Method and Data Processing System to Prevent Manipulation of Computer Systems

An electronic computer system comprising:

• a storage system that is able to be read from and written to,
• means for switching said storage system into a write-protected mode, said switching means being exclusively operable from outside of an operating system of said computer system,
• means for prompting a user to perform a switching allowing temporarily writing to a write-protectable storage area,
• a write-protectable storage area for storing security-relevant information,
• means for prompting a user to perform a manual switching to restrict writing to said write-protectable storage area,
• a physical write-protection mechanism for said write-protectable storage area, comprising the switching means.

A computer program product comprising a computer useable storage medium including a computer readable program, wherein the computer readable program includes a functional component that when executed on a computer causes the computer to perform the steps of

• prompting a user to perform a switching allowing temporarily writing to a write-protectable storage area, wherein a respective physical write-protection mechanism comprises a switching means which is exclusively operable from outside of the operating system of said computer system,
• storing security-relevant information into said write-protectable storage area (32),
• prompting a user to perform a manual switching to restrict writing to said write-protectable storage area, thus resulting in generating a write-protected storage area,
• restricting any write access to said write protected storage area in response to said manual switching during further runtime of said computer system.