Postechians Concerned about IP Addresses Monitoring
Postechians Concerned about IP Addresses Monitoring
  • Reporter Chung Yu-sun
  • 승인 2012.10.17 17:22
  • 댓글 0
이 기사를 공유합니다

On September, a few students were caught playing Diablo 3, an RPG online computer game, on computers of the Department of Physics. To those students, warnings were sent to prevent future gaming on school computers. From this atypical incident, Postechians are concerned what range the monitoring expands to. There is a rumor that the school is developing a method to check who is on what server 24/7. Students are protesting that such measures violate individual’s privacy.
For two weeks, the Information Technology Services Team had sampled the 20 most often used IP addresses, the numeric address of a computer on the Internet, within POSTECH. After the data was obtained, the IP addresses were provided to the according department. This was done to identify the reason behind students’ relatively low academic grades and attendance rates during the spring semester. The professors were suspicious that gaming was the main reason, especially since Diablo 3 had just been released.

   

The rumor that aroused due to this incidence was declared to be false. Mr. Kim Gi Jong and Mr. Kim Dae-Heon  of the Information Technology Services Team stated that it is almost impossible to monitor everyone’s movement on the internet for 24 hours a day. There are too many users and IP addresses within POSTECH to enact the rumor. They, however, state that it is possible to tract a certain IP address that may be causing a disturbance to the university. In most cases, IP mapping is not used. But if complaint mails, sent from outside of POSTECH in regards to illegal downloading, reach the Information Technology Service Team, it tracks down the IP addresses. The current policy for illegal downloading is to block the user’s IP address and require the user to delete the downloaded file. Once the user follows the directed steps, the user is free to use the Internet again. Although more serious punishments should be enforced, technological uncertainties make it difficult to punish the user. 
As the University’s Internet  network is used by a mass group of people, students should refrain from illegal downloading. It is unethical and slows down the Internet connection for others. During the spring semester, about 195 complaint mails were sent to POSTECH. Most were caught through downloading copyrighted material from P2P sites. The price that the user pays when caught is for both downloading and uploading. Furthermore in regards to the issue of gaming, it does not slow down the speed of the internet. However, it is advised to play only up to the point that the students can manage their academic grades. In the meantime, Postechians are free to stop worrying about the rumor that the administration is planning to monitor the University’s Internet network for 24/7.