30 Mar
1998
30 Mar
'98
11:58 a.m.
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30 Mar
30 Mar
12:31 p.m.
On Mon, 30 Mar 1998, Seth J. Morabito wrote:
So, what do you all do with old data you find?
I'm not religious about
this -- I don't necessarily think there's a "right" and a
"wrong". But
it's a worthy subject to talk about, and definitely has historical
implications. Hypothetically speaking, for instance, let's say you came
accross a tape with some interoffice memos and source code from Bell
Labs, 1970 -- UNIX development notes, memos to and from Dennis Ritchie
and Ken Thompson, that sort of thing :) Certainly very historically
significant, and I'd probably end up cutting it to CD or something.
But that's a pretty black-and-white example, I'm sure there's a lot of
gray area out there.
First, it's impractical to simply wipe out a disk as soon as you get it.
On Unix systems, there's sort of a separation between user data and system
data, but the separation is more poorly defined for an MS-DOS system for
example, and you want to retain the useful system data in almost every
case.
When there is personal data present on a system, I don't go out of my way
to view it. If I find some directories which contain docs or database
info, that's generally the first stuff I start deleting to reclaim space.
On most systems you find, it is difficult to make a correlation between
data and real people, so viewing personal data on such systems might be
ethically "ambiguous", but it's at least a level removed from going
through personal data on your company's systems, which is Clearly Wrong
(TM).
12:51 p.m.
On Mon, 30 Mar 1998, Seth J. Morabito wrote:
But unfortunately, it's _not_ that simple.
Curiosity got the better
of me, and I at least had to see what types of directories were on
the system. This system came from Lockheed Martin, and very much to my
surprise, contained lots and lots of Hubble Space Telescope simulation
information. Stuff I didn't understand, but nonetheless, I found myself
peeking at some of it -- how could I not? Something that cool and
interesting has quite the pull to a geek like myself.
Hell, as far as I'm concerned that's valuable data that should have been
preserved. I'm sure the Lockheed Martin folks kept a copy for themselves.
But look at it this way: in this case the data you found was paid for by
American (ie. your) tax dollars. So you have every right to look at it.
It's not like it was somebody's love letters.
I've since simply re-initialized the drives: My
thinking was, "This
data is not mine, I have no right to keep it. It may be sensitive,
even though I don't understand it. If Lockheed Martin had wanted it,
they surely made backups and transferred to another system." Since it
wasn't really historically significant _that_I_could_tell_, I felt
somewhat obligated to delete it without reading more.
Ugh! I would've kept it. It wasn't hurting anybody, and its not like I
was going to sell it to the Russians (as if they could do anything useful
with it anyway).
implications. Hypothetically speaking, for instance,
let's say you came
accross a tape with some interoffice memos and source code from Bell
Labs, 1970 -- UNIX development notes, memos to and from Dennis Ritchie
and Ken Thompson, that sort of thing :) Certainly very historically
significant, and I'd probably end up cutting it to CD or something.
But that's a pretty black-and-white example, I'm sure there's a lot of
gray area out there.
I wouldn't lose any sleep over this issue. If you get a system from the
original owner with data still on it, ask them how you should proceed with
it. If the original owner is not available, use your best judgement.
Sam Alternate e-mail: dastar(a)siconic.com
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Computer Historian, Programmer, Musician, Philosopher, Athlete, Writer, Jackass
Coming Soon...Vintage Computer Festival 2.0
See http://www.siconic.com/vcf for details!
11:43 p.m.
[Data Privacy of retired systems...]
Well, I had to sign a Non-Disclosure thingie before I could take the 11/44
out of Knox. They were very interested that I destroy whatever wasn't O/S info.
They had student records and accounting stuff on there. In fact, they wanted to
magnet the harddisk until someone said it'd nuke servo tracks.
-------
2:42 p.m.
On Mon, 30 Mar 1998, Seth J. Morabito wrote:
I'm curious to know how people deal with old data
found on systems
they rescue/restore. The question was put in my mind recently by
A very important question for people involved in this hobby....
