Xref: utzoo comp.admin.policy:441 comp.unix.admin:2214 Path: utzoo!utgpu!news-server.csri.toronto.edu!rpi!zaphod.mps.ohio-state.edu!wuarchive!uunet!munnari.oz.au!uniwa!cc.curtin.edu.au!chooper From: chooper@cc.curtin.edu.au (Todd Hooper) Newsgroups: comp.admin.policy,comp.unix.admin Subject: Re: E-mail Privacy Message-ID: <1991Jun14.153835.8709@cc.curtin.edu.au> Date: 14 Jun 91 07:38:34 GMT References: <50318@muvms3.bitnet> <3651@happym.WA.COM> <8114@ecs.soton.ac.uk> Organization: Curtin University of Technology Lines: 33 In article <8114@ecs.soton.ac.uk>, tjc@ecs.soton.ac.uk (Tim Chown) writes: > Anyway, as a result I saw a message between two students that > was clearly showing them to be cheating in an assigment by exchanging > pieces of code. I only saw the subject line, but it was enough. > Do you turn a blind eye? Do you let the offenders gain an unfair > advantage? It's not at all clear cut. We have correlation software > written as the basis as a PhD that checks for collaboration on the > structure of code, but when you have the extra "proof" should you > root (literally ;-) around further? Tricky. Personally, I totally ignore the 'subject' header of bounced mail. In this case, I would have ignored it as well. It is the job of academic staff to uncover plagiarism - not mine. I think a consistent policy of enforcing privacy is the best defense. If it is known that you might read mail, or interpret the contents in some way (even if this only involves looking at the subject line) then you may leave yourself open to more problems (e.g. why didn't you stop this hacker mailing /etc/passwd to someone?). Most mailers have the 'headers-only' facility, when bouncing mail to the postmaster. This should really be a default on mailers, since I can't think of a single case where I have needed to look at the body of a message. I can't see how you could be alerted to the contents by the subject - what sort of student would be dumb enough to put a subject like 'Here is a copy of my assignment...' ;-) -- Todd Hooper (Postmaster) Computing Centre Curtin University of Technology Western Australia Internet : hooper_ta@cc.curtin.edu.au Phone : +61 9 351 7467 (24 hour messaging system) Fax +61 9 351 2673