Business Commons^™

Blockchain Applications In Higher Education Based On The Nist Cybersecurity Framework, Brady Lund Ph.D.

Journal of Cybersecurity Education, Research and Practice

This paper investigates the integration of blockchain technology into core systems within institutions of higher education, utilizing the National Institute of Standards and Technology’s (NIST) Cybersecurity Framework as a guiding framework. It supplies definitions of key terminology including blockchain, consensus mechanisms, decentralized identity, and smart contracts, and examines the application of secure blockchain across various educational functions such as enrollment management, degree auditing, and award processing. Each facet of the NIST Framework is utilized to explore the integration of blockchain technology and address persistent security concerns. The paper contributes to the literature by defining blockchain technology applications and opportunities within …

Improving Belonging And Connectedness In The Cybersecurity Workforce: From College To The Profession, Mary Beth Klinger

Journal of Cybersecurity Education, Research and Practice

This article explores the results of a project aimed at supporting community college students in their academic pursuit of an Associate of Applied Science (AAS) degree in Cybersecurity through mentorship, collaboration, skill preparation, and other activities and touch points to increase students’ sense of belonging and connectedness in the cybersecurity profession. The goal of the project was focused on developing diverse, educated, and skilled cybersecurity personnel for employment within local industry and government to help curtail the current regional cybersecurity workforce gap that is emblematic of the lack of qualified cybersecurity personnel that presently exists nationwide. Emphasis throughout the project …

Social Engineering Cyber Threats, Young B. Choi, Josh Rubin

Journal of Global Awareness

The article explores the pervasive threat of social engineering in cybersecurity, emphasizing its success in infiltrating information systems by manipulating individuals rather than employing traditional hacking methods. The author underscores the vulnerability arising from human trust, as individuals, especially those lacking technology education, tend to be targets. While cryptography offers partial security, social engineering complicates overall system security. Mitigation strategies include educating employees on threats, risks, and security policies, coupled with enforcing penalties for noncompliance. Additionally, employing two-factor authentication and physical token-based access adds layers of protection. The article delves into semantic attacks, classifying various exploitation methods and emphasizing the …

Building A Diverse Cybersecurity Workforce: A Study On Attracting Learners With Varied Educational Backgrounds, Mubashrah Saddiqa, Kristian Helmer Kjær Larsen1 Helmer Kjær Larsen, Robert Nedergaard Nielsen, Jens Myrup Pedersen

Journal of Cybersecurity Education, Research and Practice

Cybersecurity has traditionally been perceived as a highly technical field, centered around hacking, programming, and network defense. However, this article contends that the scope of cybersecurity must transcend its technical confines to embrace a more inclusive approach. By incorporating various concepts such as privacy, data sharing, and ethics, cybersecurity can foster diversity among audiences with varying educational backgrounds, thereby cultivating a richer and more resilient security landscape. A more diverse cybersecurity workforce can provide a broader range of perspectives, experiences, and skills to address the complex and ever-evolving threats of the digital age. The research focuses on enhancing cybersecurity education …

Integrating Nist And Iso Cybersecurity Audit And Risk Assessment Frameworks Into Cameroonian Law, Bernard Ngalim

Journal of Cybersecurity Education, Research and Practice

This paper reviews cybersecurity laws and regulations in Cameroon, focusing on cybersecurity and information security audits and risk assessments. The importance of cybersecurity risk assessment and the implementation of security controls to cure deficiencies noted during risk assessments or audits is a critical step in developing cybersecurity resilience. Cameroon's cybersecurity legal framework provides for audits but does not explicitly enumerate controls. Consequently, integrating relevant controls from the NIST frameworks and ISO Standards can improve the cybersecurity posture in Cameroon while waiting for a comprehensive revision of the legal framework. NIST and ISO are internationally recognized as best practices in information …

Infrastructure As Code For Cybersecurity Training, Rui Pinto, Rolando Martins, Carlos Novo

Journal of Cybersecurity Education, Research and Practice

An organization's infrastructure rests upon the premise that cybersecurity professionals have specific knowledge in administrating and protecting it against outside threats. Without this expertise, sensitive information could be leaked to malicious actors and cause damage to critical systems. These attacks tend to become increasingly specialized, meaning cybersecurity professionals must ensure proficiency in specific areas. Naturally, recommendations include creating advanced practical training scenarios considering realistic situations to help trainees gain detailed knowledge. However, the caveats of high-cost infrastructure and difficulties in the deployment process of this kind of system, primarily due to the manual process of pre-configuring software needed for the …

