After only three days of immersion in the security and risk management (SRM) community and culture at the 2008 Security Analysis and Risk Management conference, I saw the ongoing problems with SRM that must be solved in order to advance the profession. Firstly, The comparison between risk analysis methodologies is impossible without collectively defining a “methodology of methodologies.” Decision makers commonly fail to understand and intelligently differentiate between security and risk analysis methodologies. There are many methodologies out there, but each has been developed for its own purpose and been tailored to its own decision maker. By developing a system of classification, a taxonomy of risk methodologies, SRM professionals and decision makers can discuss the differences and similarities between the methodologies in order to determine the right one for the situation. However, even before this step can be achieved the SRM community needs to establish a common lexicon. The terminology of security analysis has never been definitive. Every government agency and SRM company has a different definition of risk, threat, consequence, vulnerability, and other words related to SRM.

Fundamental in their nature, these problems need to be answered, at least to some degree of common understanding, so that every SRM professional is on the same page. Without a common lexicon or a “methodology of methodologies” security risk management as a profession will face many barriers to advancement and great frustration.

The Security Analysis and Risk Management Association made an attempt to tackle these problems head on head with SARMApedia. SARMApedia is a common knowledge base for security risk management. The site is based on mediawiki, a wiki technology originally developed for Wikipedia. SARMApedia allows any professional to document definitions and analysis methods for discussion. There are also separate pages on who’s who in SRM. The site currently is in need of more content and participation from the professionals, but even students are allowed to sign up and contribute. SARMApedia could prove to be a great resource for SRM and also unify the profession.

Two plenary speakers spoke early this morning. Dirk Mauer, Deputy Assistant Secretary of Defense of the Crisis Management and Defense Support of Civil Authorities, detailed the ongoing development of the DoD’s Defense Critical Infrastructure Program. The DCIP ensures the availability of assets deemed necessary for DoD missions and operations. It focuses on domestic and foreign assets and their dependencies on one another. It is not possible or feasible to protect the entire critical infrastructure, so the DCIP lays out a model of identifying, prioritizing, and mitigating risk of critical infrastructure assets essential to the DoD. The DCIP aims to collaborate with all of the federal departs, conduct vulnerability assessments, and promote risk management. The DCIP is a new iteration of a ten-year critical infrastructure program in the DoD. In a Q&A immediately following his presentation, Dirk explained how the DCIP will work closely with the risk analysis and management programs in the DHS. The DoD adheres to the DHS’s national framework for critical infrastructure protection.

Cathleen Berrick, Director of Homeland Security and Justice Team in the Government Accountability Office spoke next on a GAO forum on risk management practices. The forum brought together key players in risk management from the private and government sectors to address homeland security risk management problems and challenges. The forum found that the top three issues that needed to be solved were improving risk communication, overcoming political obstacles, and improving strategic thinking. By the end of the forum there were talks about a special advising committee on risk management to Congress. You can read the complete findings of the forum on the GAO-08-627SP document.

There are still three technical sessions left and also the SARMA networking reception this evening. At the reception the SRA club will be meeting Edward Joepeck, the President of SARMA, to talk about how the College of IST and SARMA can work together to better educate the future generation of risk mangers.

More coverage later today.

I wrote this paper for a classification and division assignment in my English class this semester. I hope you enjoy.

World of Warcraft has become a historical achievement for the video gaming industry, and consequently a popular social icon. Over the past three years, it has gained an almost religious following of over 10 million people. If the entire population in New York City and Philadelphia sat down and played World of Warcraft at the same time, it would still be short of 10,000,000 by about 250,000. World of Warcraft, or WoW for short, is a massively multiplayer online role-playing game (MMORPG). Thousands of players can be on the same seamless and persistent virtual world. Players assume the life of a fictional charter in the fantasy world of Azeroth, a brainchild of the software developing company Blizzard. Azeroth is an intricate universe of swords and sorcery. Players create their own customized character based on race, class, and appearance. The underlying theme of the game is a continuing epic war between the Alliance and Horde. The Alliance is made up of Humans, Night Elves, Dwarves, Draenei, and Gnomes. The Horde is composed of Orcs, Undead, Tauren, and Blood Elves. On top of nine different races, there are nine different classes. Each of these classes have unique abilities and traits that allow them to compliment other classes when players work as groups. Teamwork is integral part of WoW, and consequently one of features that WoW is most renowned for. Players must often work in groups of up to forty players to defeat powerful bosses and fight back mobs of monsters; this is called dungeon raiding. Some of these raids can literally last days. Another interesting element of WoW is Player versus Player (PvP). WoW allows players to fight each other. This makes the Horde versus Alliance storyline very interesting and competitive. The role-playing aspect of the game allows players to complete quests or kill monsters to gain experience and level up. With the recent expansion pack, characters can be leveled up to 70. WoW is probably the most sophistically engineered game every made; it would take a thousand- page guide to properly explain the game play completely.