It kind of depends. I am a sys admin professionally right now, so I too
have a religion based around the personal privacy of users. But as the guy
responsible for what information people have access to, I am well aware of
what's on any systems that are sold/given away. Certainly something
important would have been backed up (Hubble stuff) but something sensitive
would almost certainly been erased. My company images and stores medical
records, about as sensitive as you can get. Short of the magnetic eraser,
any drive that leaves my immediate line of sight gets wiped as clean as I
can get it. Scientific/technical information that I come across I like to
look at, and sometimes it inspires me to learn what the heck they're
talking about. I'm not going to make copies and send it to the Chinese
government or anything, so I don't see any harm done by it. Of course any
personal mailboxes or notes get erased before my curiosity even knows they
ever existed.
Some people have looked at me like I was the most depraved criminal in the
world when I mentioned reading about this or that electronic device or how
interesting the schematic for a doo-dad was on an old system. It's a
personal choice, and they are responsible for putting it in your hands
anyway. Just have a little respect for personal privacy and use your own
judgement.
Aaron
5:17 p.m.
Just to to thrown in a little story of my own. Nothing like top-secret
international data or anything, but I once uncovered some old TRS-80 disks at
a local flea-market. So I check them out naturally. On them was some text
files of a very personal nature. Let's see... there was a draft of a letter
the man was writing for his wife... a very heated letter that talked about
splitting up and whatnot... very personal. Also, on there was some legal
documents actually going towards a divorce between the two. To make it more
interesting... the names on the documents, and apparently the previous owners
of the disks, were one of the local lawyers that we all know very well here.
Of course, they're still (happily?) married, and the documents were dated
around 1985.
Now, wouldn't you think he should have deleted that information? Do you think
I still have those documents? Well, honestly, I'm not sure if I do or not
around on floppy somewhere, but I doubt it. It had no interested to me, and I
certainly wasn't going to pass them around town!
That's enough of that boring story. But, it does prove a small if not large
point!
Catch ya' later,
CORD COSLOR
Aaron Christopher Finney wrote:
On Mon, 30 Mar 1998, Seth J. Morabito wrote:
--
___________________________________________________
| Cord G. Coslor : archive(a)navix.net |\
| Deanna S. Wynn : deannasue(a)navix.net | |
|---------------------------------------------------| |
| http://www.geocities.com/SiliconValley/Vista/4395 | |
|---------------------------------------------------| |
| PO Box 308 - Peru, NE - 68421 - (402) 872- 3272 | |
|___________________________________________________| |
\____________________________________________________\|
I'm curious to know how people deal with old
data found on systems
they rescue/restore. The question was put in my mind recently by
A very important question for people involved in this hobby....
It kind of depends. I am a sys admin professionally right now, so I too
have a religion based around the personal privacy of users. But as the guy
responsible for what information people have access to, I am well aware of
what's on any systems that are sold/given away. Certainly something
important would have been backed up (Hubble stuff) but something sensitive
would almost certainly been erased. My company images and stores medical
records, about as sensitive as you can get. Short of the magnetic eraser,
any drive that leaves my immediate line of sight gets wiped as clean as I
can get it. Scientific/technical information that I come across I like to
look at, and sometimes it inspires me to learn what the heck they're
talking about. I'm not going to make copies and send it to the Chinese
government or anything, so I don't see any harm done by it. Of course any
personal mailboxes or notes get erased before my curiosity even knows they
ever existed.
Some people have looked at me like I was the most depraved criminal in the
world when I mentioned reading about this or that electronic device or how
interesting the schematic for a doo-dad was on an old system. It's a
personal choice, and they are responsible for putting it in your hands
anyway. Just have a little respect for personal privacy and use your own
judgement.
Aaron 
31 Mar
31 Mar
3:09 a.m.
