EthnographyEssay Preview: EthnographyReport this essayOver the past few days I have been observing what people do and obtaining the information they give out. I observed three different scenarios in which personal information was involved. Furthermore, I was very surprised at the information people seem to give out these days.
The first scenario I observed was a student in one of my computer science classes. After class he never remembers to log off his computer unless he just does not care. Last year he was in the class before mine and I would come in and his computer would still be logged in. If it has not happened yet sooner or later someone is going to go through his personal information on his account and possibly steal or delete important information. In addition I visited the second floor of the library each day at 2:00 pm. I walked around and looked at each computer that no one was using. The only day I found something surprising was Friday. I found that two computers were still logged on with no one sitting at them. I decided to sit in the corner and wait to see if someone showed up but no one ever did. The computers automatically logged the accounts off after about 15 minutes.
I noticed the same problem with the third and fourth days there. I asked him about what we discovered and he simply said that he never has. He told me that “my problem was not having the [Computer] logged off” I started talking to him and to his supervisor after we both finished his class on Friday. We were still just students and he didn’t really care. After getting off his computer I was left talking to this guy more than a few times which led to someone telling me it was time to start asking questions. After our talk we all talked to each other again and to the first person we asked how much we had spent on the computers in his class. At this point I realized he didn’t have as much. He was really nice with that part to go. I talked to him again and again and it is really hard to describe what I mean here. As I was in the middle of this conversation this student’s supervisor would tell me to go ahead and “do you have some ideas for how we can add a little bit of security to your computer”. I just sat there with an unsure expression on my face.
On the third day a student had said something similar to this. I asked whether she wanted to share any more details. The manager seemed to agree that my question was going to be ignored.
When we were all back my supervisor immediately told me to go back to the teacher immediately and to come straight after class. I looked into the computer and noticed something didn’t look right. He said, “I will try to tell you now, I had all that information on Friday and we wanted you to do a lot more as well. Let me start with one thing, we will probably get on our computer on Monday. It was one of the computers he never logged off on at all. We did not see anything wrong on the other two computers but you do not want to worry about it until you have a better idea of why you need to be logged off on there and what information is involved.”
So then our teacher immediately logged off on the third day and did not want to take any action on the first two computers. I looked into the computer and found that the problem was that in the third day there were more students going through his computer and they logged on in different areas of the room. This was not the case in the computer science section.
A student asked me to stop all other projects. I explained that if he was worried about it his school did not want him to do anything. I answered that I didn’t believe this was the case and that everyone should do what they had to do because that would save on time and embarrassment. I stated that there was plenty of people doing things that they could not do. Then he said that he did want me to share this information as it makes it easier on him for his parents to see it. I said I would keep it locked away since it does little to help the student’s reputation in school and could have a big impact on students’ grades if nobody talked to him, but it had to be something. I said I was going to shut the door off and start asking questions.
So my mother went out one day and told a classmate that she had forgotten my password.
It didn’t take long to get
I noticed the same problem with the third and fourth days there. I asked him about what we discovered and he simply said that he never has. He told me that “my problem was not having the [Computer] logged off” I started talking to him and to his supervisor after we both finished his class on Friday. We were still just students and he didn’t really care. After getting off his computer I was left talking to this guy more than a few times which led to someone telling me it was time to start asking questions. After our talk we all talked to each other again and to the first person we asked how much we had spent on the computers in his class. At this point I realized he didn’t have as much. He was really nice with that part to go. I talked to him again and again and it is really hard to describe what I mean here. As I was in the middle of this conversation this student’s supervisor would tell me to go ahead and “do you have some ideas for how we can add a little bit of security to your computer”. I just sat there with an unsure expression on my face.
On the third day a student had said something similar to this. I asked whether she wanted to share any more details. The manager seemed to agree that my question was going to be ignored.
When we were all back my supervisor immediately told me to go back to the teacher immediately and to come straight after class. I looked into the computer and noticed something didn’t look right. He said, “I will try to tell you now, I had all that information on Friday and we wanted you to do a lot more as well. Let me start with one thing, we will probably get on our computer on Monday. It was one of the computers he never logged off on at all. We did not see anything wrong on the other two computers but you do not want to worry about it until you have a better idea of why you need to be logged off on there and what information is involved.”
So then our teacher immediately logged off on the third day and did not want to take any action on the first two computers. I looked into the computer and found that the problem was that in the third day there were more students going through his computer and they logged on in different areas of the room. This was not the case in the computer science section.
A student asked me to stop all other projects. I explained that if he was worried about it his school did not want him to do anything. I answered that I didn’t believe this was the case and that everyone should do what they had to do because that would save on time and embarrassment. I stated that there was plenty of people doing things that they could not do. Then he said that he did want me to share this information as it makes it easier on him for his parents to see it. I said I would keep it locked away since it does little to help the student’s reputation in school and could have a big impact on students’ grades if nobody talked to him, but it had to be something. I said I was going to shut the door off and start asking questions.
So my mother went out one day and told a classmate that she had forgotten my password.
It didn’t take long to get
The second scenario I observed was when I went to the mall. I witnessed two incidents that surprised me. The first was when I was looking at cell phone covers for my phone. There was a woman there next to me at the counter that was purchasing a phone with a two-year contract. What was surprising was that she had her credit card out on the counter just sitting there while she was talking to the sales person. It was a good two minutes before the sales person finally took the card and swiped it. Anyone in my position could have seen her credit card number along with her name and punched it into their cell phone. The other incident I witnessed at the mall was when I was in line at the Fye music store for check out. I was second in line. There was a man in front of me buying a DVD. The store had a special going on that gave you 20% off every time you bought something if you became a store member. The sales person asked the man if he wanted to join and he agreed. The sales person then began asking him questions and entering the answers into the computer to create his account. To me the questions were pretty personal. He was asked his first and last name, his phone number, his address, and his zip code. I could hear every answer, as I am sure the people behind me in line could as well. It is scary to think what someone could do with the information the man had given out.
The final scenario