I look forward to talking to AECT colleagues on Thursday, 11/9/17 about accommodating crowdsourced data in social research and program
evaluation. This conversation complements my future research agenda on using specialized crowds for e-learning evaluation.
 |
| Steve King aka Dr. Security |
For issues about managing data and cybersecurity, I typically
turn to the expertise of Steve King, Netswitch
COO/CTO. Learn more about Steve and read
what I learned about security and engaging crowds in e-learning evaluation.
Steve is happy to advise evaluators on issues of architectural requirements and
cloud data security. Reach out to him on Twitter and LinkedIn @sking1145.
Platform
Considerations for Human Intelligence Tasks
A secured Web conferencing platform or a MOOC separate from
a school’s network should support crowdsourced evaluation activities. A secure
web-conferencing platform that imposes a bunch of restrictions is necessary to
assure there is no easy avenue to compromise crowd evaluation tasks.
Assuming the crowd will be operating on an external host
(cloud provider like AWS or Azure), the platform ought to be able to offer
several services. Cloud providers typically offer content monitoring services
so that up and downloads can be erased/destroyed at discretion. They also offer
meta-data backup of the event itself so key information can be retained without
leaving the crowd initiator or evaluator vulnerable to actual content being
compromised.
Data Processing
Considerations
The cloud service provider should be able to process large
volumes of high velocity, structured (spreadsheets, databases) and unstructured
(videos, images, audio) information as well as secure all of it. Even if an
evaluator choses to run evaluation tasks in a local private cloud, any provider
will offer this level of security.
But it is CRUCIAL to separate the cloud from the school’s network
so that the crowd members can’t gain access to the school’s information or
administrative network. If an evaluator can only run off the school’s
system/network itself, she will be forced to set-up a sub-net at least and buy
some hardware which could get more expensive than running the whole thing in a
cloud. I would NOT advise an evaluator to try the latter option.
Credentials
Considerations
In order to have a clearly defined crowd, crowd initiators
must assign every member a credential and use whatever vetting process the
evaluator would normally use to determine their appropriateness for
participation. A SSN or EIN number matched with key locator information or
student ID that can be validated could work.
Other Key Platform,
Data, and Credential Considerations:
The Federal Risk and Authorization Management Program
(FedRAMP), while specifically related to government security requirements, provides
compliance guidelines that will guarantee a secure web conferencing platform.
FedRAMP standards meet the baseline security controls set
out by the National Institute of Standards.
A web conferencing platform should be FedRAMP compliant, and
if not, should employ a layered security model of some sort with the following
characteristics:
·
Gated
access is one important characteristic.
Gated access refers to the security
options that manage entrance to and usage of virtual rooms employed by a web
conferencing platform. Gated access also
helps prevent DDoS attacks
·
Platform, data, and credential restriction settings are important.
The ability to set restrictions on the hours a
virtual room can be accessed minimizes the time in which sensitive and vulnerable
information can be viewed and compromised. Crowdsource HITs initiators will
want to be able to monitor remote users. The platform should allow the encryption
of all information in transit. It should also allow session locks and the
ability to terminate credentials so the crowdsource initiator can manage the
platform access. Session locks allow evaluators to control who can enter a room
at what time. Credential termination should be both manual and automatic based
on a member leaving a room or meeting space where their credentials will no
longer work for re-entry without a new login.
The platform should also let
evaluators encrypt the event recordings, both at rest and in transit so that
when a crowd initiator shares the contents with evaluation members unable to
participate synchronously, only authorized members will have the encryption
keys that will allow them access.
Initiators will want to be able to
control and define roles and access privileges for the crowd which will
establish the specific conditions by which a member can interact with a group
or room. Role-based access control and dynamic privilege management are keys to
this next layer. It is the evaluator’s ultimate control over who gets to enter
which rooms, so she can decide that a member who needs to share information
with a key group but should not be allowed direct access to that group can be
assigned to a sub-conference room where a primary conference member can meet
them, gain the information and return to the primary meeting.
Dynamic privilege management allows
an evaluator to enable the retention of a member’s virtual identity while suspending
their access privileges, so a member could have their privileges upgraded
temporarily for a one-time event and then returned to their prior status. This
could also facilitate evaluation requirements for working on individual or
group e-learning tasks, and protecting small human intelligence tasks or HITs.
The conferencing platform should
also allow a way to pair a person with unique authenticators that can customize
their privileges. This is done through
individual access codes which are essentially the member’s fingerprints.
Depending upon the privileges granted, individual access controls keep track of
access rules and determine which sessions each member will be allowed to enter.
This comes in handy for the identification of suspects following an information
leak or inappropriate sharing of sensitive material.