Building The Operational Technology (Ot) Cybersecurity Workforce: What Are Employers Looking For?, Christopher A. Ramezan, Paul M. Coffy, Jared Lemons

Journal of Cybersecurity Education, Research and Practice

A trained workforce is needed to protect operational technology (OT) and industrial control systems (ICS) within national critical infrastructure and critical industries. However, what knowledge, skills, and credentials are employers looking for in OT cybersecurity professionals? To best train the next generation of OT cybersecurity professionals, an understanding of current OT cybersecurity position requirements is needed. Thus, this work analyzes 100 OT cybersecurity positions to provide insights on key prerequisite requirements such as prior professional experience, education, industry certifications, security clearances, programming expertise, soft verbal and written communication skills, knowledge of OT frameworks, standards, and network communication protocols, and position …

Integrating Certifications Into The Cybersecurity College Curriculum: The Efficacy Of Education With Certifications To Increase The Cybersecurity Workforce, Binh Tran, Karen C. Benson, Lorraine Jonassen

Journal of Cybersecurity Education, Research and Practice

One only needs to listen to the news reports to recognize that the gap between securing the enterprise and cybersecurity threats, breaches, and vulnerabilities appears to be widening at an alarming rate. An un-tapped resource to combat these attacks lies in the students of the secondary educational system. Necessary in the cybersecurity education is a 3-tiered approach to quickly escalate the student into a workplace-ready graduate. The analogy used is a three-legged-stool, where curriculum content, hands-on skills, and certifications are equal instruments in the edification of the cybersecurity student. This paper endeavors to delve into the 3^rd leg of …

Cybersecurity Challenges And Awareness Of The Multi-Generational Learners In Nepal, Raj Kumar Dhungana, Lina Gurung Dr, Hem Poudyal

Journal of Cybersecurity Education, Research and Practice

Increased exposure to technologies has lately emerged as one of the everyday realities of digital natives, especially K-12 students, and teachers, the digital immigrants. Protection from cybersecurity risks in digital learning spaces is a human right, but students are increasingly exposed to high-risk cyberspace without time to cope with cybersecurity risks. This study, using a survey (N-891 students and 157 teachers) and in-depth interviews (27 students and 14 teachers), described the students' cybersecurity-related experiences and challenges in Nepal. This study revealed that the school’s cybersecurity support system is poor and teachers has very low awareness and competencies to protect students …

Like Treating The Symptom Rather Than The Cause - The Omission Of Courses Over Terrorism In Nsa Designated Institutions, Ida L. Oesteraas

Journal of Cybersecurity Education, Research and Practice

The National Security Agency (NSA) awards Center of Academic Excellence (CAE) designations to institutions that commit to producing cybersecurity professionals who will work in careers that reduce vulnerabilities in our national infrastructure. A review of the curricula in the 327 institutions and their degree programs reveal that only two programs offer a required course about terrorism. Given the fluid nature of terrorism and its threat to national infrastructure, the omission is concerning. It is recommended that NSA-certified cybersecurity programs begin implementing educational content that aim to teach about this emerging crime and justice issue. One suggestion is to embrace the …

Compete To Learn: Toward Cybersecurity As A Sport, Tj Oconnor, Dane Brown, Jasmine Jackson, Bryson Payne, Suzanna Schmeelk

Journal of Cybersecurity Education, Research and Practice

To support the workforce gap of skilled cybersecurity professionals, gamified pedagogical approaches for teaching cybersecurity have exponentially grown over the last two decades. During this same period, e-sports developed into a multi-billion dollar industry and became a staple on college campuses. In this work, we explore the opportunity to integrate e-sports and gamified cybersecurity approaches into the inaugural US Cyber Games Team. During this tenure, we learned many lessons about recruiting, assessing, and training cybersecurity teams. We share our approach, materials, and lessons learned to serve as a model for fielding amateur cybersecurity teams for future competition.

