Cyber security education is as essential as “The Three R’s”

Smartphones have diffused rapidly across South African society and constitute the most dominant information and communication technologies in everyday use. That being so, it is important to ensure that all South Africans know how to secure their smart devices. This requires a high level of security awareness and knowledge. As yet, there is no formal curriculum addressing cyber security in South African schools. Indeed, it seems to be left to Universities to teach cyber security principles, and they currently only do this when students take computing-related courses. The outcome of this approach is that only a very small percentage of South Africans, i.e. those who take computing courses at University, are made aware of cyber security risks and know how to take precautions. Moreover, because this group is overwhelmingly male, this educational strategy disproportionately leaves young female South Africans vulnerable to cyber attacks. We thus contend that cyber security ought to be taught as children learn the essential “3 Rs” – delivering requisite skills at University level does not adequately prepare young South Africans for a world where cyber security is an essential skill. Starting to provide awareness and knowledge at primary school, and embedding it across the curriculum would, in addition to ensuring that people have the skills when they need them, also remove the current gender imbalance in cyber security awareness

Comparative study of admissions criteria of a selection of South African universities

Summary: The new school-leaving certificate, the National Senior Certificate (NSC), was awarded for the first time in 2008. This necessitated a relook at the entrance requirements for university, as the school subjects offered, and the evaluation thereof, had changed considerably compared with those for the previous schoolleaving certificate (Senior Certificate). It became important for universities to adjust their admission requirements from the 2009 firstyear intake onwards. The admission requirements of nine universities (considered by FinWeek, 18 March 2010, to be similar in terms of effectiveness and classification) were compared. The universities are: the University of the Free State (UOFS), the University of the Western Cape (UWC/WestCapU), the University of KwaZuluNatal (UKZN), the University of Pretoria (UP/UPret), NorthWest University (NWU/NWestU), the University of the Witwatersrand (WITS/UWits), the University of Cape Town (UCT), Rhodes University (Rhodes/RhodesU) and the University of Stellenbosch (US/UStell). (The second abbreviation appearing in some cases is the abbreviation used in Figure 1, which was taken directly from Finweek.) Effectiveness is defined by FinWeek as a combination of the following: undergraduate success rate; graduates as percentage of total enrolment; research output units and contracted research, while classification of institutions is defined as a range from mainly undergraduate training institutions to mainly researchled institutions. This study considered how the nine selected South African universities utilise the NSC results to select students for their mathematical statistics and computer science degrees. Some of the universities use only the NSC results for placement, while others use a combination of the NSC results and some additional admission tests. At most universities the NSC results are combined into an admission point score (APS). This APS is calculated differently at the different universities. The following questions were investigated: How is the APS calculated by each of the nine universities considered in this study? What minimum APS is required for general entrance to undergraduate studies at these universities? What minimum APS do students need to enter a three-year programme in mathematical statistics or computer science at these nine universities? To compare the admission requirements of the universities considered, the entrance requirements documents of the various universities were studied and compared. Furthermore, secondary data of the University of the Western Cape were used to illustrate the differences in the APSs for these universities. A sample of 176 students who matriculated in 2008 with six or more designated NSC subjects and who were in their first year at UWC in 2009 was considered for this study. The UWC data were used to calculate the APSs according to the 2011 admission requirements of the nine universities. In general, students have to offer a minimum of four subjects from the designated subject list, with a level 4 (≥50 percent) or more, to qualify for university admission. For this study only students who had completed six or more designated subjects were considered. To further contain the study, only students that could possibly have qualified for a mathematical statistics or computer science degree were considered. These programmes require school mathematics and not mathematical literacy as a subject. Both these programmes are offered at all the universities considered in this study and could, therefore, be compared. The method for calculating the APS differs substantially between the universities, as does the minimum score required for university admission. To compare the minimum required APS for admission to the respective selected universities the research data of 176 UWC students were used. It was found that only 11 percent of the 176 students admitted to UWC would have qualified for admission at UCT. Although UWC and Rhodes use similar methods for calculating their APSs they have very different minimum APS requirements: Rhodes requires an APS of 40, whereas UWC requires an APS of only 27. Consequently Rhodes would have accepted only 18 percent of the students that were accepted by UWC. Due to the stricter mathematics requirement for the programmes considered, fewer students qualify for these programmes than would have qualified for general university admission. In order to see what APS would be necessary for a student studying at UWC to successfully complete a first year, the 2009 end-of-year university results of the 176 students of this pilot study were used. Of the 176 UWC students that started their studies in 2009, only 108 (61 percent) progressed to the next academic year in 2010. Their average UWC APS was 41,4 with a 95 percent confidence interval of (40,4; 42,3). If a simplified method is used for calculating the APS, namely summing the school scores (without life orientation (LO)), the 95 percent confidence interval for the mean APS of the students that progressed is (30,4; 32,1). It needs to be noted that both UWC and Rhodes use a more complex method of calculating the APS which inflates the APS by approximately 10 points. Currently universities differ considerably in their calculation of the APS as well as their minimum entrance requirements. A simplified and standardised method for the calculation of the APS would allow learners and other stakeholders to easily determine the APS required to be selected for a particular tertiary programme. For most programmes further school subject requirements are specified. For the mathematical statistics and computer science programmes at the universities studied, the difference in the school mathematics requirement is most pronounced. According to this pilot study the APS a student requires to successfully complete the first academic year at UWC, is approximately 30 when the simplified method to calculate the APS is used (summing the scores of six designated school subjects (without LO)). An APS of 30 is currently being used by UP, UKZN and UFS as the minimum requirement for selection. Their method of calculating the APS is very similar to the method proposed by this study. Additional studies would need to be carried out to confirm the results of this pilot study. Further studies are also needed to determine how the scores of the nondesignated subjects should be adjusted for possible inclusion in the calculation of the APS. The NSC is now standardised across South Africa. If the APS is also calculated in a standardised manner it should be sufficient to use this information to determine which students would be able to succeed at university. The minimum admission requirement could vary from university to university depending on the programme for which a student applies. The minimum APS for a programme should be carefully considered and adjusted so that selected students have a chance to succeed. If academically underprepared students are selected for tertiary studies the universities should be aware that these students will need extensive extracurricular assistance. Without additional interventions these underprepared students will have no chance of succeeding at university, which is ethically unjustifiable.Department of HE and Training approved listDepartment of HE and Training approved lis

