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Understanding Computer Viruses: What They Can Do, Why People Write Them
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by Jeanna Matthews
CSTA Member
Clarkson University
Potsdam, New York
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| | I am thrilled you are thinking about using this module on computer viruses with your students. It does not require any specific background material but will be most interesting to students who have used computers enough to be familiar with threats from computer viruses. It could be used successfully at either the middle school or high school level. Given the level of threats we experience from computer viruses to home and business computers today, I think this would be a worthwhile lesson for all students. It would be a good addition to an AP-level computer programming course or a general course focusing on using computer applications.
Objectives
In this lesson, students will:
- Learn how computer viruses and other malware attack computer systems
- Differentiate between front-door and back-door attacks
- Gain strategies for preventing both types of attacks
- Think critically about what computer viruses are capable of doing and the effects of computer viruses on our society
Time Required to Teach the Lesson
- One to two hours of lecture
- One to two hours for students to complete worksheets (computer with Internet access is required)
I designed the lesson to include a classroom instructional period with class participation, followed by a lab in which students could complete a worksheet alone or in groups. The lesson could be expanded to include a discussion following the lab and/or more in-depth reports done by students outside of class. For example, I recommend an open-ended discussion of the ethics of "hacking computers", the impacts of malicious programs on individuals and society as a whole, and the opportunity to use technical skills to benefit society instead.
I have included PowerPoint slides (ppt/322K) that could be used to guide the classroom instruction and discussion. Many of the slides' bullets are framed in a question-and-answer format. You could ask students to brainstorm or contribute ideas before the "answer" is revealed.
The worksheet (.pdf/34K) is a combination of review questions from the classroom instruction and open-ended investigation questions that are best answered through Web searches. In this way, students learn about valuable Web resources and get practice in doing research on the Internet. While the classroom instructional material should be accessible to a wide variety of ages and backgrounds, you may want to modify the questions to make the exercise shorter or easier depending on the background and interest of your students. In general, I have arranged the questions from easiest to hardest. The worksheet key (.pdf/34K) is also included.
Students will need access to a computer with an Internet connection to complete many of the questions on the worksheet on their own. You can also assign the worksheet as a group activity using a single computer and a projector.
If the students are working on a computer, I recommend giving them the worksheet as a Microsoft Word file and allowing them to add their answers to the file. This is especially helpful when saving their netstat output or copying definitions they find on the Web. Encourage them to note their sources for anything referenced or copied as good practice in knowing the difference between citing a reference and plagiarizing.
I believe this lesson will help your students better understand the threat of computer viruses—different ways they spread, what types of things viruses can do, why viruses are created, and what they can do to defend against them. It is a good opportunity both to teach them practical skills that will help them prevent damage to their family computers as well as an opportunity to talk about some of the new ethical challenges posed by the Internet.
I hope you find this lesson helpful. I would love to hear any feedback, questions or comments. If you find this lesson useful, you may want to consider an easy-to-use set of exercises I have written using a freely available program for network trace analysis. You can find information on these at www.wiley.com/college/matthews.
Jeanna Matthews is an assistant professor of Computer Science at Clarkson University in Potsdam, New York Her research interests include operating systems,computer networks and computer security. She is the author of Computer Networking: Internet Protocols in Action published by John Wiley & Sons and produces a weekly radio show, "Common Sense Computing". She leads several hands-on computing laboratories including the Clarkson Open Source Institute and Clarkson Internet Teaching Laboratory. Students in her classes and labs have been winners in a number of prestigious computing contests inlcuding the 2001, 2002 and 2004 IBM Linux Challenge, the 2005 IBM North American Grid Scholar's Challenge and most recently, the 2005 Unisys Tuxmaster competition. She received her Ph.D. and M.S. in Computer Science from the University of California at Berkeley and her B.S. in in Mathematics and Computer Science from Ohio State University. She is a member of the Computer Science Teachers Association (CSTA) and can be reached at jnm@clarkson.edu and jnm@acm.org.
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