facultynews

International association elects Bernardo as representative

Dean of the College of Education Dr. Allan Bernardo was elected as member of the Executive Committee of the Asian Association of Social Psychology (AASP) during the group’s general assembly on July 11. The assembly was held at the University of Melborne, Australia. The Executive Committee is the highest governing body of the AASP and is composed of 10 elected officers.

Bernardo was elected as the South East Asian Regional Representative to the Executive Committee. He also presented two papers during ASSP’s biennial conference in Melbourne last July 10-13. The papers he presented were The Structure of Pedagogical Beliefs of Filipino Mathematics Teachers and Motivation, Learning Strategy, and Academic Achievement Among Filipino College Students. The president of the AASP is Dr. Susumu Yamaguchi of the Tokyo University.

On its fourth volume of publication, the AASP publishes the Asian Journal of Social Psychology. It is edited by Kwok Leung of the City University of Hong Kong. The AASP also publishes the book series Progress in Asian Social Psychology.

The next biennial conference of the AASP will be held in Manila in July 2003. It will be co-hosted by DLSU-M, University of the Philippines, and Ateneo de Manila University.

Beware of the Worm Virus

We’ve been hit. The Information Technology Center last week received reports on the University’s e-mail system getting attacked by a virus called Sircam, also known in aliases such as I-Worm.Sircam, W32.Sircam, and W32/SirCam.

Sircam is a mass mailing e-mail worm with the ability to spread through Windows Network shares. The worm’s body is 137216 bytes long but when it comes as an e-mail attachment, it becomes larger in size due to a document that is attached to its body.

When a Sircam-infected e-mail attachment is opened, it shows the document it picked up from the sender’s machines. The file is displayed with the appropriate program according to its extension: ‘.DOC’: WinWord.exe or WordPad.exe; ‘.XLS’: Excel.exe; ‘.ZIP’: winzip.exe

This effectively disguises the worm’s activity. While the user is checking the document the system gets infected. The attached file has the name of a picked document file with a double extension like ‘.DOC.EXE’, ‘.XLS.PIF’. The ‘.COM’, ‘.BAT’, ‘.PIF’ and ‘.LNK’ are used as second (executable) extensions. Since the worm can pick any of the user’s personal document, it can send out confidential information.

The next time you receive an email with an attachment like .exe .gif .jpg .scr .txt .vbs .bat from an unknown source, please do not open it or, if you think it is unimportant, delete it. If you need to open these attachments, please ask assistance from the IT Security Group. Forward or send your email to itsec@mail.dlsu.edu.ph

To remove Sircam virus, please download sirc_dis.reg at ftp://scribes.dlsu.edu.ph then double click the sirc_dis.reg icon. This cure will remove the files and registry keys created by the Sircam worm or virus. After running the sirc_dis.reg, restart your PC. Please call ITC to request for an updated F-Secure Anti-virus.


History Department lines up lectures

The History Department, together with the International Studies Department and the European Documentation and Research Center, will sponsor a lecture on the Philippine Revolution as it was seen from the viewpoint of the French. The lecturer will be Dr. Maria Luisa Camagay, director of the University of the Philippines Press and professor of History from the University of the Philippines. The lecture will take place at the EDRC Library on August 8.

History Department Chair Dr. Cornelio Bascara will deliver a lecture at the Instituto Cervantes de Manila on August 25. Bascara will talk on the Philippine Revolution from the perspective of the Spanish.

Meanwhile, Dr. Luis Dery and Dr. Rene Escalante will participate in the round table conference on the issues involving the specific data and site of the First Cry of the Philippine Revolution of 1896. Dery will be one of the principal panelists, while Escalante will act as one of the neutral panelists. The National Historical Institute sponsors the conference. It will be held at the AV Room of the NHI on August 27-29.