The Dark Side of Software Engineering Evil on Computing Projects

by Rost, Johann; Glass, Robert L.

• ISBN13: 9780470597170
• ISBN10: 0470597178
• Edition: 1st
• Format: Paperback
• Copyright: 2011-02-22
• Publisher: Wiley-IEEE Computer Society Pr

Summary

Scandal! Corruption! Software engineering?Industry experts Johann Rost and Robert L. Glass explore the seamy underbelly of software engineering in this timely report on and analysis of the prevalance of subversion, lying, hacking, and espionage on every level of software project management. Based on the authors' original research and augmented by frank discussion and insights from other well-respected figures, The Dark Side of Software Engineering goes where other management studies fear to tread -- a corporate environment where schedules are fabricated, trust is betrayed, millions of dollars are lost, and there is a serious need for the kind of corrective action that this book ultimately proposes.

Author Biography

Johann Rost has worked in the software industry for twenty years. He has taught at the University of Applied Science at Bingen, Germany, and at Politehnica University at Bucharest, Romania. Robert L. Glass is the author of twenty-eight books on computing subjects, including the bestselling Facts and Fallacies of Software Engineering. He has written nearly one hundred articles on computing subjects and has served as a columnist for three leading publications-Communications of the ACM (The Practical Programmer), IEEE Software (The Loyal Opposition), and Information Systems Management (Through a Glass, Darkly).

Table of Contents

Foreword	p. ix
Introduction	p. 1
What's the Dark Side?	p. 1
Why the Dark Side?	p. 2
Who Cares About the Dark Side?	p. 3
How Dark is the Dark Side?	p. 5
What Else is on the Dark Side?	p. 7
Ethics and the Dark Side	p. 8
Personal Anecdotes About the Dark Side	p. 11
Reference	p. 14
Dark Side Issues	p. 15
Subversion	p. 17
Introductory Case Studies and Anecdotes	p. 17
A Faculty Feedback System	p. 18
An Unusual Cooperative Effort	p. 21
Lack of Cooperation due to Self Interest	p. 22
An Evil Teammate	p. 22
Thwarting the Evil Union	p. 24
The Survey: Impact of Subversive Stakeholders On Software Projects	p. 24
Introduction	p. 25
The Survey	p. 26
The Survey Findings	p. 27
Conclusions	p. 34
Impact on Practice	p. 35
Impact on Research	p. 35
Limitations	p. 35
Challenges	p. 36
Acknowledgments	p. 37
Selected Responses	p. 37
Sample Answers to the Question: ôWhat Were the Motivations and Goals of the Subversive Stakeholders?ö	p. 37
Sample Answers to the Question ôHow Were the Subversive Attacks Discovered?ö	p. 45
Sample Answers to the Question ôHow Can Projects be Defended Against Subversive Stakeholders?ö	p. 49
A Follow-Up to the Survey: Some Hypotheses and Related Survey Findings	p. 56
References	p. 80
Lying	p. 81
Introductory Case Studies and Anecdotes	p. 81
Incidents of Lying: The Survey	p. 86
The Survey Results	p. 87
General Scope	p. 87
An Overview of the Problem	p. 88
Clarification of Terms	p. 89
Discussion	p. 93
Conclusions	p. 93
Limitations	p. 94
Qualitative Survey Responses on Lying	p. 95
What Can Be Done About Lying?	p. 96
The Questionnaire Used in the Survey	p. 107
References	p. 112
Hacking	p. 113
Case Studies of Attacks and Biographies of Hackers	p. 113
Cyber Terrorism and Government-Sponsored Hacking	p. 118
The Hacker Subculture	p. 121
Why They Are Called ôHackersö	p. 121
Motivation of Hackers	p. 121
Hacker Slang	p. 122
Hacker Ethics	p. 123
Public Opinion about Hackers	p. 130
How a Hacker Is Identified	p. 132
Time Line of a Typical Malware Attack	p. 135
Hacker Economy: How Does a Hacker Make Money?	p. 136
Social Engineering	p. 142
Social Engineering Examples and Case Studies	p. 143
Tactics of Social Engineering	p. 151
A Lingering Question	p. 153
Late-Breaking News	p. 154
Theft of Information	p. 157
Introduction	p. 157
Case Studies	p. 158
Data Theft	p. 158
Source Code Theft	p. 161
How Do the Victims Find Out That Their Secrets Are Stolen?	p. 164
Intellectual Property Protection	p. 166
Trade Secret Protection	p. 167
Copyright Protection	p. 169
Patent Protection	p. 169
Steganography	p. 170
Open Versus Closed Source	p. 170
Espionage	p. 175
Introduction	p. 175
What Is Espionage?	p. 176
Case Studies	p. 177
Sweden Versus Russia	p. 178
Shekhar Verma	p. 178
Lineage III	p. 179
GM versus VW: Jose Ignacio Lopez	p. 179
British Midland Tools	p. 179
Solid Oak Software	p. 180
Proctor & Gamble versus Unilever	p. 181
News Corp Versus Vivendi	p. 181
Spying: Was A TI Chip Really Stolen by a French Spy?	p. 181
Conficker	p. 183
Cyber Warfare	p. 185
Reference	p. 187
Disgruntled Employees and Sabotage	p. 189
Introduction and Background	p. 189
Disgruntled Employee Data Issues	p. 192
Data Tampering	p. 192
Data Destruction	p. 194
Data Made Public	p. 196
Theft Via Data	p. 199
Disgruntled Employee Software Issues	p. 199
Software Destruction	p. 199
Disgruntled Employee System Issues	p. 200
What to Do About Disgruntled Employee Acts	p. 203
Sabotage	p. 206
References	p. 212
Whistle-Blowing	p. 213
A Hypothetical Scenario	p. 215
Whistle-Blowing and Software Engineering	p. 217
More Case Studies and Anecdotes	p. 220
Jeffrey Wigand and Brown and Williamson Tobacco	p. 220
A Longitudinal Study of Whistle-Blowing	p. 221
An Even More Pessimistic View	p. 222
Academic Whistle-Blowing	p. 223
The Sum Total of Whistle-Blowing	p. 224
References	p. 225
Appendix to Chapter 7 Practical Implications of the Research into whistle-Blowing	p. 227
References	p. 240
Viewpoints on Dark Side Issues	p. 243
Introduction	p. 243
Opinions, Predictions, and Beliefs	p. 245
Automated Crime	p. 246
Information Sources	p. 237
Let's Play Make Believe	p. 258
Reference	p. 260
Dark, Light, or Just Another Shade of Grey?	p. 261
Rational Software Developers as Pathological Code Hackers	p. 264
Personal Anecdotes	p. 269
An Officer and a Gentleman Confronts the Dark Side	p. 270
Less Carrot and More Stick	p. 273
References	p. 275
ôThem and Usö: Dispatches from the Virtual Software Team Trenches	p. 276
What is it to Lie on a Software Project?	p. 281
ôMerciless Control Instrumentö and the Mysterious Missing Fax	p. 284
Forest of Arden	p. 289
Hard-Headed Hardware Hit Man	p. 292
A Lighthearted Anecdote	p. 294
Conclusions	p. 299
Index	p. 303
Table of Contents provided by Ingram. All Rights Reserved.