Research Proposal
Lasya Muthyam
Intern/Mentor
1/10/2022
Title:
Reflecting on our Society: The Effects of Technology on Society’s Security.
Introduction and Overview of Research:
The topic that is currently being researched analyzes how cybersecurity plays a role in
preserving society’s security. With the increase in the availability of computers and the growing
power technology holds in society, there has been a startling rise in cyberattacks over the past
couple of decades. Due to the general public being uninformed about safety protocols while
exploring the Internet and cybercriminals constantly attempting to hack the most secure systems,
a panic has arisen in the society of to what extent should technology be relied on to store
classified information. To this controversy, the hypothesis responds by stating a logical stance
that while technology is an important resource, it comes with many risks and flaws and therefore
should be approached with vigilance. The hypothesis will be backed up by data gathered through
metadata (like past studies and articles) and interviews of current professionals who work to
combat this growing problem. After the data collection, the information will be synthesized to
clearly explore the problems and possible solutions to cyberattacks. At the end of the research,
the paper aims to inform the general public about different ways people can prevent future
cyberattacks by staying vigilant about the constant threat of a hack.
Background and Rationale:
Over the past couple of decades, there has been a massive boom in the tech industry as
humans have started to rely more and more on technological innovations to assist in strenuous
tasks. Starting from the invention of computers, this trend started to drastically change how
society functions as more and more people started to have access to technology in their daily
lives. This new phenomenon has since spread to other, and more professional, sectors like the
economy, the government, hospitals, schools, etc, making our entire society run on the assistance
of computers and other devices. The immediate effects of this new resource were very beneficial
to society, the main effects being improved efficiency with difficult procedures due to technology
safely storing large sets of data. As computers and other devices started to develop along with
time, clients and users started to receive greater control over the devices they deal with. As the
Internet and technology become a tool that holds great importance to our society, some
individuals started to try to find ways of gaining illegal access to devices and get ahold of the
information stored. Starting from 1834, there have been relatively few cyberattacks until 2010.
With technology being a relatively new and inaccessible resource for the general public, the
majority of cyber attacks took place between nations or governments who were in a war.
Although from 2010, there has been a startling increase in the number of cyberattacks. With a
low number of only 15 cyberattacks happening from 2000-2010, the number of cyberattacks
skyrocketed to almost 1,500,000 attacks in the decade. Moving onto 2021, there was a greater
number of cyber attacks than the previous decade as there were more than 1,600,000
cyberattacks.
With the number of cyberattacks growing exponentially over the past decades, there has
been a panic throughout society on whether or not to rely on technology to store information.
With cyber-attacks affecting millions of people worldwide, people have been avoiding using this
resource. Eventually, there emerged a new controversy on to what extent should we rely on
technology?. As technology is a resource that we greatly rely on and has aided us in making so
much progress, it is not something society can afford to abandon. Through researching this topic
and learning more about cybersecurity I wish to address these blurry lines and inform the public
about ways to stay safe online. By researching and analyzing the different ways a system can be
attacked, I wish to learn more about certain loopholes in our current tech infrastructure and learn
about future plans to address this growing problem.
Research Methodology:
Research Question:
To what extent should society rely on technology to store classified information? What should
society and its individuals do to protect its classified information from the growing number of
cyber-attacks? How do the solutions vary across different professional sectors?
Research Hypothesis:
While many technological innovations have helped us access and store information efficiently,
many remain with hardware and software flaws. Although, through understanding cybersecurity
trends and security features we can protect data from the dangers of a screen.
Emerging Themes:
One emerging theme that will be addressed in the research paper to support the Research
hypothesis is that the broadening availability of technology in the world has led systems to
become more vulnerable to attacks. As more people have ready access to computers and the
Internet, unfortunately, most people have little to no knowledge on how to stay safe online. This
makes the job of hackers very easy as they can use many simple methods to hack into systems.
Another emerging theme that will be argued in the research paper to support the Research
Hypothesis is that software and hardware, while different in states, will have similar solutions
that require a revision and strengthening of security infrastructure. Currently, it is recommended
that both the software and hardware be protected by a firewall and anti-virus services. While
these have helped prevent many malicious threats, they are not secure enough to prevent a hack
from happing completely. A common trend that has been emerging from the cybersecurity firm
hints that revisions must be made to the existing system’s security features and devices should be
developed with pre-installed protection.
Research Design Model:
I plan to conduct interviews and also gather previous studies and papers (metadata) to collect
further information about my research topic as a study, survey or other forms of data collection
will not yield accurate and necessary data for my research topic.
Variables in my Research:
As an experiment will not logically correlate with my research questions, I am mainly using
interviews and metadata to collect data on my research questions. I, therefore, do not have
concrete variables in my research.
