of somesort to do the evaluations, publish the results and find a way to convince companies of their credibility.

I am thankful that there are so many individuals willing to run DC projects on their personal machines so it is not necessary for a corporate buy-in to make a DC project meaningful and sucessful.

Perhaps the corporate world just is not the best arena for this kind of work.

-Sid

 

[networkman]

Assimilator1, et al. Our users, both public and staff, can download all they want, but only managers(and other approved users like the IT Dept) are allowed to install software. That's not a complete defense against spyware and virii, but it has cut down significantly on the number of problems as compared to say three years ago(under a different IT Director).

We've also instituted Enterprise-wide antivirus solutions(which the users are not allowed to disable via policies(both paper and electronic(via AD)). And the antivirus software is not limited solely to virii, additional programs have been added to the watch list in the event that non-authorized personnel do manage to install software they're not authorized for; you wouldn't believe the logs I've seen of various attempts though. :roll:

 

[RaySun2Be]

Perhaps the corporate world just is not the best arena for this kind of work.

I disagree. provided the security and other issues could be resolved, the corporate arena has many resources that sit idle and could really help forward the advances in science and health. They have the horsepower and resouces and $$ that could really help make a difference and speed up the process.

 

[dmcowen674]

Originally posted by: RaySun2Be

Perhaps the corporate world just is not the best arena for this kind of work.

I disagree. provided the security and other issues could be resolved, the corporate arena has many resources that sit idle and could really help forward the advances in science and health. They have the horsepower and resouces and $$ that could really help make a difference and speed up the process.

But that goes against the grain of the Power Trip Nuts in the U.S. like the idiot that fired the Ohio Programmer.

 

[GeoffS]

Originally posted by: dmcowen674

Originally posted by: RaySun2Be

Perhaps the corporate world just is not the best arena for this kind of work.

I disagree. provided the security and other issues could be resolved, the corporate arena has many resources that sit idle and could really help forward the advances in science and health. They have the horsepower and resouces and $$ that could really help make a difference and speed up the process.

But that goes against the grain of the Power Trip Nuts in the U.S. like the idiot that fired the Ohio Programmer.

... whose idea of security is probably keeping his passwords taped to the bottom of his desk... :roll:

 

[Jeff7]

Originally posted by: GeoffS


... whose idea of security is probably keeping his passwords taped to the bottom of his desk... :roll:

Or under the monitor. Or in a file named "passwords.txt".


About the only drawback I can see to running a distributed computing program is the increased power consumption. That, vs a CPU Idling program (though installing this money-saver would likely also result in termination), would result in increased power bills, especially with a large group of PC's. It's not a heck of a lot though, at least based on what my Kill-A-Watt told me about my PC. With monitor, I get these numbers:
306W idle
325W Full load (Folding@Home)

19 watt increase. That's an XP2100+@2.1GHz.
So if your building has 200 PC's, and assume they all increase by just 15 watts each. 3KW/H. Lets assume 7 cents per KW/H. 24hrs a day, times 30 days = 720hrs/month.
I get $151.20 per month, for $1814.40 in a year.

So it does have its costs. Of course, a business with 200 decent PC's is probably making enough money to cover that. Heck, this hypothetical company's executive could likely make up that cost in a week's salary.

On the other hand, the fact that these administrators seem so arrogant, that they feel that anything a user installs is a threat placed on a PC by a moron, just weakens their case. And that they consider SETI@Home to be a danerous program is blatant ignorance.

One parting thought - if spyware finds its way onto a computer, perhaps by someone unwittingly opening a spam e-mail linking to a malicious HTML page, is that user therefore held accountable for installing software? Can they then be fired? Spyware can, after all, use up system and network resources in monitoring and reporting its host's computer usage habits.


I would say though, if they don't want to "waste" money on the extra power usage caused by full CPU loads, they should enable some kind of power saving on the PC's - put some in standby mode, or have them shut down entirely. You can use the RTC alarm to turn them on at a certain time every day, and schedule them to shut down as well.
Or use a CPU Idler.
And educate the people on the difference between the computer and the monitor, and that you can in fact turn off the monitor without losing your work. <--all too many people don't seem to know this information.

 

[Hyperfocal]

After reading the story again, I think it is very clear that Mr. Hayes defamed Mr. Smith in his comments to the newspaper. Making comments like he did would violate most company's HR standards and come very close to libel or slander.

He was within his rights to fire Mr. Smith, but he had no business badmouthing him to the newspaper.

Mr. Hayes may have opened the state of Ohio up for a big lawsuit.

 

[dmcowen674]

Originally posted by: Hyperfocal
After reading the story again, I think it is very clear that Mr. Hayes defamed Mr. Smith in his comments to the newspaper. Making comments like he did would violate most company's HR standards and come very close to libel or slander.

He was within his rights to fire Mr. Smith, but he had no business badmouthing him to the newspaper.

Mr. Hayes may have opened the state of Ohio up for a big lawsuit.

Title summary should say Lost his job and denegrated by Idiot.

 

[RaySun2Be]

Originally posted by: Hyperfocal
After reading the story again, I think it is very clear that Mr. Hayes defamed Mr. Smith in his comments to the newspaper. Making comments like he did would violate most company's HR standards and come very close to libel or slander.

He was within his rights to fire Mr. Smith, but he had no business badmouthing him to the newspaper.

Mr. Hayes may have opened the state of Ohio up for a big lawsuit.

I was thinking along those same lines myself. As an Ohio taxpayer, having to payout on a lawsuit sucks, but in this case I think it is justified. And I think Mr. Hayes should lose his job for those totally inappropriate and defamatory statements.

 

[Assimilator1]

Thanks NWM

Jeff7
Just one point ,Win2k &amp; WinXP have built in software cpu idlers/coolers
Btw an extra $1800/yr seems like a good argument against running DC even for a big company......unless they got some free advertising from it

Ray
I think Insidious was referring to the attitude of a lot of 'corporate' managers rather than the h/w

 

[dmcowen674]

Will Berkely blame SETI???

Afterall Georgia tried to blame Distributed.net.

10-22-2004 Hacker Breaks Into UC Berkeley Computer System

A computer hacker recently broke in to a computer system at the University of California, Berkeley, and gained access to the names and social security numbers of about 1.4 million California residents.

University officials confirmed the break-in and called it the worst computer security breach the university has ever suffered.

The university said state agencies and the FBI are investigating the incident, but that the perpetrator has not been identified.