Cyber security education is as essential as “the three R's”

Smartphones have diffused rapidly across South African society and constitute the most dominant information and communication technologies in everyday use. That being so, it is important to ensure that all South Africans know how to secure their smart devices. Doing so requires a high level of security awareness and knowledge. As yet, there is no formal curriculum addressing cyber security in South African schools. Indeed, it seems to be left to universities to teach cyber security principles, and they currently only do this when students take computingrelated courses. The outcome of this approach is that only a very small percentage of South Africans, i.e. those who take computing courses at university, are made aware of cyber security risks and know how to take precautions. In this paper we found that, because this group is overwhelmingly male, this educational strategy disproportionately leaves young South African women vulnerable to cyber-attacks. We thus contend that cyber security ought to be taught as children learn the essential “3 Rs”—delivering requisite skills at University level does not adequately prepare young South Africans for a world where cyber security is an essential skill. Starting to provide awareness and knowledge at primary school, and embedding it across the curriculum would, in addition to ensuring that people have the skills when they need them, also remove the current gender imbalance in cyber security awareness

Smartphone owners need security advice. How can we ensure they get it?

Computer users often behave insecurely, and do not take the precautions they ought to. One reads almost daily about people not protecting their devices, not making backups and falling for phishing messages. This impacts all of society since people increasingly carry a computer in their pockets: their smartphones. It could be that smartphone owners simply do not know enough about security threats or precautions. To address this, many official bodies publish advice online. For such a broadcast-type educational approach to work, two assumptions must be satisfied. The first is that people will deliberately seek out security-related information and the second is that they will consult official sources to satisfy their information needs. Assumptions such as these ought to be verified, especially with the numbers of cyber attacks on the rise. It was decided to explore the validity of these assumptions by surveying students at a South African university, including both Computer Science and Non-Computer Science students. The intention was to explore levels of awareness of Smartphone security practice, the sources of advice the students used, and the impact of a Computer Science education on awareness and information seeking behaviours. Awareness, it was found, was variable across the board but poorer amongst students without a formal computing education. Moreover, it became clear that students often found Facebook more helpful than public media, in terms of obtaining security advice

Towards ensuring scalability, interoperability and efficient access control in a multi-domain grid-based environment

The application of grid computing has been hampered by three basic challenges: scalability, interoperability and efficient access control which need to be optimized before a full-scale adoption of grid computing can take place. To address these challenges, a novel architectural model was designed for a multi-domain grid based environment (built on three domains). It was modelled using the dynamic role-based access control. The architecture’s framework assumes that each domain has an independent local security monitoring unit and a central security monitoring unit that monitors security for the entire grid. The architecture was evaluated using the Grid Security Services Simulator, a meta-query language and Java Runtime Environment 1.7.0.5 for implementing the workflows that define the model’s task. In terms of scalability, the results show that as the number of grid nodes increases, the average turnaround time reduces, and thereby increases the number of service requesters (grid users) on the grid. Grid middleware integration across various domains as well as the appropriate handling of authentication and authorisation through a local security monitoring unit and a central security monitoring unit proved that the architecture is interoperable. Finally, a case study scenario used for access control across the domains shows the efficiency of the role based access control approach used for achieving appropriate access to resources. Based on the results obtained, the proposed framework has proved to be interoperable, scalable and efficiently suitable for enforcing access control within the parameters evaluated.Department of HE and Training approved lis