Combining Frameworks To Improve Military Health System Quality And Cybersecurity, Dr. Maureen L. Schafer, Dr. Joseph H. Schafer

Military Cyber Affairs

Existing conceptual frameworks and commercially available technology could be considered to rapidly operationalize the use of Quality Measures (QM) within military health systems (Costantino et al. 2020). Purchased healthcare as well as digital healthcare services have paved the way for data collection from multiple information systems thus offering stakeholders actionable intelligence to both guide and measure healthcare outcomes. However, the collection of data secondary to Smart Devices, disparate information systems, cloud services, and the Internet of Medical Things (IOMT) is a complication for security experts that also affect clients, stakeholders, organizations, and businesses delivering patient care. We have combined three …

Self-Learning Algorithms For Intrusion Detection And Prevention Systems (Idps), Juan E. Nunez, Roger W. Tchegui Donfack, Rohit Rohit, Hayley Horn

SMU Data Science Review

Today, there is an increased risk to data privacy and information security due to cyberattacks that compromise data reliability and accessibility. New machine learning models are needed to detect and prevent these cyberattacks. One application of these models is cybersecurity threat detection and prevention systems that can create a baseline of a network's traffic patterns to detect anomalies without needing pre-labeled data; thus, enabling the identification of abnormal network events as threats. This research explored algorithms that can help automate anomaly detection on an enterprise network using Canadian Institute for Cybersecurity data. This study demonstrates that Neural Networks with Bayesian …

Cybersecurity Continuity Risks: Lessons Learned From The Covid-19 Pandemic, Tyler Fezzey, John H. Batchelor, Gerald F. Burch, Randall Reid

Journal of Cybersecurity Education, Research and Practice

The scope and breadth of the COVID-19 pandemic were unprecedented. This is especially true for business continuity and the related area of cybersecurity. Historically, business continuity and cybersecurity are viewed and researched as separate fields. This paper synthesizes the two disciplines as one, thus pointing out the need to address both topics simultaneously. This study identifies blind spots experienced by businesses as they navigated through the difficult time of the pandemic by using data collected during the height of the COVID-19 pandemic. One major shortcoming was that most continuity and cybersecurity plans focused on single-axis threats. The COVID-19 pandemic resulted …

Cybersecurity Educational Resources For K-12, Debra Bowen, James Jaurez, Nancy Jones, William Reid, Christopher Simpson

Journal of Cybersecurity Education, Research and Practice

There are many resources to guide successful K-12 cybersecurity education. The objective of these resources is to prepare skilled and ethical cybersecurity students at the earliest level to meet the demands of higher-level programs. The goal of this article is to provide, as a starting point, a list of as many currently popular K-12 educational resources as possible. The resources provided are broken into five categories: 1) Career Information, 2) Curriculum, 3) Competitions, 4) CyberCamps, and 5) Labs and Gaming. Each resource listed has a link, the K-12 levels that are supported, whether the resource is free or has a …

Assessing The Practical Cybersecurity Skills Gained Through Criminal Justice Academic Programs To Benefit Security Operations Centers (Socs), Lucy Tsado, Jung Seob "Scott" Kim

Journal of Cybersecurity Education, Research and Practice

Private-sector and public-sector organizations have increasingly built specific business units for securing company assets, reputation, and lives, known as security operations centers (SOCs). Depending on the organization, these centers may also be referred to as global security operations centers, cybersecurity operations centers, fusion centers, and corporate command centers, among many other names. The concept of centralized function within an organization to improve an organization’s security posture has attracted both the government and the private sectors to either build their own SOCs or hire third-party SOC companies.

In this article, the need for a multidisciplinary approach to cybersecurity education at colleges …

Subject Matter Experts’ Feedback On Experimental Procedures To Measure User’S Judgment Errors In Social Engineering Attacks, Tommy Pollock, Yair Levy, Wei Li, Ajoy Kumar

Journal of Cybersecurity Education, Research and Practice

Distracted users can fail to correctly distinguish the differences between legitimate and malicious emails or search engine results. Mobile phone users can have a more challenging time identifying malicious content due to the smaller screen size and the limited security features in mobile phone applications. Thus, the main goal of this research study was to design, develop, and validate a set of field experiments to assess user’s judgment when exposed to two types of simulated social engineering attacks: phishing and Potentially Malicious Search Engine Results (PMSER), based on the interaction of the environment (distracting vs. non-distracting) and type of device …

A Taxonomy Of Cyberattacks Against Critical Infrastructure, Miloslava Plachkinova, Ace Vo