Data Collection:
When I conduct my interview I will have already collected data from previous interviews. I will
write questions that branch off of the questions I had asked my previous interviewees or I will
ask them about topics that I would still want more clarification on. When collecting metadata, I
will find previous studies and/or research papers on different solutions that professionals had
experimented with to prevent or limit the vulnerability of systems to cyberattacks. My metadata
will include studies that explore both the hardware and software properties of technology and
different solutions for each.
Project Observations:
At the end of my research, I plan to demonstrate the research and data I have collected by
creating a mobile app that informs my audience, the general public, about the different types of
cyberattacks and how it affects a system. The mobile app will be structured similarly to an
interactive simulation and will allow the user to interact with the UI (buttons, pop-ups,
notifications, etc.) to expose them to different types of attacks. As the user is assumed to not be
well informed about cybersecurity, the app will walk them through what each attack is, how it
interacts with the system, and how to prevent them from occurring in their personal device. I
believe that this app will be very interactive and will clearly display both my research and
accomplish my goal of educating the general public about cyberattacks.
Logistical Considerations:
The biggest limitation of my research project is that in the field of technology, things are
changing on a daily basis. With new discoveries, studies, and software/hardware being
developed, it will be hard for me to collect and analyze the most recent data. Additionally, one of
the solutions that I had focussed on (Zero-Trust Architecture) is a relatively new solution that is
still in the implementing stages. Therefore, the sources that I collected did not provide the most
accurate information about the overall performance of the solution as it takes time to uncover its
flaws. Although to minimize this as much as possible, I will make sure to emphasize that that
research focuses on the importance of learning about the latest cybersecurity trends in order to
learn about how to stay safe while using technology to store classified information.
Operational Definitions:
● Algorithms: a set of instructions that a person codes into a device so that it can function
the way it is supposed to (BBC Ideas, 2019)
● Hardware vs Software: Hardware consists of the physical components of any
device(CPU< motherboard, circuits, chips, etc. Software is the code and algorithms that
are programmed into a device and tell it how to function (Du et al., 2019)
● Efficiency: the term used to describe an algorithm that completes a task in a timely and
simple manner (Gordon, 2021)
● Firewalls: a protective shield that applies to both hardware and software(separately) to
block malicious attacks on a router, server, or system (Edureka, 2021)
● Cryptography: the study of encrypting and decrypting messages to hide and unmask
information (Markel, 2021)
● Internet of Things(IoT): when an everyday object is connected to the internet through
computing devices, allowing them to send and receive data (Clark, 2017)
References:
BCC Ideas, (2019). What exactly is an algorithm? Algorithms explained [Video]. Youtube.
Retrieved from. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZnBF2GeAKbo
Bu L., (2019) Design of secure and trustworthy system-on-chip architectures using
hardware-based root-of-trust techniques. Boston University. Retrieved from
https://open.bu.edu/handle/2144/36148
Clark J., (2017). Making secure chips for iot devices. IBM Business Operation Blog. Retrieved
from
https://www.ibm.com/blogs/internet-of-things/what-is-the-iot/
Climer S., (2018) History of cyber attacks from the morris worm to exact. Midsight. Retrieved
from https://www.bbc.com/news/technology-24667834
Dickson B., (2021) Computer vision can help spot cyber threats with startling accuracy. TNW
News. Retrieved October 27, 2021, from
https://thenextweb.com/news/computer-vision-help-spot-cyber-threats-startling-accuracy-
syndication
Dorsch J., (2018) Making secure chips for iot devices. Semiconductor Engineering. Retrieved
from https://semiengineering.com/making-chips-for-iot-devices-secure/
Du M., Feng, X., Jiang Y., Li X., Yang X., (2019) Computer vision algorithms and hardware
implementations. ScienceDirect. Retrieved from
https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0167926019301762
Edureka, (2021) Cybersecurity firewall: How application security works? Edureka. Retrieved
from https://www.edureka.co/blog/cybersecurity-firewall/
Gordon R., (2021) How quickly do algorithms improve? MIT News. Retrieved October 27, 2021,
from
https://news.mit.edu/2021/how-quickly-do-algorithms-improve-0920
Markel S., (2021) How is cryptography used in everyday life?. TechMoon. Retrieved from
https://technologymoon.com/how-is-cryptography-used-in-everyday-life/
Rainie, L., Anderson, J., & Page D. (2017). Code-dependent: Pros and cons of the algorithm age.
Pew Research Center. Retrieved October 27, 2021, from
http://www.pewinternet.org/2017/02/08/code-dependent-pros-and-cons-of-the-algorithm-
age
