Peer Review

Computer Fraud Word Search

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Overview:: This activity combines gaming theory with a short answer/matching, drill and practice activity to help students learn about the different types of computer fraud. It also has the student classify each type of computer fraud as a computer attack, a social engineering method, malware, or some combination of the three.
Type of Material:: Drill and Practice.
Recommended Uses:: Educational resource to be incorporated into classroom use in the form of open discussion, class activity, homework assignment and examination review in the area of forensic accounting.
Technical Requirements:: Microsoft Office Word 2007 or later version.
Identify Major Learning Goals:: To understand how vulnerable computer systems are to fraud. To understand the pervasiveness of computer fraud in terms of computer attacks, malware, and social engineering. To identify each type of fraud as a computer attack, a social engineering method, or malware.
Target Student Population:: College Lower Division and Upper Division, introductory computer, information systems or accounting information systems, forensic accounting course
Prerequisite Knowledge or Skills:: Some knowledge of computers and princples of accounting.

Rating:
Strengths:: Combines a wealth of material and terminology in an exercise that makes learning the terminology fun, and engages more fully the different senses, hopefully having the desired effect of promoting retention of the material. Is very current and relevant to the types of computer frauds that can take place. Beneficial in using a current textbook reference for anyone who might want to use the exercise but is uncertain of any of the terms.
Concerns:: As the teaching notes states at the website, the third learning objective, of categorization of the frauds as either malware, social engineering and computer attack might be subject to debate. For example salami technique and round down techniques are both listed as computer attack by the solution (and the cited reference), but they could be debated as being considered as malware examples. Also masquerading is listed as computer attack, but could be considered as social engineering. These classifications are not all mutually exclusive into those three categories, and so a first time user may want to be careful in terms of how much to emphasize or require that specific learning objective. The exercise is beneficial in getting students to think about how the frauds are perpetrated.

Rating:
Strengths:: By its nature of the exercise having two parts, there is reinforcement and building on the concepts. This allows for multiple ways that the tool can be used. The versatility and usefulness for virtually anyone who uses computers today makes this material relevant in many areas, not just in accounting.
Concerns:: None

Rating:
Strengths:: The author’s game and related website are professionally done.High marks in particular for the interactive dimension. Also in terms of design quality and visual appeal, the fact that the solution for the word find is in different colors, helps the learner find any missing words or terms more easily.
Concerns:: None.

Other Issues and Comments:: This exercise was classroom tested with two groups of upper division Accounting Information Systems students over two separate classroom sessions. After having lectured on the material, students were asked to work on the word search by themselves for a few minutes and then gathered into small groups. A high level of enthusiasm for this part was noted among both traditional and nontraditional students; even though Halloween had been several weeks past, students chuckled over this little extra. In the next week’s class, students worked on the definitions for a few minutes on their own, before convening into groups to see how many terms they could match, without using their notes or texts. This exercise was not as easy as one might think, as several of the terms had similar definitions. I noticed several students explain to others their reasoning and thus believe the exercise involved active learning methods. Finally, students mentioned their plans to use the exercise in their own review for a testing situation.
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