Jen Johnson

Week One: We met the staff and Grad students at OGI and began work on a slide presentation that we will be giving within the next two weeks. This presentation covers network Security from an intrusion perspective. It was a little bit of a slow start, as our first two days were spent furiously reading a topic previously little known to us. However, once we began working on our slides and organizing the data we were covering, things seemed to pick up speed and interest. Week Two: Our slide presentation appears to be done and we will be giving a dry run presentation to Dr. Feng next week. We have been installing Linux and Windows on our computers and have been familiarizing ourselves with everything. We will soon be attempting to hack into one another's computers to demonstrate different techniques. Week Three: Linux is installed, updated and running, and I am trying to get used to it. I believe that I'm spoiled by easier operating systems! Some of the hacking programs that we are experimenting with are putting up quite a struggle, but we should have them ironed out soon. We have attended a reading group this week, and are scheduled to attend another this afternoon. Tomorrow we are going to a presentation given by a representative from Oracle which should be very interesting. Week Four: I can't believe another week is gone. We presented part one of our slides to the group and got a lot of positive feedback. We will be presenting part two next week. We are also working on setting up Forensix on several computers in our office; this may take a few days. Week Five: We attended several reading groups and are presenting the second half of our slides to the group tomorrow. We are almost through setting up the Forensix system on our Linux boxes, and are looking forward to learning all about it. We drove 6 hours down the Oregon Coast to visit Bandon and the Wildlife Safari there. We had a great time! Week Six: We have finished presenting our slides to the group and the slides have been posted on the SYSL website. We are now actively working with the Forensix system and have setup both a front and back end to experiment with. I will be learning to write SQL querries to combat attempts to subvert the system. Week Seven: It has been a week of meeting, reading groups and heavy reading. I have been reading some of the SQL queries that have been used on the Forensix system to determine the time frame on hacks and intrusions on the system, and am getting a stronger grip on the entire concept. I have been reading through a paper on Forensix written by one of the grad students here, but need more information and practice before I can write queries of my own. Week Eight: It's hard to believe that we only have one more week here. To get the full results we really wanted, we would need another year! In any case, we seem to have run into a software glitch and may have to completely reinstall both Linux and Forensix on the front and back end machines. We are hoping that this is not the case, as it would be very time consuming... We will know more on Monday when we go through a trial run of our work. Week Nine: We have run some bugs and queries, and although we would love more time to get more programs running, our time is winding down. We have been to a lot of talks and meetings lately and the Forensix project seems to be running well. I feel very lucky to have been exposed to so many new ideas and theories and look forward to implementing them in the future. What an amazing summer. Week Ten: We will be in San Diego for the USENIX Security Symposium this week. With lectures and talks on Networking, Security and the like, it should be a great opportunity to connect with others in my field.