Computer Science Test 1 Nddc Scholarship

Software is protected by intellectual property laws. Making unauthorized copies, commonly known as software piracy, is a criminal offense. If a school reproduces software without a valid license, they are violating the developer's copyright, which can lead to severe legal consequences, heavy fines, or criminal prosecution against the institution.

Decryption is the specific cryptographic process used to turn ciphertext back into its original plaintext. While encoding and decoding are general terms for changing data formats, decryption specifically requires a secret key or password to unlock the mathematical protection applied during the encryption stage, ensuring only authorized parties read the data.

In computer security, a hoax is a false warning designed to cause panic and spread misinformation. Unlike actual viruses or worms that contain malicious code, a hoax relies on social engineering to trick users into clogging mail servers by forwarding the message, often providing 'instructions' that might actually damage the computer.

The Operating System (OS) serves as the gatekeeper for all hardware and software resources. It manages user accounts, passwords, and permissions through its kernel and security subsystems. By authenticating users during login, the OS ensures that only authorized individuals can access specific files, applications, or administrative settings on the machine.

A Peer-to-Peer (P2P) network allows individual computers to communicate and share files directly with one another without the need for a central server. In this architecture, every 'peer' acts as both a client and a server, which made these early services highly efficient but also controversial regarding copyright infringement.

Information security is a broad field focused on the 'CIA triad': Confidentiality, Integrity, and Availability. It involves implementing technical, administrative, and physical safeguards to prevent unauthorized access, disclosure, disruption, or destruction of sensitive data, ensuring that information remains accurate and accessible only to those with the proper credentials.

The Computer Misuse Act of 1990 was introduced in the UK to criminalize unauthorized access to computer systems, commonly referred to as hacking. It was designed to provide a legal framework for prosecuting individuals who intentionally gain access to data without permission, or who perform more serious acts like digital fraud and sabotage.

A firewall acts as a digital barrier between a trusted internal network and untrusted external networks, such as the internet. By analyzing incoming and outgoing traffic based on a predefined set of security rules, it can block suspicious data packets and prevent hackers from gaining unauthorized entry into a private network.

CAPTCHA stands for 'Completely Automated Public Turing test to tell Computers and Humans Apart.' It typically requires users to identify distorted text or specific objects in images. These tasks are easy for humans but difficult for automated 'bots,' thereby preventing spam, brute-force attacks, and fake account registrations on websites.

Copy protection refers to the technical measures and anti-duplication technologies embedded within software to prevent unauthorized copying. While 'Copyright' provides the legal right to prevent copying, 'Copy protection' is the actual mechanical or digital method, such as encryption or license keys, used to physically enforce those legal restrictions.