Insights into the use and affordances of social and collaborative applications for student projects

The use of social and collaborative computing has the potential of assisting learning and improving the ability to work together as part of a team. Team work is a graduate attribute that students need to acquire before transitioning from university into the workplace. The aim of this exploratory research was to provide insights into the use of social and collaborative applications by Computer Science students, and the emergent affordances student project teams have created with the use of these applications. It answers the questions: What elearning platforms or applications do students use to collaborate for team projects? What technology affordance draws students to use these applications? This study adopts affordance theory as the theoretical framework. Two types of content analysis: conventional content analysis and summative content analysis were used to analyse the data. Data was gathered using a pre-designed questionnaire with the teams during the first semester of 2016. Findings show that the university’s elearning platform is utilised for some of their courses; however students seem to prefer free and open source platforms. Student project teams used applications such as WhatsApp, Telegram, Dropbox, Google Drive, Google Docs, as well as email messages, to work jointly, and were successfully able to complete their team projects. Four types of technology affordances: communicative-affordance, document share-affordance, course resource-affordance, and integrity-affordance, were identified as being relevant

Strategies for information management in education: some international experience

Background: Recent analysis of the management of information and communications technologies in South African education suggests strongly that there is only limited strategic thinking that might guide policy-makers, school principals, teachers, learners and suppliers of educational technologies. It is clear that here in South Africa, as elsewhere, the actual practice of technology-mediated education is driven more by the available technologies than by actual learner needs, good management principles and the wider national imperative. There might be lessons to be learned from experience elsewhere. Objectives: This article reports and analyses conversation with eight international educators in Europe, Canada, the United States, New Zealand and Australia. All are managing the impact of technology in different ways (reactive and pro-active), at different levels (pre-primary through to senior citizen), in different roles (teachers, administrators and senior managers) and in different contexts (schools and universities). Method: Open-ended conversations with educators and educational administrators in developed countries were recorded, transcribed and analysed. The qualitative analysis of the content was done in the style of ‘open coding’ and ‘selective coding’ using a qualitative content analysis tool. Results: Whilst technology is still seen to drive much thinking, it is found that that success is not derived from the technology, but from a full and proper understanding of the needs and aspirations of those who are directly involved in educational processes, and by means of a managerial focus that properly recognises the context within which an institution exists. Conclusion: Whilst this result might be expected, the detailed analysis of the findings further reveals the need to manage investments in educational technologies at different levels and in different ways.Department of HE and Training approved lis

Improved Hand-Tracking Framework with a Recovery Mechanism

Abstract−Hand-tracking is fundamental to translating sign language to a spoken language. Accurate and reliable sign language translation depends on effective and accurate hand-tracking. This paper proposes an improved hand-tracking framework that includes a tracking recovery algorithm optimising a previous framework to better handle occlusion. It integrates the tracking recovery algorithm to improve the discrimination between hands and the tracking of hands. The framework was evaluated on 30 South African Sign Language phrases that use: a single hand; both hands without occlusion; and both hands with occlusion. Ten individuals in constrained and unconstrained environments performed the gestures. Overall, the proposed framework achieved an average success rate of 91.8% compared to an average success rate of 81.1% using the previous framework. The results show an improved tracking accuracy across all signs in constrained and unconstrained environments

Understanding stakeholder expectations in higher education

Higher education invests heavily in information technology and information systems, with variable outcomes. Organisations in other sectors, such as engineering, the defence industry, public administration and business, have developed and adopted good practice for the choice, development and operation of software-based systems that are only sometimes understood in higher education. In order to assess the extent to which good practice might assist higher education, the four tertiary institutions in the Western Cape of South Africa were approached and a representative range of academic, administrative, technical and managerial respondents agreed to contribute to the study. Interviews were organised in two parts: the first an open conversation about their involvement with systems, and the second a structured examination of systems-related events that they considered significant. By inspection of those events, bipolar scales were developed by which respondents were able to characterise events (for example as ‘challenging’ or ‘easy’, or as ‘functional’ or ‘dysfunctional’). Respondents rated events on those scales. Repertory Grid analysis was applied so as to investigate which scales correlated with event success. 30 scales (out of 170) proved to be adequately correlated with success, and by principal component analysis they were combined to form ten ‘success scale’ groups, indicating ten areas where the deployment of good practice might be expected to lead to more effective use of improved information systems. A new Reference Model is developed that has a role to play in resolving the transitions between the domains of the Information Management Body of Knowledge (IMBOK)

Fast tracking students from disadvantaged backgrounds into main stream Computer Science

A computer-based training (CBT) system was used to teach Computer Literacy to full-time students at the University of the Western Cape. This approach was successful in creating computer literate students as well as creating an opportunity for students from educationally disadvantaged schools to enter the Computer Science course. The students experienced this new approach to learning positively. This has laid the foundation to export the computer-based education model to communities outside the university. Lifelong learning opportunities will thus be created.Department of HE and Training approved lis