In the News

	In The News

This section features topical, current news items of interest to the international security community. These articles and highlights are selected from various popular science and security magazines, newspapers, and online sources.

US News     

“Top US Undergraduate Computer Science Programs Skip Cybersecurity Classes,” Dark Reading, 7 April 2016. [Online].
A new study conducted on the top 121 computer science programs revealed surprising details about the education gap in cybersecurity. Out of the top ten universities, only one requires any cybersecurity course be completed and three do not even offer a course on cybersecurity. Furthermore, the University of Alabama, which does not have a top program, was the only school that required 3 or more cybersecurity courses for the degree.
See: http://www.darkreading.com/vulnerabilities---threats/top-us-undergraduate-computer-science-programs-skip-cybersecurity-classes/d/d-id/1325024

“Do US universities deserve an “F” in teaching cybersecurity?,” Naked Security, 13 April 2016. [Online].
With a rapidly growing need for cybersecurity professionals there must also be proper education to fill those jobs. Research firm CloudPassage conducted a survey to see what cybersecurity education in the United States looked like. They graded the top universities on a scale from A to F.
See: https://nakedsecurity.sophos.com/2016/04/13/do-us-universities-deserve-an-f-in-teaching-cybersecurity/

“How These Mormon Women Became Some of the Best Cybersecurity Hackers in the U.S.,” Fortune, 27 April 2016. [Online].
This year's National Collegiate Cyber Defense Competition featured only seven women out of ten teams with eight members each. BYU featured four of those seven competitors. Jack Harrington, vice president of cybersecurity at Raytheon commented, “We’ve got to tap into this talent pool that’s 50% of the population.” BYU finished second in the competition.
See: http://fortune.com/2016/04/27/mormon-women-cybersecurity/

“NSA lauds The Citadel for cybersecurity training,” The Post and Courier, 28 April 2016. [Online].
The NSA designated The Citadel as a National Center of Excellence in Cyber Defense. The school’s provost said that the distinction will help set graduates apart from the rest of the field. The honor comes after the university introduced a minor in cybersecurity in 2013 and a graduate certificate in the same field in 2014.
See: http://www.postandcourier.com/20160428/160429361/nsa-lauds-the-citadel-for-cybersecurity-training

“The Aviation Industry is Starting to Grapple with Cybersecurity,” Slate, 3 May 2016. [Online].
Security of wireless networks on airplanes has been under some intense criticism following several events. In 2015, a security researcher was detained by the FBI after commenting about how easily hackable networks onboard his flight were. Since then, the Cybersecurity Standards for Aircraft to Improve Resilience Act of 2016 has been introduced which aims to create standards for security on in flight networks.
See: http://www.slate.com/articles/technology/future_tense/2016/05/the_aviation_industry_is_starting_to_grapple_with_cybersecurity.html

International News 

“Whaling Emerges as Major Cybersecurity Threat,” CIO, 21 April 2016. [Online].
Whaling, a clever play on the term “phishing” that targets company executives and their relationships with employees, has recently stepped forward as one of the more prominent cyber threats to companies. The FBI estimates that companies have lost a collective $2.3 billion over the past three years. 
See: http://www.cio.com/article/3059621/security/whaling-emerges-as-major-cybersecurity-threat.html

“Will Emotions be Hackable? Exploring How Cybersecurity Could Evolve,” CSMonitor, 2 May 2016. [Online].
The University of California Berkeley’s Center for Long-Term Cybersecurity (CLTC) published a report detailing what security may look like in the year 2020. Among their ideas, was the vulnerablility of the massive repositories of personal data and emotional histories that come with it.
See: http://www.csmonitor.com/World/Passcode/2016/0502/Will-emotions-be-hackable-Exploring-how-cybersecurity-could-evolve-video

“Instagram Hacked by 10-Year-Old, Who Wins $10,000 Prize for Finding Ways to Delete Comments,”  Independent, 4 May 2016. [Online].
A ten year old from Finland was able to uncover a bug in Instagram that allowed the exploiter to delete comments posted by any user. In exchange for reporting the bug, the young hacker received a $10,000 prize from Facebook, who owns Instagram, through their Bug Bounty Program.
See: http://www.independent.co.uk/life-style/gadgets-and-tech/news/instagram-hacked-by-10-year-old-who-gets-10000-prize-for-finding-way-to-delete-users-comments-a7012496.html

“Big Data Breaches Found at Major Email Services — Expert,” Reuters, 5 May 2016. [Online].
The discovery of the breach came when Hold Security researchers stumbled upon a Russian hacker gloating that he had stolen over one billion email acounts. Most accounts came from Russian provider mail.ru with smaller portions of the stolen emails belonging to users of Gmail, Microsoft, and Yahoo. 
See: http://www.reuters.com/article/us-cyber-passwords-idUSKCN0XV1I6 

(ID#: 16-9549)

Note:

Articles listed on these pages have been found on publicly available internet pages and are cited with links to those pages. Some of the information included herein has been reprinted with permission from the authors or data repositories. Direct any requests via Email to news@scienceofsecurity.net for removal of the links or modifications to specific citations. Please include the ID# of the specific citation in your correspondence.