This immense complexity and vastness of WoW is most likely the reason why it remains such an enigma to anyone not in the gaming community. WoW culture has come under scrutiny in television series such as Family Guy and the Office. These shows basically give people the impression that WoWers have no social life what so every. People need to understand that not all people who play WoW are friendless and girlfriendless geeks. After all, WoW is without a doubt a prime example of how the internet serves as a vehicle of communication that can span across the world. It is a social network phenomenon. The global connectivity that WoW creates brings a lot of diverse players to the same magical world; consequently, there are several different groups that players could be classified under. While these categories may not be all-inclusive or entirely realistic, understanding the kinds of people and reasons why they play may give the public a better appreciation of exactly what World of Warcraft is all about.

The Noob

A noob, a slang term for newbie with variations such as noobie and nooblet, is someone who is completely and utterly clueless about what he or she is doing in World of Warcraft. It could possibly be the first time that the noob is playing WoW, or it could be a derogatory name used for someone who is acting retarded in-game. Most of the time, however, noobs are genuinely new to the game. Most noobs are often the older players, rather than the younger ones. Noobs often annoyingly ask the more experienced players where to go for quests or how to get to a certain location. A level 70 human paladin player was quoted, “One day, a random noob came up to me and said that he wanted to be like me some day. I almost rolled out of my seat laughing.” Being slapped across the face with the term boob is very insulting to an experience gamer, but people often forget, that at one time they were a noob. It is just a stage in one’s gaming development.

The Causal WoWer

Most noobs generally become a casual WoWer in due time. This type of players does not make WoW an integral part of their life. They may have a high level character, but it probably took them a year or two to achieve this. Casuals may be involved in a clan, but they are mostly likely not active participants. On average they play between two and four hours a day. In real life, they definitely have friends, family, a job, a girlfriend, and maybe even married. This type of player is statically the plurality of all WoW players. In WoW, they may be a level fifty-four Warlock, but in real life they are a high school science teacher. In WoW, they may have an armored white war stallion, but in real life have a dog named Bozo. Yes, it’s true; the majority of people that play Wow are not obsessed about it. They are contributing members of society. They have lives outside of the game.

The WoW Addict

In his gleaming armor from the depths of dungeon Zul’Gurub, the WoW addict has mastered every class and every race. His attacks or spells can instantly kill, and his battle cry is something to be terrified of. The WoW addict spends the majority of his or her day playing WoW. It holds a higher priority than going to college classes or a job. His relationships have been ruined and he is receding from his social life and friends. WoW addicts, have the World of Warcraft certified keyboard to better help them navigate and make battle with other players. On average, WoW addicts spend between six and ten hours playing. They have not only financially invested in the game, but also emotionally. There is no distinction between the fictional character and the addict’s individual consciousness. His only friends are WoW friends. He may be the leader a guild, or a loner wreaking havoc in his enemy’s territory. He is the raid leader, commanding all thirty-nine of the other group members in a strategically coordinated attack on a dark fortress floating in the sky. The game enthralls his imagination. The ability to be someone else in alternate fantasy universe never ceases to wet his appetite for adventure. He becomes so immersed in this magical world that he begins to forget the important of the real world, where he feels that his feet must always remain on the ground and head out of the clouds. Some readers may feel that a WoW addict has stepped over the boundaries of rationality, but in the gaming community, putting six hours or so into a video game daily is common. The WoW addict simply loves the game and cannot live real life each day without being taken away to this limitless environment where imagination is the only inhibitor.

The WoW Rehabber

The adage, “Life in moderation,” is a piece of advice that WoW players need to remember. World of Warcraft has ruined the WoW rehabber’s life. The WoW rehabber is someone that has identified that they have a problem and ceases engagement with the game. They have put so much time into the game that it is physically, emotionally, and even financially impossible to continue playing the game. A WoW rehabber is someone who was once an addict but has quit playing WoW .To correct this damaging addiction, a WoW rehabber deletes characters or in worst case scenario deletes their accounts. This is one of the hardest things that a WoWer can do in his or her life. They are in a sense deleting a part of their soul or consciousness. Going through withdrawal and rehab is very prevalent in the WoW community. In Korea, it was reported that a child died due to neglect by her World of Warcraft addicted parents. China even imposed laws setting time limits on WoW. There are even guides out on the internet with instructions on how to go through WoW rehabilitation. The key concept here is self-responsibility. Responsible WoW players will never have to go through rehabilitation.