Journal of Cybersecurity Education, Research and Practice

The current study proposes a taxonomy to organize existing knowledge on cybercrimes against critical infrastructure such as power plants, water treatment facilities, dams, and nuclear facilities. Routine Activity Theory is used to inform a three-dimensional taxonomy with the following dimensions: hacker motivation (likely offender), cyber, physical, and cyber-physical components of any cyber-physical system (suitable target), and security (capable guardian). The focus of the study is to develop and evaluate the classification tool using Design Science Research (DSR) methodology. Publicly available data was used to evaluate the utility and usability of the proposed artifact by exploring three possible scenarios – Stuxnet, …

The 2020 Twitter Hack – So Many Lessons To Be Learned, Paul D. Witman, Scott Mackelprang

Journal of Cybersecurity Education, Research and Practice

In mid-July 2020, the social media site Twitter had over 100 of its most prominent user accounts start to tweet requests to send Bitcoin to specified Bitcoin wallets. The requests promised that the Bitcoin senders would receive their money back doubled, as a gesture of charity amidst the COVID-19 pandemic. The attack appears to have been carried out by a small group of hackers, leveraging social engineering to get access to internal Twitter support tools. These tools allowed the hackers to gain full control of the high-profile user accounts and post messages on their behalf. The attack provides many paths …

Toward A Student-Ready Cybersecurity Program: Findings From A Survey Of Stem-Students, Lora Pitman, Brian K. Payne, Tancy Vandecar-Burdin, Lenora Thorbjornsen

Journal of Cybersecurity Education, Research and Practice

As the number of available cybersecurity jobs continues to grow, colleges strive to offer to their cybersecurity students an environment which will make them sufficiently prepared to enter the workforce after graduation. This paper explores the academic and professional needs of STEM-students in various higher education institutions across Virginia and how cybersecurity programs can cater to these needs. It also seeks to propose an evidence-based approach for improving the existing cybersecurity programs so that they can become more inclusive and student-ready. A survey of 251 college students in four higher-education institutions in Virginia showed that while there are common patterns …

The Impact Of A Gencyber Camp On In-Service Teachers’ Tpack, Kevin M. Thomas, Jessica Ivy, Kristin Cook, Robert R. Kelley

Journal of Cybersecurity Education, Research and Practice

The purpose of this study was to examine the impact of a GenCyber camp curriculum on teachers’ technology, pedagogy, and content knowledge (TPACK). The camp was designed to engage participants in developing the knowledge and skills to incorporate GenCyber Cybersecurity First Principles and GenCyber Cybersecurity Concepts (GenCyber, 2019) into their curriculums. Participants (37 middle and high school teachers from a variety of disciplines) attended one of two weeklong camps held at a Midwestern liberal arts university. Using the TPACK Self-Reflection and TPACK Self-Assessment Surveys, pre- and post-camp data were collected from participants. Findings indicate that participants demonstrated an increase in …

Developing An Ai-Powered Chatbot To Support The Administration Of Middle And High School Cybersecurity Camps, Jonathan He, Chunsheng Xin

Journal of Cybersecurity Education, Research and Practice

Throughout the Internet, many chatbots have been deployed by various organizations to answer questions asked by customers. In recent years, we have been running cybersecurity summer camps for youth. Due to COVID-19, our in-person camp has been changed to virtual camps. As a result, we decided to develop a chatbot to reduce the number of emails, phone calls, as well as the human burden for answering the same or similar questions again and again based on questions we received from previous camps. This paper introduces our practical experience to implement an AI-powered chatbot for middle and high school cybersecurity camps …

Observations, Evaluations, And Recommendations For Deterlab From An Educational Perspective, Ahmed Ibrahim, Vitaly Ford

Journal of Cybersecurity Education, Research and Practice

DETERLab is a cluster environment that provides a set of virtual machines that can be used by researchers and teachers to run cybersecurity experiments and competitions, and where it is possible to deploy different network configurations to research attack and defense mechanisms in the cyber world. While we were working to develop a pathway for producing more usable and effective cybersecurity educational resources by investigating and examining several projects, we examined DETERLab as a prospective platform to use in the classroom. Throughout our experimentation, we faced challenges that we decided to document in order to help other educators use the …

Applying High Impact Practices In An Interdisciplinary Cybersecurity Program, Brian K. Payne, Lisa Mayes, Tisha Paredes, Elizabeth Smith, Hongyi Wu, Chunsheng Xin

