High School Cyber Defense Competiton

[f_kenisky () earthlink net]

The very first of it's kind hosted by UTSA and Dr. Greg White.  What is the High School Cyber Defense Competition you 
ask?  Before I answer that question I feel it's necessary to note who is Dr. Greg White.

Dr. White is a Professor and what I would refer to as a weekend warrior.  He's a Colonel in Air Force who started a 
initiative called "Dark Screen" a few years ago which is an on going project to establish metropolitan areas with a 
disaster recovery plan for IT.

Dr. White also spearheaded the CDC two years ago at the collegiate level, which has now become a National competition.

"The purpose of the competition, according to Dr. Gregory B. White, Director of the Center for Infrastructure Assurance 
and Security, is to encourage students to learn more about computer security and information assurance.  With the 
increasing dependence in society on computer systems and networks, the importance of having trained individuals who can 
secure these essential assets is growing continually.   Dr. White hoped that the students’ experience at the 
competition sparks a lifelong interest in security.  He also believed that preparing for the competition enhanced their 
understanding of security concepts.  The competition was designed to test students’ and teams’ ability to identify 
record and fix security problems in the given system and/or network."

Taken from a press release written by Cadet Staff Sergeant Meghan Mangus

Next year he said he would like to expand this to include other areas of security to provide more competition.  One 
idea is individual and team forensics tasks.  I'm working on that idea.  Problem is I have the idea but no idea how to 
get started.  I guess that's the hard part.

If anyone within the Texas area has any type of relationship with high schools in this area I encourage you to pass 
this along to them.  And encourage the kids to get involved with this.

One very smart young man walked away with $1,000 this weekend. This is nothing to sneeze at for a 17 year old who just 
got his drivers license.

If you'd like more information to pass along to your school or if you're outside of Texas and are drooling and just 
want to know more or if you're a sponsor with lots of money who would like to help sponsor this event next year go to 
the following web site and contact them yourself.

http://www.utsa.edu/cias/HSCDC/index.html

Information Security takes an active approach. I think Dr. White has got the best non downloadable security tool ever 
created.  This was an exciting weekend because it was very managable.  Next year I'm afraid it will grow 4 times.  And 
the next year 4 to 6 times that to the point of preliminaries.

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