Cisco acts fast, fights off holiday bug Coming just in time for the holidays, a Cisco software defect stalled computer networks worldwide prompting the networking-giant to deliver a speedy fix and temper customer concern.

The problem was traced to a defect in the source code of a software program from newly acquired Grand Junction Networks Inc. that runs in some Cisco switches. The defect was tied to the internal computer clock. And on December 26 at exactly 12:O 1 Pacific Standard Time, computers could not connect to their LAN network.

According to Jack Moses, director of mar- keting for Cisco, the company had no pre- vious knowledge of the defect until it was noti- fied by a Japan-based company. Japan was one of the first to be affected by the defect since the country is in a time zone ahead of the US.

“Our engineers diag- nosed the problem with- in two hours of notification and had a field installable software upgrade within eight,” said Moses. “We aggres- sively and effectively re- sponded to a serious customer issue.”

The following day Cisco fielded 300 custo- mer support cases di- rectly associated with

the defect. And by the end of the business day, all customer problems worldwide had been re- solved. Some customers even had the presence of mind to turn the internal clocks of their computers ahead, thus fooling the defect.

The incident could have been much worse had it not happened during the holiday sea- son, when most busi- nesses are closed or operate on skeletal staffs.

Ironically, like a holi- day guest knowing when it’s time to leave, the defect self-cor- rected on December 31st allowing any non- fixed networks to come back online.

The defect affected only a small percentage of Cisco’s customer base and, unlike a computer virus, the defect did not destroy or alter data nor did it contaminate other computers.

Thomas Kane&&e

Amendments to Data Protection Act Guidelines on the irnpli- cations of the amend- ments to the Data Protection Act brought about by the Criminal Justice and Public Order Act are being issued free of charge by the Data Protection Registrar.

The new sections of the Act have established three new criminal of- fences, all designed to tackle the problems cre- ated by the growing market in personal infor- mation. The first makes it an offence for a person to procure the disclosure of personal data to him, where he knows or has reason to believe that he is not a person to whom the data user is regis- tered to disclose the data.

The sale, or offering for sale (including adver- tising for sale) of perso- nal data obtained in this way include the other new criminal offences established. It is now possible to commit an offence of aiding and abetting/incitement in respect of these primary offences

The guidance is available on written re- quest from: The MarkeG ing G Communications Department, Office of the Data Protection Re- gistrar, Wyclaffe House, Water Lane, Wilmslow SK3 5AF, UK or via E-mail: data@ wycliffe. demon.co.uk

Computer Audit Update l February 1996 0 1996, Elsevier Science Ltd.