Journal of Cybersecurity Education, Research and Practice

The Center for Cybersecurity Education and Research at Old Dominion University has expanded its use of high impact practices in the university’s undergraduate cybersecurity degree program. Strategies developed to promote student learning included learning communities, undergraduate research, a robust internship program, service learning, and electronic portfolios. This paper reviews the literature on these practices, highlights the way that they were implemented in our cybersecurity program, and discusses some of the challenges encountered with each practice. Although the prior literature on high impact practices rarely touches on cybersecurity coursework, the robust evidence of the success of those practices provides a sound …

The Soft Skills Business Demands Of The Chief Information Security Officer, Richard Smit, Jeroen Van Yperen Hagedoorn, Patric Versteeg, Pascal Ravesteijn

Journal of International Technology and Information Management

While many researchers have investigated soft skills for different roles related to business, engineering, healthcare and others, the soft skills needed by the chief information security officer (CISO) in a leadership position are not studied in-depth. This paper describes a first study aimed at filling this gap.

In this multimethod research, both the business leaders perspective as well as an analysis of CISO job ads is studied. The methodology used to capture the business leaders perspective is via a Delphi study and the jobs adds are studied using a quantitative content analysis.

With an increasing threat to information security for …

Icts For Surveillance And Suppression: The Case Of The Indian Emergency 1975-1977, Ramesh Subramanian

Journal of International Technology and Information Management

Information and Communications technologies (ICT) pervade society. The Internet, wireless communication, and social media are ubiquitous in and indispensable in society today. As they continue to grow and mushroom, there are new and increased calls from various segments of the society such as technologists, activists, sociologists, and legal experts, who issue warnings on the more nefarious and undesirable uses of ICTs, especially by governments. In fact, government control and surveillance using ICTs is not a new phenomenon. By looking at history, we are able to see several instances when ICTs have been used by governments to control, surveil, and infringe …

Malaware Defensive: A Game To Train Users To Combat Malware, Tyler Moon, Tamirat Abegaz, Bryson Payne, Abi Salimi

Journal of Cybersecurity Education, Research and Practice

Several research findings indicate that basic cyber hygiene can potentially deter the majority of cyber threats. One of the ways cybersecurity professionals can prepare users to ensure proper hygiene is to help them develop their ability to spot the difference between normal and abnormal behavior in a computer system. Malware disrupts the normal behavior of a computer system. The lack of appropriate user training has been one of the main reasons behind the exposure of computer systems to threats, from social engineering to viruses, trojans, and ransomware. Basic knowledge about common behavioral characteristics of malware could help users identify potentially …

Divergent Student Views Of Cybersecurity, Susan E. Ramlo, John B. Nicholas

Journal of Cybersecurity Education, Research and Practice

Cybersecurity is a worldwide issue and concern. Prior studies indicate that many people do not use cybersecurity best practices. Although these prior studies used large-scale surveys or interviews, this study used Q methodology [Q] because Q provides greater insight than Likert-format surveys. In fact, Q was created to scientifically study subjectivity. Within a Q study, various stages as well as philosophical, epistemological, and ontological principles represent a complete methodology. At first, Q researchers collect items that represent the broad range of communications about the topic (called the concourse). Although the items can be pictures, scents, or other means of communication, …

Teaching About The Dark Web In Criminal Justice Or Related Programs At The Community College And University Levels., Scott H. Belshaw, Brooke Nodeland, Lorrin Underwood, Alexandrea Colaiuta

Journal of Cybersecurity Education, Research and Practice

Increasingly, criminal justice practitioners have been called on to help solve breaches in cyber security. However, while the demand for criminal justice participation in cyber investigations increases daily, most universities are lagging in their educational and training opportunities for students entering the criminal justice fields. This article discusses the need to incorporate courses discussing the Dark Web in criminal justice. A review of existing cyber-criminal justice programs in Texas and nationally suggests that most community colleges and 4-year universities have yet to develop courses/programs in understanding and investigating the Dark Web on the internet. The Dark Web serves as the …

Car Hacking: Accessing And Exploiting The Can Bus Protocol, Bryson R. Payne

Journal of Cybersecurity Education, Research and Practice

With the rapid adoption of internet-connected and driver-assist technologies, and the spread of semi-autonomous to self-driving cars on roads worldwide, cybersecurity for smart cars is a timely concern and one worth exploring both in the classroom and in the real world. Highly publicized hacks against production cars, and a relatively small number of crashes involving autonomous vehicles, have brought the issue of securing smart cars to the forefront as a matter of public and individual safety, and the cybersecurity of these “data centers on wheels” is of greater concern than ever.

However, up to this point there has been a …