[Dickinson College] Technology Services

Peer-to-Peer Information

Dickinson College has seen an increase in the number of students returning to campus with Peer-to-Peer clients installed on their computers.

Students are prohibited from using College-provided computer/network services to:

Interfere with any other person's fair use of computer systems.
Violate any local, state or federal law.
Establish workgroup file sharing, print sharing or peer-to-peer services on any segment of the Dickinson campus network without approval and verification from LIS.

This is detailed in the Dickinson College’s Responsible Use Policy.

http://lis.dickinson.edu/Technology/Policies/responsibleusepolicy.htm

Peer-to-Peer clients abuse network resources as most peer-to-peer applications use any and all available bandwidth. This can effectively slow all other intranet and Internet use to a crawl.

Peer-to-Peer clients also pose a risk of downloading copyrighted materials for which there can be legal ramifications.

A first offense for running peer-to-peer clients on your computer will result in the removal of your computer from the campus network. Once the peer-to-peer client is removed your access will be restored.

A second offense will result in a 2 week removal from the campus network.

A third offense will result in the removal of the computer for an entire semester. Below are recommended instructions on how to disable file sharing for the most common peer-to-peer clients. While this list contains the most common peer-to- peer applications it does not cover all peer to peer clients. If you are unsure about software you are using contact helpdesk@dickinson.edu or rsa@dickinson.edu to determine if the program you are using is a peer-to- peer client. Note that these links point to instructions provided by the University of Chicago. Please direct questions to the Dickinson College Help Desk staff and NOT to University of Chicago support staff.