Name:
Practice PT - Big Data and Cybersecurity Dilemmas
To help explain your topic you will write responses to the prompts below. Your responses must provide
evidence of the extensive knowledge you have developed of your topic and its impacts. Write your responses
so they would be understandable to someone who is not familiar with the topic. Your response to any one
prompt must not exceed 300 words.
Individual Written Responses:
a. Describe the dilemma.
● What are the details of your specific issue or instance of the dilemma?
● Explain both sides of the issue and the potential beneficial and harmful effects. Your description
should include:
○ the populations that are impacted by both the beneficial and harmful effects.
○ the potential consequences of choosing one side of the argument over the other.
Although it seems like common sense to use data encryption in business and other entities for security,
Backdooring encryption algorithms is considered as the best way to enforce cryptographic control. The NSA
(National Security Agency) has taken the decision to impose “backdoors” in response to terrorist attacks and
robberies, which are the most common issues nowadays. For example, the attack in San Bernardino, CA,
revealed the lack security that our society has, resulting on the death of 14 people. Members of the FBI tried to
track and investigate terrorist's iPhone, ultimately cracking the PIN code on the device in order to find more
evidence from another possible attack to the nation from those people. The FBI required support from Apple and
suggested a “backdoor” in order to obtain more information about the criminals. After analyzing their decisions, I
decided to strongly support the idea of providing a “backdoor” among cyber industries because it will protect the
entire nation (the population in general) and will lead to find real criminals that live among us. However, this
decision also has its negative side, including the invasion to the right of privacy, even if it’s protecting the life of
tons of people. Organizations such as the Electronic Privacy Information Center and the Electronic Frontier
Foundation challenged the “backdoors” imposed by the NSA, saying that it would have the effect not only of
subjecting citizens to increased and possibly illegal government surveillance, but that the strength of the
encryption could not be evaluated by the public as its design was classified secret, and that therefore individuals
and businesses might be hobbled with an insecure communications system.
b. Explain the computing “innovation” that gave rise to this dilemma, both how it functions and how it is
used.
● Connect what you researched to terminology and ideas you have learned in this course, and
specifically during this unit.
● Your description does not need to be overly technical, but should aim to explain elements of the
technology that you think the “average” person might not know...
