My Schools Technology Security Discussion

[Creed1]

So right now I am in 9th grade soon to get my own school laptop provided by my school. This reminded me about my schools technology security for the following reason. So last year, the older grades got the new laptops. A group of kids called themselves "Professional hackers" by becoming administrator on the laptops via CMD by looking up a WikiHow Article. I had one person from that group threaten to DDOS me because he was trying to prove to me that he was hacking via "Tree" and "netstat"  and I denied any claim of it being "hacking." He never did DDOS me. Well finally they were busted due to "trigger points" on the laptops and they were taken away from them  . Except a long time ago there was one successful kid who was able to upload a bug/virus into our schools network crashing it for 3 days. 

 

One thing I am hoping on these laptops are for an unlocked BIOS so I can boot from other operating systems via my external SSD. It would be nice to have my own windows 10 install + a couple Linux distros. This is the current policy which may stop me:

Download, or run unauthorized programs without permission from IT

And

Change hardware belonging to the District.

I would have to ask the Head security administrators at my school just to be sure. 

 

What are your thoughts? 

 

[MoonlightSylv]

What's the question exactly?

[Creed1]

1 minute ago, ShadowTechXTS said:

What's the question exactly?

Thoughts?

 

[it_dont_work]

3 minutes ago, CmzPlusHardware said:

So right now I am in 9th grade soon to get my own school laptop provided by my school

 

This is the current policy which may stop me:

Download, or run unauthorized programs without permission from IT

And

Change hardware belonging to the District.

I would have to ask the Head security administrators at my school just to be sure. 

 

It's not yours why fuck with it? Your essentially asking if its right to modify a library book.

[Colexd]

It's not like you're gonna fuck up their laptops, but since its not yours, and its already stated, you need their permission.

[JaegerB]

I've tried the same thing at my school, and even the technologically literate IT dudes weren't cool with it. Sure, it isn't in any way dangerous, and your IT guys would know that too, but its more of a matter of the folks up in high places getting upset because you touched something. The laptops cost them money, they don't want to lose that investment no matter how low the chances.

[LienusLateTips]

ask

[ARikozuM]

If the school is providing it, don't mess with it.

[PorkishPig]

54 minutes ago, CmzPlusHardware said:

So right now I am in 9th grade soon to get my own school laptop provided by my school. This reminded me about my schools technology security for the following reason. So last year, the older grades got the new laptops. A group of kids called themselves "Professional hackers" by becoming administrator on the laptops via CMD by looking up a WikiHow Article. I had one person from that group threaten to DDOS me because he was trying to prove to me that he was hacking via "Tree" and "netstat"  and I denied any claim of it being "hacking." He never did DDOS me. Well finally they were busted due to "trigger points" on the laptops and they were taken away from them  . Except a long time ago there was one successful kid who was able to upload a bug/virus into our schools network crashing it for 3 days. 

 

One thing I am hoping on these laptops are for an unlocked BIOS so I can boot from other operating systems via my external SSD. It would be nice to have my own windows 10 install + a couple Linux distros. This is the current policy which may stop me:

Download, or run unauthorized programs without permission from IT

And

Change hardware belonging to the District.

I would have to ask the Head security administrators at my school just to be sure. 

 

What are your thoughts? 

 

5

As an IT intern at a private high school, I suggest that you don't mess with lender equipment. I've had way too many kids screw with the BIOS of our Chromium OS laptops just to prevent access to it all together. If you end up following in the steps of one of the students there, by deleting the school-distributed Linux distro, it will only make my job harder.

 

Of course, every school is different. All you need to do is ask.

 

Everything you've said about the "professional hacker" kids seem to be at every school. Where I worked, most students would just use the school desktops to access the Windows control panel without access to Start Menu search indexing or the Run dialog and call themselves hackers. The worst I've ever seen a kid do is use a YouTube tutorial to use Kali Linux to dictionary attack an unrestricted faculty wireless network. A quick network-wide ban to his Mac address somehow caused him to give up.

[DocSwag]

I mean, technically you're in the clear since bios stuff isn't hardware modifications and running a different os isn't a computer program really.

 

Regardless, you should ask first. Since it's better to be safe than risk it and become a biscuit.

[Sentryy]

just go to a recycling center and get a thinkpad or latitude running with evrything but an os for  less than $100. thats cheaper than replacing a school laptop if you somehow fuck it up. I'm 99% sure if you ask to they'll say no. Aren't school laptops only to be used for school stuff anyways? 

[D13H4RD]

If it’s provided by the school and you didn’t actually buy it from them, then you would need to ask their permission.

 

Since it’s not a laptop that you actually own