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This story is about how much IT ignorance, weak security, or hysterical over-reaction can result in misjudging of a teacher. Parties involved are:

- the teacher Julie Amero who considers herself not tech savvy and panicked,
- the principal, who if he is responsible for the IT in the school failed to put down the policy,
- the kids who reported the teacher not thinking much about the possible consequences,
- the parents of the kids who reported the teacher without first asking themselves some tough questions about what kids can and sometime do by accident or on purpose,
- the school’s I.T. department, the sys administrator in particular, who allowed the anti-virus software to elapse, failing to give a substitute teacher her own username and password for logging into the system, etc.,
- the police who failed to investigate the matter using proper forensic procedures
- the prosecutor who did not demand a forensic analysis from the investigating cops,
- the judge who refused to allow an expert to present forensic evidence on behalf of the accused,
- the jury who accepted to hear such a case without demanding additional evidence before making a judgment

_Where did What happen_

Julie Amero, a 40-year-old substitute teacher from Connecticut is facing up to 40 years in prison for exposing her seventh grade class to a cascade of pornographic imagery. Amero maintains that she is a victim of a malicious software infestation that caused her computer to spawn porn uncontrollably.

The prosecutor claimed the teacher “must” have clicked on the pornographic sites. The detective in the investigation “admitted there was no search made for adware, which can generate pop-up advertisements”.

It seems as if the prosecutor has not experienced a browser hijacking before since the school’s computer did neither have a filter installed, nor anti-spyware software or up-to-date anti-virus software (PS. it was running on Windows 98 when the alleged criminal act happened during 2004).

Now, the 40 year old teacher’s reputation is shot and she could face up to 40 years in jail. Let’s hope this conviction gets overturned.

_What did forensic analysis indicate_

All of the jpg’s that were checked in the cache folders were of 5, 6 and 15 kB size. This is very small and in contrast to larger pictures of at least 35 kB and larger that one would want if intentionally visiting a pornographic site, thereby giving the user greater resolution.

Google’s prefetch behavior for webpages if one uses Firefox is just one example of a well-intended feature with unfortunate negative side effects (see [1] stopping Google from prefetchinging web pages). Here, the website as well as the web logs that record users’ access to sites would record and show investigators suchvisits as if they had been voluntarily initiated by the user that is being investigated.

Unfortunately, the prosecutor’s office did not considcer this fact. Judge Hillary B. Strackbein of the Superior Court in New London , CT 06320 banned the technical expert W. Herbert Horner from presenting technical evidence to back up his claims that you can read here about:
- [2] The Strange Case of Ms. Julie Amero: Commentary by Mr. Herb Horner

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_What security posture does the school district have regardin information assets and PCs?_

The duty to protect the integrity of the computer in the classrom can surely not rest with the teacher. Neither can it be that a substitute teacher is not given her own username and password to access the system as happened in this case.

Setting up the system with appropriate protection is surely the district’s IT department’s job. Also, the testimony given in court by a local police officer regarding the so-called timestamped logs on the system proving deliberate, manual browsing of a website is totally ludicrous as we all know.

_What can one do?_

Hence, this means one should block all pop-ups routinely and disable browser prefetch in Mozilla Firefox. This is also a reminder for authorities that just because particular entries are present in subpoenaed Web logs, does not necessarily mean that they are accurate representations of user intent. In many cases, one may actually be looking at victims whose browser may have been highjacked by pop-up spyware, not perpetrators looking for illegal downloads.

Apart from using software to remove adware, spyware and so on you may want to check how one can prevent Google prefetch to work when using Mozilla browsers such as Firefox here:

- [3] CyTRAP Labs - security guide - Mozilla and Firefox - stopping Google from prefetchinging web pages

_CASE_

If Connecticut is anything like your neighborhood or ours, most schools do not have a dedicated technology/IT individual. Instead, if it goes well, another teacher who has one course more acts as supporter (maybe even two) but basically, the schools rely on a district-wide department to give mostly remote support. In some cases, it is even an outsourced activity.

The IT support person, the fellow teacher, provides the on-site support one might need. Even if this individual is very tech-savvy but the lack of support from a dedicated IT department and the general lack of pc/internet knowledge whatsoever on the part of the MAJORITY of teachers is a bad combination. Add to that, the general state of funding most public school systems are in and you can see how the factors listed at the beginning of this article can come about (the aging and outdated systems/software). This ruling is absurd from any perspective.

[4] [5] adware, [6] anti virus software, [7] awareness, [8] browser hijacking, [9] Connecticut+Justice+System, [10] Connecticut+Schoolteacher, [11] court verdicts, [12] criminal act, [13] cybercrime, [14] forensics, [15] forensic evidence, [16] google, [17] information security, [18] jail time, [19] Julie+Amero, [20] law, [21] Network+Security, [22] pornographic websites, [23] pornographic sites, [24] prefetching web pages, [25] prevention, [26] regulation, [27] security culture, [28] spyware, [29] web logs