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Center for Information Assurance and Security Education

The Center for Information Assurance and Security Education (CIASE) at Illinois State University is committed to furthering information assurance education at ISU, the state of Illinois, and nationwide.  Located in the School of Information Technology, the center falls under the mission of the school “to provide premier undergraduate and distinguished graduate programs for the education of computing and telecommunications professionals, to support other academic units through courses in information technology, and to maintain, through education and research, a leadership position in the application of information technology.”  The center’s mission is to ensure the school provides this level of education and research in the field of information assurance and security.

The Department of Homeland Security and the National Security Agency have designated the CIASE as a Center of Academic Excellance in Information Assurance Education. This honor places ISU among the leading institutions in the United States for Information Assurance education. It also provides students with opportunities for federal scholarships in Information Assurance.

DHSNSACNSS

Information Security Blog

A view from the other side
Wed, 26 Aug 2009 by dtwitch
Slate’s Farhad Manjoo argues that IT departments are arbitrary and capricious in their restrictions on software.  For the most part, I agree.

Heartland’s CEO discusses “devastating” breach
Fri, 19 Jun 2009 by dtwitch
Article from ComputerWorld gives some details on the Heartland payment processor breach.  Note that the CEO calls PCI compliance the “lowest common denominator.”

NY Times Magazine article on data centers gives insight on data center security
Fri, 19 Jun 2009 by dtwitch
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/06/14/magazine/14search-t.html

Verizon breach report released
Fri, 17 Apr 2009 by dtwitch
As they have for the last five years, Verizon released a report on data breaches. Some quick and interesting facts from the report: Most breaches result from external attacks. Most of the attacks were simple Most of the attacks could have been prevented using simple, low-cost defenses Most attacks were facilitated by mistakes Most of the breaches involved financial data To [...]

Breach of ATM payment processor nets $9 million for hackers
Tue, 10 Feb 2009 by dtwitch
No word on how they got in, but they used coordinated withdrawals across the world during a 30 minute window to withdraw the money.  This is a great illustration of the sophistication of attacks today.  Link

XKCD on the realities of security
Mon, 02 Feb 2009 by dtwitch
Very true.

Man buys MP3 player with loads of US Military data on it
Wed, 28 Jan 2009 by dtwitch
oops.

Zombies Ahead: Road sign hacked
Wed, 28 Jan 2009 by dtwitch
A road sign in Austin Texas was hacked, probably using a default password.

Obama Gets a Crypto-Enabled BlackBerry?
Thu, 22 Jan 2009 by dtwitch
CNN and Marc Ambinder are claiming that Obama will get to have some sort of PDA/Smartphone with the ability to handle classified information. Neither are clear on which device it will be, but this one from General Dynamics (although it runs Windows Mobile instead of BlackBerry software) seems to fit the bill.

Hacking your brain
Mon, 12 Jan 2009 by dtwitch
Includes how to make yourself hallucinate by simply waving your hand between you and the sun. Link