World of Warcraft is not merely a game to some people, but an on-going story that they are actors participating in. It represents a tiny fraction of what future virtual technologies could be capable of creating for the human imagination and mind. These four types of WoW classifications are very broad. Even in this attempt to tear down stereotypes about World of Warcraft, the four classifications are stereotypes in themselves. There are many different kinds of WoW players, and each person has their own reasons for playing. The real question that needs to be answered is whether a character in World of Warcraft is merely a pixilated avatar on a computer screen or an extension of someone’s life. Can someone truly live their life in the World of Warcraft universe? It may like a silly question in this century, but in a hundred years or so, when developers can create a virtual environment so realistic and vivid, who is going to be able to tell the difference?

I’ve been teleporting throughout the various islands of SL, and I have been looking for a romantic island to take a special someone out on a date. So far, I have been very disappointed. Most of the “romantic” islands that I have found turn out to be tacky, virtual, soft-porn orgies. I am looking for a quiet peaceful island where my date and I can get a bite to eat in an upscale restaurant, and then go take a walk on the beach, be out in nature, or chill in some sort of karma inducing location where my date and I can cuddle. I want detail to be put in this island, and don’t mind spend a couple hundred lindens. I did a little research online through sltree.com. This pointed me to a couple of romantic getaways. Midnight Reflection, Aphrodite’s Waterfall & Caverns, and The Lost Gardens of Apollo all caught my eye. When I searched the three of these in SL, I found out that they were all credible places that didn’t allow mature content. The Lost Gardens of Apollo was overcrowded, and I couldn’t teleport to the island. The other two seemed to be very nice places to go on a date. I think that I have a better idea now of where I want to go.

In order to run a business on Second Life, one needs to have a general understanding of the SL economy. The currency in Second Life is referred to as Linden Dollars. Linden Labs makes the economy independent of pricing by freezing the exchange rate on a market-based currency exchange with US dollars and other international monetary currencies. Linden Labs reports that the Second Life economy generated about 3.6 million dollars in the month of September 2005. The 2006 Second Life gross domestic product (GDP) was 64 million US dollars. Estimates of the 2007 GDP are between 500 million and 600 million US dollars. If you would consider Second Life a country of its own, that would rank it at 166 just below Grenada. Second Life has a larger GDP that 20 other countries. The Second Life economy is no joke. The estimated economic activity in 2007 will create about 550 million US dollars. Money can definitely be made on Second Life.

Linden Labs has a very intersting exchange system set up. They call it LindenX. To control LindenX Linden Labs has set up “circuit breakers.” They are market mechanisms that basically freeze the exchange levels if market acts in certain ways. If the average exchange rate in any given day increases or decreases more that 10% the Exchange market freezes for one hour. 20% for two hours. 30% until noon of the next day. These circuit breakers help keep the exchange rate stable. One thing to look out for is Linden Labs handling of monetary policy in Second Life. Linden Labs maintains a currency peg of about L$270 for $1. This is similar to what the Chinese do with Yuan. This practice could be argued to inhibit change in value. Currently, the exchange rate is US$1.00 US dollar for L$267. L$51 million changed hands today.

The Second Life market is a free market or laissez-faire economy. There are two types of costs to to be taken into account when doing business in Second Life: Membership plans and Virtual Land Use Fees (Tier Fee). In order to own land in Second Life, a Premium membership is required. A Premium account comes with advanced technical support and a 512m2 parcel (if you donate 512m2 to a group). These issues are really insignificant compared to the amount of space. If the Penn State Library were to move onto Second Life they would need at least a 1/4 Region or more. An entire region costs $1675 US dollars and an additional $195 per month in Tier fees.

From this brief economic analysis of Second Life, one can assume that the Second Life economy is growing at a stable rate, and under the eyes of Linden labs, the exchange rate between Linden dollars and US dollars has stayed the same over the past few years. This makes it a safe environment for businesses. The facts about increasing annual GDP also prove that profits and revenues are possible.

Sun Microsystems has multiple locations in Second Life. The general location for visitors interested in Sun Microsystems is the Pavilion. The first thing I did was take a guided tour of the island in hopes of learning a little about what they had to offer. The tour guide was this silver rocket chair that flew me around to various places on the island. It told me a lot about the history of the company and various features in the Pavilion parcel.

