Imagine que tu as eu le pire jour du monde. Tu montes l’autobus et t’assoie. Mais tu vois quelque chose ; plutôt quelqu’un. A côte de toi est un bébé qui sourit et te regarde. Ses grosses joues gigotent et tu peux voir ses gencives. Ses yeux grands et brillant te regarde avec curiosité. Tu es obligé de sourire en retour ! Avant de le savoir, tu fais des visages idiots et bizarre pour voir le bébé rire. Sûrement, quand il rit encore, tu es béni pour la journée.
A mon avis, cela est la plus saines chose qui ne peut jamais arriver. En général les bébés sont adorables. Si un te regarde cela est un des plus jolis moments du monde. Leurs expressions du visage sont si drôles et saines. Leurs souris est si charmante que tu as besoin de sourire en retour. Finalement, leurs yeux sont pleins de curiosité et ils ne savent pas que le monde est une place brutale et cruelle.
When I Googled myself, I didn’t find anything that was too relevant to me. I used my name and last initial, first initial and last name and every combination in between. I found that my family is very popular and visible in the Philippines. I also found that my grandparents are there more visible online than I am. I also found that the things that did show up were not very up to date. There was a project I did in grade seven, a document about a reward I won in grade 7 and a PDF file that my basketball coach from a long time ago posted. I don’t think that’s a good thing. See more about that in my conclusion.
How might your digital footprint affect your future opportunities? Give at least two examples.
Your digital footprint can affect your future opportunities and you have no control over what’s already there. Once you post it, your future employer could see your Instagram, Facebook or Twitter feed, that could go two ways. They could love what they see, if it showed a digitally responsible, well rounded person. Or just the opposite could happen, they could see a totally irresponsible and careless person.
Your digital footprint can affect something far more important than job opportunities. It can affect academic opportunities, such as scholarships, universities and colleges. For example, if you were applying for the Technology Addiction Awareness Scholarship from some place in the U.S. If someone were to go onto your Instagram and see that you post to your story every five minutes, they could deem you ineligible for that scholarship.
Describe at least three strategies that you can use to keep your digital footprint appropriate and safe.
There are quite a few strategies that you can use to keep your digital footprint safe. I’ll try and come up with some that are more original than just “keep your account on private”.
One strategy that can be helpful is to google yourself. You won’t know what is out there until you look. You don’t need to spend all day looking at Google’s search results after you Google yourself, you can simply type your time into the little box once or twice a month.
Another strategy is to always be mindful. Before you post take the time to think about why you are posting this. Are you trying to be funny or cool? Chances are, if you’re just posting to make yourself seem different than you are that will not affect you positively in the future. You should also be mindful and think about if this could offend someone in a way that you are not okay with. What I mean by that is that you can’t make everyone happy and you should always be you.
My third strategy is to watch what you use for usernames on your accounts. I feel like usernames like CoolGamer123 and Will_1001 are better left for gaming and not social media. You shouldn’t use your first or last name for gaming, but don’t be afraid to use your real name on platforms like Twitter or Facebook.
I have one more tip for all of you, first impressions are everything, and you should treat them as such. In person, first impressions are based off how you stand, how you dress and how you speak. Online, they are based off your username, profile picture and bio.
What information did you learn that you would pass on to other students? How would you go about telling them?
Something that I think everyone should know is that just because your account says private, it’s not completely private. I would tell them this by doing an activity like the one they did in that video we had to watch beforehand. I feel like many teenagers also have too many social media accounts. Spam accounts aren’t necessary, and you are just expanding your digital footprint while using them. Keep your accounts all on a list and don’t let your list exceed three or four. You want to have a manageable amount that won’t control your life.
In conclusion, I learned a lot during this project. Some key points I learned are that my family is more visible online than I thought. I need to step it up and not be afraid to post and share my good ideas after editing them and making sure they are appropriate to post. A good digital footprint can make all the difference in career and academic opportunities; I should use the impact they make to give myself edge and an advantage.
My wonder question was, “How does the uniqueness of prime numbers allow them to be such powerful encryption tools?”. Before I began informing you about how I did my research and found or didn’t find my answer, I should probably let you know what I knew beforehand. I’m going to assume that you’re someone who doesn’t really know a lot about technology and math.
To start us off: What is a prime number and why are they so important?
Prime numbers are number that have only two factors; one and themselves. For example, two is a prime, it can be divided by two and one. Prime numbers are a huge part of analytic number theory and provide proof for many other theories. They are also a huge part of cryptography.
A Brief History
2300 years ago, the first proof of prime numbers was found by a mathematician named Euclid. He used the method of contradiction to find the primes and ended up proving that there are infinitely loads of prime numbers.
At the start of his research, he started to prove the opposite. He found that if you multiplied all the primes together and added one, that number would not be prime because it would have a prime divisor. Thus, forcing it to divide one, which is impossible. Euclid proved that there were infinite prime numbers and that all integers can be written as something made by the primes in some way.
A mathematician, Eratosthenes of Cyrene, created a systematic algorithm called the sieve of Eratosthenes that can find prime numbers! This algorithm is now widely used in computer software. How does it work? To start off, write down positive integers in order from 1 to whatever number you want and cross out the number one since, it’s not prime. The first prime is two. Cross out every second number after two, every third number after three and every fifth number after five. Continue crossing out every nth number after n. The numbers that aren’t crossed out are primes. The sieve of Eratosthenes does have a problem, it doesn’t compute prime numbers.