New subject: Apple ][+ Stuff
Cord:
You still have all of that Apple ][ software? I need to get a bunch
of applications, and AppleDOS for this ][+ for Tim Hotze. I think I
gave you a list of things, on the list a Floppy for the Timer/CLock
card.
In Particular:
*Thunderclock basic software by Thunderware for the Apple (Dos 3.3)
(Hope you still have this)
In general:
ANy of the games that will work with an Apple ][+
Any development tools for A ][+
Manual for the Apple BASIC (again, for ][+)
AppleDOS, and manuals, if any.
So, I'll pretty much take whatever you have; right now I've nothing.
Thanks!
Jeff
30 Mar
30 Mar
4:35 p.m.
Seth J. Morabito wrote:
I'm curious to know how people deal with old data
found on systems
they rescue/restore. The question was put in my mind recently by
my acquisition of a MicroVAX 3800, with three intact disks overflowing
with data that had apparently never been erased.
Well, on all the HDs that I have gotten, the only thing I will keep on the
HD is the operating system and any public domain/shareware utilities.
Everything else gets wiped (notice *wiped*, not just deleted.) Of the many
HDs I have run across, one of them contained the financial records of a bank
including those of a number of well known people around town. I do tend to
scan though the disk to see what is on it, but when I realized with this
stuff was, I just wiped the disk before it went out to someone else.
Had another instance where I had loaned out a HD to a business. When they
were through with it, they had some idiot, who passed themselves off as a
computer expert, replace the drive. They reformatted the drive thinking
that would be enough. Well, it would have been if they hadn't *really*
pissed me off by putting a label of "Big Fucker" on the drive before it was
returned to me. Long story made short, I recovered all the data off the
drive, broke the passwords, and returned the recovered data to the company
along with a few choice words about the lack of professionalism on the part
of the other "consultant". I think they got the point :).
1 Apr
1 Apr
3:05 p.m.
Why did that bother you so much? Maybe it was a compliment. The
first drive I got that was over a GB got labeled "Big F***er", and the
even larger drive which subsequently replaced it was "Son of BF", and
my current drive has the volume label "BF Lives!". Sounds like maybe
you could learn a bit about "professionalism" yourself...
On Mon, 30 Mar 1998 22:35:39 -0800, Marvin <marvin(a)rain.org> wrote:
that would be enough. Well, it would have been if they
hadn't *really*
pissed me off by putting a label of "Big F<snip>" on the drive before it
was
returned to me. Long story made short, I recovered all the data off the
drive, broke the passwords, and returned the recovered data to the company
along with a few choice words about the lack of professionalism on the part
of the other "consultant". I think they got the point :).
-Bill Richman
bill_r(a)inetnebr.com
http://incolor.inetnebr.com/bill_r
(Home of the COSMAC Elf Simulator!)
3:45 p.m.
Bill Richman wrote:
Why did that bother you so much? Maybe it was a
compliment. The
first drive I got that was over a GB got labeled "Big F***er", and the
even larger drive which subsequently replaced it was "Son of BF", and
my current drive has the volume label "BF Lives!". Sounds like maybe
you could learn a bit about "professionalism" yourself...
Your comments only deserve acknowledgement that I saw them.
3 Apr
3 Apr
2:28 p.m.
I guess my response should then be "Your comments acknowledging my
comments only deserve acknowledgement of your acknowledgement."
<Lighten up - sheesh!>
On Wed, 01 Apr 1998 21:45:41 -0800, you wrote:
Your comments only deserve acknowledgement that I saw
them.
-Bill Richman
bill_r(a)inetnebr.com
http://incolor.inetnebr.com/bill_r
(Home of the COSMAC Elf Simulator!)
9765
days inactive
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10 comments
9 participants
participants (9)
-
aaron＠wfi-inc.com -
archive＠navix.net -
bill_r＠inetnebr.com -
dastar＠wco.com -
DSEAGRAV＠toad.xkl.com -
Jeff.Kaneko＠ifrsys.com -
marvin＠rain.org -
sethm＠loomcom.com -
yowza＠yowza.com