During the 2019-2020 school year, the Southern Accent’s website was hacked by an unknown source and was temporarily moved to the web development website WIX. Senior computer science major Timothy Morgan joined the Accent staff this year and was tasked with creating a new website for the newspaper that would serve as the permanent site.
Morgan said he learned about the need for a web manager from an ad on Instagram. Because of his experience with owning his own web solution website, he thought he’d challenge himself by taking on the task.
“I felt like it might be a good way to use my skills and improve them,” Morgan said. “I definitely haven’t done a news website in the past, [but] I’ve done similar sites.”
One of Morgan’s responsibilities as web manager is maintaining the website. He mostly updates news stories, but because the site is still new, there are general things that Morgan improves when the need arises.
According to Morgan, one of the biggest challenges has been retrieving past articles from the old website. He said there have been six hacking attempts in the last three months, which emphasizes the need for proper cyber security. Additionally, Morgan is working on an automated website backup so all material can be safe in case the website is compromised.
Morgan hopes that in the future, general maintenance will be the primary concern. He said when web designers and developers put their preferred solutions in place, it can cause complications as the web manager tends to change yearly. Morgan wants to ensure that the next web manager has the tools to move forward confidently and make sure the website stays safe and operational.
“Hopefully, [the] solutions that [are] in place will make the website last for many many years to come,” Morgan said.
