After I got my degree, my father was very interested in doing a business analysis, with me, of our church.
I should mention our church. I should mention Vancouver. It is a standing joke that nobody who actually lives in Vancouver was actually born there. I went to a job interview one time and as a little bit of small talk to brace the ice and make you feel more comfortable, they asked me where are you from. I said Vancouver. They said, no no, where were you born. Well, I was actually born in Vancouver. Not only that, but both my parents were also born in Vancouver. Not only that, but 75% of my grandparents were born in Vancouver.
Partly as a result of this, I am the fifth generation, of my family, to become a member of the church. This is not only unusual in our church, but in any church in Vancouver. The pin that I have attesting to this fact was given to me when I was five years old, before I was baptized, and therefore before I was a member of the church. But I did get baptized, around about my twelth birthday, and, thus, did become a member.
So, yes, both my father and myself were members of the church. And Dad, who was making a bit of a name for himself pioneering the use of computers in education administration in Vancouver, wanted us to do a business analysis of the church, with a view to getting the church involved in computers in ministry.
I foresaw a number of problems with this project. I was very hesitant to be involved. But Dad was very keen on the whole idea. So, I joined in, and, if I do say so myself, we did a bang-up job. Dad had the position, and credentials, in the church to get people to talk to us. We conducted more than 20 interviews, with people in a wide variety of ministry areas within the church. Dad took the lead in the interviews, as the person with the pole within the church. But I threw in the questions to find out what could, actually, be done in information processing in the various areas of ministry. I actually also wrote the report.
The final report recommended some twenty areas of ministry that could be assisted, and therefore some twenty computers, that would be needed, as well as a network, to tie them together, and facilitate the exchange of information between the different areas of ministry. We presented the report, and, predictably, the church created a computer committee to consider it.
If I had been loath to do the systems analysis, I was doubly hesitant about being on the computer committee. I saw it as a conflict of interest, a rather gross conflict of interest. Since it was considering our report ( which was, you will recall, primarily my report. ) But dad, again, jumped in with both feet. Nothing much happened. So, once again, Dad wanted me to participate in the computer committee, and, once again, I acquiesced.
I went to one committee meeting. The committee started to address the need for a church membership database. The committee got bombed down in consideration of whether the church membership database would have a birth date field. Some saw this as very useful. Others saw this as a gross invasion of privacy. I pointed out that this did not need to hold up consideration of the database as a whole, as a birth date field could be created, but then not populated until this decision had been finalized. No they had to decide about the birth date field, before they could go on with any other aspects of the church membership database.
I quit the committee.
The committee continued to meet. Sporadically. This went on for some considerable time. At some point, the committee did tender and RFP, a request for proposal, and sent it to a variety of computer and networking vendors in the Vancouver area. It was based upon the recommendations from my report. Roughly twenty computers, and because of the price difference between MS-DOS computers, and Apple computers, at the time, it was based on MS-DOS computers.
Eventually, Dad informed me that the church computer committee had come to a decision. He told me the company that the tender had been given to. I was confused,. The tender had been granted to a company which was owned by one of the members of the church, and a company which, I knew, sold Apple computers exclusively. I questioned how the church was able to afford twenty Apple computers for the tender. Oh no, Dad informed me. The church member had been allowed to look at the other tenders, and, even though he had reduced his company's tender, to the point where it was the lowest bid, they were providing Apple computers, and they were only providing five.
I objected. On two grounds. First, it was a gross conflict of interest, to allow the church member, to see the other vendors tenders, and then to retender for his own company. Dad didn't see it that way. Dad didn't see that this was a conflict of interest. Dad didn't see that this was a gross breach of business ethics. Dad just saw that a church member was getting the business, and the church was getting a better price.
But I also objected on the basis of the reduction in the functionality of the tender. The five computers that were now to be purchased, would be used only, and solely, for Church administration. No other areas of ministry were to be addressed. No other areas of ministry were to benefit from the use of a computer.
Dad didn't see this as a problem.
A few years later I got into the field of information security. Well, initially I got into the field of computer virus research. But it turns out that computer virus research is an excellent introduction to the field of information security in general.
At that time, Gloria was working as a Church secretary, at a different Church. But our church, got very interested in a church membership database, tied to a simple bookkeeping package, that allowed you to track donations. ( Anytime you mention money, people get very interested. ) Fellow who was selling this particular package was doing a presentation in Seattle. So Dad asked me to come with him and attend the presentation. I did.
We attended the presentation. We asked about security. Well, I asked about security. The developer said that the package was completely secure, since you had to use a password to access it. (He didn't mention anything about encryption.) Dad was very happy about this program, and ready to recommend it to the church computer committee, despite the fact that it required an MS-DOS computer, and the church only had Apples.
However, I had inside information, in a sense. I knew that the church where Gloria was church secretary used this church database and bookkeeping program. Gloria was not given access to the database and bookkeeping program. Only the church clerk (who deals with membership) and the accountant (who deals with the bookkeeping) had passwords and accounts to access the database and bookkeeping program.
But, I had been helping Gloria, at certain times, with certain computer programs and problems. In doing this I had found out a few things about the database and bookkeeping program. It was written in dbase. dBase has a standard, and fairly compatible, and accessible, database structure. I didn't need to run the database and bookkeeping program. I can figure out, from the file names, which parts of the database stored what, and for what purpose. And, I could read everything. I could, if I wanted to, read anything in the database, and anything in the donation files. I could look up any information the church had about anybody. I look good look up anybody's donations. I didn't, but I could have.
I informed the church committee of our church about these facts. I don't know what happened, and I don't know what any discussions were, but I do know that the church continued to use databases which they threw together themselves with simple user tools.
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