Another mathematician named Pierre de Fermat had an idea. He theorized that 2n + 1 would equal prime numbers if n was to the power of two. A little while later, Leonhard Euler proved that this in fact was not true and that 2n + 1 ≠ prime numbers. Euler used a lot of math to prove this, most of which I don’t understand.
The Mersenne Sequence
The largest prime number known as of July 2018 is 277,232,917 − 1, a number with 23,249,425 digits. It was found using the Mersenne sequence. Marin Mersenne was a French mathematician. He found that for eleven primes smaller than two hundred fifty-seven n = 2p – 1p then n = a prime. For any other prime number, this equation doesn’t work. Searching for prime numbers using the Mersenne sequence has become a huge part of computer and software checks. It also helps to find defects in computer chips.
Public Key Encryption
Let’s start our journey into the deep dark parts of the internet, things hidden by layers and layers of code. Public key encryption is everywhere. Whether you’re doing a little online shopping or using social media. Public key encryption is what protects your private information, like credit card number, passwords and much more from the creepy people of the internet. A huge aspect of quantum computation is its application for code breaking. A vulnerable code is the public key system. Public key is based on a very complicated and difficult math algorithm called Shor’s algorithm.
Cryptography is a division of math that is solely concerned with finding schemes and formulas to help enhance privacy in communication using code. Cryptography allows you to have privacy and confidentially in communication. It relies on advance math and even has its own special branch that is all about exploring the properties and relations of numbers using number theory. The word cryptography comes from the Greek word Kryptos. Kryptos is Greek for to hide so, in my opinion, the name suits the meaning very well.
There are a few different public key systems that are common.
One of which is RSA. RSA is named for its creators, Ron Rivest, Adi Shamir and Leonard Adleman. RSA is used by U.S. banks to provide a safe way for online banking and a private connection.
The other common one is DSA. DSA stands for Digital Signature Algorithm. DSA is sometimes used by websites to add Google code into the site functions. Some websites also use DSA to make their site virtually non-existent to untrusted or unsecure users.
Public key systems are even in your home. At home, you use a public key system to keep your Wi-Fi safe from hackers. The public key system in your Wi-Fi can even keep your Wi-Fi safe from mooching neighbors.
As the information people are trying to protect gets more sensitive, we are seeing the amount of DSA and RSA encryptions go up and up. Meaning, it should become harder for people to hack into private networks.
The goal for both encryptions are the same. They are there to make it so that the information that is being sent is only understood by the sender and trusted recipients and to maintain the integrity and preservation of data. Previous attempts at privacy seem very mundane in comparison. People have tried using hidden text, disappearing inks and code pads to protect their information but, these are far less secure than RSA and DSA programs.
How does public encryption work?
To my understanding, the public key encryption system works by finding an extremely large factor of a prime number (usually 100-200 digits long). The system takes this number and uses it like a lock. Every lock has a key, right? The key for this lock is the prime number itself. To send the message, it is divided into little chunks and the information that can be obtained is limited. There are two ways the receiver can decipher the message. One is by using an elaborate reconstruction process or equation. It usually involves many different mathematical equations. The other deciphering method is to inverse the equation that was used initially for the encryption. Addition turns into subtraction, division into multiplication and vice versa.
Conclusion
We have started to apply math number theory to help add to the privacy and security of the information. We are making more and more involved algorithms and allowing information to be seen solely by the target audience. In commercial and personal use, we can verify that it’s a trusted sender and the integrity and privacy that the information remains secret.
In conclusion, the importance and use of cryptography is increasing. In many places, paper and pen are becoming less and less common. There are huge data increases meaning, that we’re going to start needing more permanent storage in computers and with the rise of tech use, there are more security issues than ever before. With all those increasements, we are going to need more cryptologic advancements and surely more secure and user-friendly cryptologic systems to protect the consumer’s databases and social medias. Leaving me with a single question; How will we do it?
Mr. Robinson’s Questions:
What questions did you need to research in order to research your topic?
After formulation my starting question, I wanted to see what I could find out about the history of both prime numbers and public key encryption. During my research, I used key words more than question. The key words I used were, “Public keys” “Prime numbers and encryption” “Cryptography”.
What new or familiar tools did you try to use as you worked through this project?
During the project, I used Gale Engage learning, which was a whole new experience for me. I also used Word, EasyBib, WordReference (for a thesaurus) and Pexels, all of which I’ve used before.
What was the process you used to investigate this topic?
The process I used wasn’t very intricate. I went to the Gale Engage website and used my keywords and the topic finder. I mainly used trial and error. I clicked on a few articles, read a little bit and decided if it was relevant to my topic.
How did you verify and cite the information you found?
To verify my information, I went on google and saw if anyone was saying the same thing. I for my citations I used EasyBib and the ones that were already there with the article for Gale Engage Learning.
How did the process of completing this challenge go? What could you have done better?
The process of completing this challenge was very fun. I really enjoyed learning about my topic. What I could have done better is that I could have added more information from my research that I had completed but I didn’t because I figured my little article was long enough. I also could have verified my spelling and grammar usage more.