Sun opened their presence on SL in 2006, and they have the title of being the first Fortune 500 company to hold a conference on SL. From perspective of their guided tour, I found the Pavilion to be very well designed and visually appealing. The textures where detailed, and there weren’t really dull areas anywhere. Sun Microsystems doesn’t have any dedicated website for their SL presence, but there are many press releases on their main page.

In the center of the parcel there is a media center with a lot of seats and large video display screens. There was an information booth that told me Sun used this to display new products. Other Sun affiliated locations offer a tour of their new supercomputer which they showed at the 2007 conference in Reno, Nevada. Inside the visitor center there are also rooms for SL meetings and conferences. A recruitment center and press briefing lounge are located here as well.

Sun showcases their products in one of the building in the Pavilion. All of their servers are set up. You can actually open them up and see what they look like inside.

One thing that I really liked was a nifty little marketing ploy. Sun gives away free SL clothing that has the Sun Microsystems logo on it. The shirts are pretty cool, and it promotes their company as well.

I was a little disappointed in the amount of Sun employees on the site. During the time that I was touring the site I saw only one person there. The map revealed that there were only three people on the entire island. To improve their SL presence, Sun needs to get more people actively involved during the day to roam there island and talk to visitors. Without people there, Sun’s island appears very desolate and empty. I would only really recommend this island to a friend who is interested in buying products or services or looking for a job with Sun Microsystems.

IBM has a very similar island layout. Like Sun, IBM focuses on using SL as a communications and marketing platform. They have a plethora of confrence rooms and media centers, they even have a large theater. Unlike Sun, IBM seemed to have more employees on the island, and people specifically working there to help visitors out. They even had their own sandbox that had various projects under construction. Based on my tour of Sun Microsystem’s Pavilion, and a brief stint in IBM. It seemed to me that IBM had a better and more complex island.

In light of yesterday’s events (Hookers in Istania), I have decided to look into SL’s prostitution and escorting economy. I find that the demand for VR prostitution and escorting in Second Life are very interesting issues from the perspective of an economist. How does the industry make money? What marketing techniques do they use? How does Second Life’s interface affect the business cycle. Before the hooker’s where expelled yesterday from Istania I had a chance to talk to them about their business associates and employers.

Exotic dancers Rachel and Zimmy work for a SL company called Club XTC Elite. According to Rachel, “I can make around 2000 Lindens a day on average.” I asked Zimmy more about her SL employer and she told me, “XTC has about 25 dancers working for them, and their own island.” That is 50,000 Lindens per day (estimated).

I’m sure people wonder who is really behind the mask. For all we know, one of these dancers could very well be a man. Rachel and Zimmy both claim to be college students and girls. Zimmy goes to UCLA, and Rachel goes to Texas A&M. Marketing and Business Supply Chain majors respectivley. These stories (if they are true) make sense. Two intelligent college students in business majors trying to bring in the Lindens on SL. Rachel even calimed to have a boyfriend in RL. If these two SL hookers are telling the truth, it is great insight into what kind of people get into this business into SL. These people are not necessarily in a lower socio-economic group like their counter-parts in RL. “I do this job just to get Lindens for clothes in SL,” says Rachel, “It saves me a lot of money from shopping in real life.”

Second Life’s features allow XTC to have virtual ads almost anywhere. And a query for XTC retrieved multiple XTC affiliated locations. XTC is one of many producers in this particular market as well.It would be interesting to see a report on the economy in general of Second Life.

“There is a very high demand for our business in Second Life.”
—Rachel

A group of hookers/escorts invaded Istania today in search of business. They created objects in the sandbox and engaged in X-rated activities. Even when Istania admins where notified of the situation, the Hookers attacked with a C4 bomb which blew everyone in the sandbox across the map in different directions. The Hookers then continued to evade the authorities for the next couple of hours, while a single Berk’s admin bravely pursued them. A heated battle took place in the late afternoon. The Berk’s admin harnessed the power of a black hole to “black” them into voluntary exile. The Hookers rallied and counter-attacked by filling the entire sandlot, top to bottom, with SL porno ads in the shape of giant triangles. Theses triangles cannot be removed by the Istania admins…the Hookers were really good scripters. We must wait for the all-powerful, all-seeing, all-mighty Tarkus Octagon to lay the smack down on these Hookers and protect the citizens of Istania.

LONG LIVE TARKUS OCTAGON!

Here is what remains of this spectacular SL battle: