Information Sciences and Technology Department

Information technology students stepped up to secure Virginia’s elections

Teresa Donnellan — Wed, 28 Aug 2024 14:19:47 +0000

Information technology students stepped up to secure Virginia’s elections Teresa Donnellan Wed, 08/28/2024 - 10:19

Secure elections are the cornerstone of democracy, and the Virginia Cyber Navigator Internship Program (VA-CNIP) has equipped students with the skills to strengthen the cybersecurity posture of election infrastructures. As an intern last summer, information technology (IT) major Duong Thuy Nguyen helped secure a rural county's technology for the upcoming presidential election alongside two other George Mason students, Maha Khan and Sophie Bates.

Sponsored by the National Security Agency (NSA) and run by the University of Virginia (UVA) and other five Virginia universities including George Mason, VA-CNIP was developed to address the need for improved election security in localities that may not have the resources to implement necessary cybersecurity measures.

Nguyen, who is pursuing a dual concentration in database technology and programming and cyber security, traveled to Campbell County for a few days each week over the summer to support the county’s dedicated and hard-working IT staff in complying with the Locality Election Security Standards (LESS) required by the Commonwealth of Virginia. The LESS requirements are designed to ensure that all localities, regardless of size, have baseline cybersecurity measures in place, with further goals to achieve "preferred" or "premium" levels of security. The program thus not only prepared students for future careers but also left a lasting impact on the local governments they serve.

From left to right, Albanese, Hicks, and Nguyen with two other VA-CNIP interns. Photo provided.

George Mason Associate Professor Max Albanese helped lead VA-CNIP, designing a course in election security that was a prerequisite for all interns. In addition to the course, a two-day boot camp at UVA provided interns with training, including hands-on activities and talks from high profile industry experts and election officials. This year United States Election Assistance Commissioner Thomas Hicks spoke at the boot camp.

“Especially this year, the focus was on trying to send interns to localities that were in most need of upgrading their security posture,” said Albanese, “and that means the more rural or less technologically advanced counties.”

Each week, students worked remotely for part of their assignments but also traveled to their assigned localities for on-site work. Due to the often-rural nature of the counties involved, VA-CNIP provided a $3,000 travel allowance to each intern in addition to their $9,000 stipend. This allowed students to travel long distances and, when necessary, stay overnight in nearby towns to avoid lengthy commutes. The George Mason interns this year traveled about four hours one way to reach Campbell County.

Nguyen in Campbell County. Photo provided.

Nguyen noted how rewarding it was to work in-person with the local IT department. Her tasks included developing security policies, conducting research on cybersecurity tools, and even designing tabletop exercises to prepare local officials for possible cyber incidents on election day. Nguyen raved about her internship, which was her first. Even though she had to travel a lot, she said, she would not change her experience.

“They were all very welcoming, and they gave us all the support that we needed,” she said.

VA-CNIP exemplifies the power of academia, government, and students working together to tackle one of the most pressing challenges of our time—ensuring the security and integrity of democratic processes. While funding for VA-CNIP ends this year, there are ongoing discussions about sustaining the program going forward.

In This Story

Massimiliano Albanese

Explore career options at University Career Services

Topics

information technology

Information Sciences and Technology Department

information sciences and technology

Myeong Lee’s information network research will guide  the Virginia Board of People with Disabilities

Teresa Donnellan — Thu, 04 Apr 2024 14:57:58 +0000

Myeong Lee’s information network research will guide  the Virginia Board of People with Disabilities Teresa Donnellan Thu, 04/04/2024 - 10:57

Myeong Lee, an assistant professor of information science and the director of the Community Informatics Lab at ��AV, has been working with the Virginia Board of People with Disabilities (VPBD) since presenting at their Information Access Summit in November 2022. 

"It was an event of government staff members, officials, non-profits, and community advocates, discussing the information access challenges faced by individuals with disabilities and their family members," Lee recalled. At the summit, he emphasized the need to address not only tech literacy issues but also structural barriers to information access. His ideas resonated with VBPD members and state government officials, leading to the inception of the Mapping Information Ecology project, for which Lee received a grant of about $150,000 from the VBPD.

Myeong Lee

Lee, whose past research has focused on information access issues in local communities, explained, “At the community level, if information is fragmented across different sources and in different forms, then those structural factors make people's access difficult." Lee’s research approach involved finding a way to measure these structural challenges and mitigate their negative impact. 

The project aims to understand information provision and management practices from both information provider and user perspectives. Lee's team employed a mixed-method approach, conducting interviews with providers and surveying their information sharing patterns to uncover both managerial and structural challenges.  

Based on network analysis of information-sharing patterns, key findings from the project will extend our understanding of obstacles faced by individuals with disabilities and their family members, such as the lack of customized information for diverse populations, outdated information, and reliance on informal sources, such as social media, leading to exposure to misinformation. 

“We are currently designing the survey questionnaire to [further] understand both information providers’ and users’ practices,” said Lee. Using information from the survey, he explained, “We want to visualize those networks—how information is circulated and shared.” The data visualization will help Lee and his team identify “hot spots” and “cold spots” where improvements can be made. Finally, the team will provide recommendations to the VBPD. 

“We want to provide information systems strategies, structural recommendations, and related policy recommendations to the state. That's our goal," said Lee.  

Despite the project's official ending in May, Lee envisions continued collaboration between his team and the VBPD. Looking ahead, he sees potential applications of their approach beyond disability-related issues. Ultimately, Lee hopes to create metrics and tools for assessing information availability and fragmentation at the state level so to assist policymakers in understanding the complicated issue of information access. 

Lee's work exemplifies a holistic approach to information access, bridging the gap between research and policy to empower marginalized communities. He concluded, "It's not just about making recommendations—it's about building systems and developing assessment metrics that empower users and inform policymakers for years to come." 

In This Story

Myeong Lee

Topics

information sciences and technology

Information Sciences and Technology Department

Disability policy

Community-Based Research

Mason/Amazon hackathon is a win for Mason students

Colleen Rich — Mon, 07 Nov 2022 17:44:39 +0000

Mason/Amazon hackathon is a win for Mason students Colleen Rich Mon, 11/07/2022 - 12:44

Nervousness, shock, disbelief, exhaustion. Those were among the emotions ��AV freshmen Pranay Yella and Pranav Reddippali said they experienced at the 2022 Bring Down Counterfeiting Public Policy Hackathon.

In the end, though, it was worth it—$15,000 to be exact.

Team Nimbus—Pranav Reddippali, Srivatsa Krishnamurthy, Pranay Yella—took second place at the Mason/Amazon Bring Down Counterfeiting Public Policy Hackathon. Photo by Blue Clarity

That is how much Team Nimbus—which included Yella, an information technology major; Reddippali, a computer science major; and their friend from the University of Virginia, Srivatsa Krishnamurthy—were awarded as the event’s second-place finisher.

Their proposal: Develop a Google Chrome extension that can prevent the consumption of counterfeit medicine by focusing on exposing counterfeit pharmacies.

Louise Shelley, founder and director of Mason's TraCCC. Photo by John Boal Photography

Team Hypercube earned the $20,000 first prize for its concept of a national counterfeiting index through an artificial intelligence (AI)-powered blockchain that would allow federal, state and local law enforcement to share information, and consumers to verify the authenticity of a product through their phones.

“Opportunities like this are definitely something to be taken seriously,” Yella said. “An idea is a free thing, but once you implement it, it can revolutionize the world.”

[Mason and the Bring Down Counterfeiting Public Policy Hackathon are featured in Amazon's 2023 Brand Protection Report, which was part of this Good Morning America report.]

The hackathon, co-hosted by Mason’s Terrorism, Transnational Crime and Corruption Center (TraCCC) and Amazon, was held Nov. 5 at the Homeland Security Investigations Lab in Arlington, Virginia.

TraaCCC is located at Mason Square (formerly Arlington Campus), where the 345,000-square -oot Fuse building is under construction, scheduled to open in 2025. Fuse will serve as a technological hub in the Rosslyn-Ballston corridor, connecting students, faculty, industry, and government.

Saturday's hackathon, administered by Blue Clarity, challenged teams from U.S. and international academic institutions, companies, and other affiliations to develop innovative ideas to improve public–private collaborations against the industry-wide global challenge of counterfeiting. More than 280 individuals registered for the hackathon. More than 30 teams submitted proposals by the deadline, 11 of which made the finals.

An panel of judges scored the submissions based on potential impact, scalability, creativity and design.

In developing the submissions, participants had access to experts and mentors from Amazon, law enforcement, tech and retail industries, academia, and government.

From Mason, those included the Criminal Investigations and Network Analysis Center (CINA), the College of Science, the School of Computing, and the Antonin Scalia Law School.

“Only effective public–private collaboration and a relentless pursuit of solutions can solve this problem,” Mason President Gregory Washington said. “This important event is a step in that direction because this hackathon involves policy. We’re not just pursuing greater understanding of counterfeiting, we’re trying to improve the response to the problem. We appreciate Amazon’s commitment to work with Mason to find innovative solutions and to provide opportunities for Mason students to take part in these challenging hands-on experiences.”

Added Kebharu Smith, director of Amazon’s Counterfeit Crimes Unit: “We’re excited to be, as Amazon, part of this hackathon with Mason and TraCCC and the other partners that participated in this first hackathon, to really think about ways that we can fight counterfeiters and the scourge of counterfeiting. This partnership is key to us moving forward and going after counterfeiters and beating them at this threat.”

Kebharu Smith, director of Amazon’s Counterfeit Crimes Unit, spoke with the media following the hackathon. Photo by Blue Clarity

Which brings us back to Yella and Reddippali, the Mason students who finished second in the competition with their friend from UVA.

Asked why they decided to focus on counterfeit medicine and pharmacies, Reddippali said, “Because we felt it had the most impact on people with lives at stake. With other counterfeit goods, it is the stealing of intellectual property. But we felt this was more urgent.”

Yella, Reddippali, and Krishnamurthy, all from Ashburn, Virginia, met in high school. Reddippali said Yella came up with the idea of the Chrome extension, but they all collaborated on the details that include checking the legitimacy of online pharmacies and creating a forum where users can provide feedback that can be accessed by local, state and federal authorities.

“They were so thoughtful in thinking about counterfeiting as a health and safety issue,” said Louise Shelley, TraCCC’s founder and director. “And they were so incredibly clever in thinking about solutions.”

They are also thinking about the future of their project.

“We’re definitely going to go on with this project in a more serious way,” Yella said. “We feel this product can revolutionize the medicine industry. We definitely want to use our funds to make it successful in the future.”

In the moment, though, “They were so excited,” Shelley said, “they were shaking.”

Other awards:

Mason’s Criminal Investigations Network and Analysis Center sponsored a special $10,000 prize to fund follow-up research by A-CAPP Team #1, which proposed producing a central database to help law enforcement and private businesses track individuals and factories that manufacture or sell counterfeit items.

The $5,000 student prize went to The Spartan Solution, which demonstrated a cipher-based solution to combat counterfeit listings on e-commerce sites before the listings reach consumers.

The crowdsource prize of $2,000 went to Team G.I.N., which detailed creation of a network, accessible by a QR code, that will allow everyone the ability to distinguish between genuine and counterfeit goods.

Topics

Campus News

Students

Amazon

Schar School of Policy and Government Terrorism Transnational Crime and Corruption Center (TraCCC)

Arlington campus

Information Sciences and Technology Department

New scoring framework addresses software vulnerabilities

Tama Moni — Tue, 25 Oct 2022 17:50:54 +0000

New scoring framework addresses software vulnerabilities Tama Moni Tue, 10/25/2022 - 13:50

In This Story

Massimiliano Albanese

Liza Wilson Durant

The ��AV College of Engineering and Computing has launched the Mason Vulnerability Scoring Framework (MVSF), which publishes a continuously updated ranking of the most-common global software weaknesses. The work, in conjunction with PARC (Palo Alto Research Center), relies on the National Institute of Standards and Technology’s (NIST)—Common Vulnerabilities and Exposures data and other sources of vulnerability information to create an up-to-date database that can be used to identify and mitigate risks. This line of work has resulted in multiple pending patent applications and a Best Paper Award at the 19th International Conference on Security and Cryptography.

Cybersecurity code with 1s and 0s
Photo provided by iStock images

Liza Wilson Durant, Mason’s associate provost for strategic initiatives and community engagement, says, "This preemptive tool to guide strategic defense against cybersecurity vulnerabilities will not only safeguard systems but mitigate potential business revenue losses for those who leverage the tool. “

An existing list called the Common Weakness Enumeration (CWE) Top 25 Most Dangerous Software Weaknesses, compiled by The MITRE Corporation, has long been the industry standard. MVSF improves on the CWE Top 25 by having data input monthly, compared to MITRE’s yearly reporting. This improvement allows researchers, programmers, developers, and others to have an accurate, almost real-time picture of where software vulnerabilities are most likely to be exploited. Additionally, where MITRE ranks the top 25 vulnerabilities, MVSF ranks the top 150.

Associate Professor, Department of Information Sciences and Technology and Associate Director, Center for Secure Information Systems, Max Albanese oversees the project for Mason. He says, “If there is a trend where a certain type of vulnerability is becoming more severe, you don’t have to wait for a full year to discover that; you’ll see that class of vulnerability getting worse – or better – month-to-month.” MVSF can even correct course based on new information, going back and re-ranking weaknesses’ order in a previous month based on new information that was not known at the time of original ranking.

Albanese further notes that NIST assigns a severity score to vulnerabilities based on a combination of an exploitability score – how difficult the vulnerability is to exploit – and an impact score – how bad the consequences would be if the vulnerability were exploited. MVSF uses those components as variables but allows users to add their own, additional variables not considered by NIST. MVSF also allows users to decide how to weigh the variables that rank the vulnerabilities. This customizability, still under development, is an important feature of the new system.

Mason and PARC’s collaboration on the Mason Vulnerability Scoring Framework builds on a relationship that started with both of them working on a Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) project dubbed SCIBORG: Secure Configurations for the Internet of Things (IoT) based on Optimization and Reasoning on Graphs. The goal of SCIBORG was to devise fundamentally new approaches to determine security configurations that protect critical infrastructure and IoT-based systems.

The association with PARC here was important to making the project a success. “Working with GMU was a productive collaboration,” says Marc Mosko, principal scientist, PARC. “Configuration vulnerabilities are growing, now comprising over 15 percent of all Common Vulnerability and Exposure (CVE) notices. We appreciate that across many different industry sectors, there are often gaps in context between management, software security teams, and those who are responsible for ensuring systems are performing optimally on an ongoing basis. Our work addresses these evolving configuration security needs, and we look forward to exploring opportunities to apply this work in the future.”

Mason and PARC’s collaboration on the Mason Vulnerability Scoring Framework builds on a relationship that started with both of them working on a Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) program ConSec in a project dubbed SCIBORG: Secure Configurations for the Internet of Things (IoT) based on Optimization and Reasoning on Graphs. The goal of SCIBORG was to devise fundamentally new approaches to determine security configurations that protect critical infrastructure and IoT-based systems.

Albanese, who is also an external consultant for MITRE, has initiated a collaboration with MITRE’s group responsible for CWE to leverage synergies between the two organizations.

In addition to the excitement of the innovation, it is equally impactful to see undergraduate students involved in its design and implementation and innovating alongside their mentor faculty," says Wilson Durant.

The Virginia Commonwealth Cyber Initiative (CCI) will provide continued support for two Mason undergraduate students to assist with the project, which Albanese says is key for the continued maintenance of the system.

Topics

cryptography

configuration vulnerabilities

Internet of Things

Information Sciences and Technology Department

Research

CEC faculty research

Commonwealth Cyber Initiative CATAPULT fund launches translational research projects

Martha Bushong — Thu, 06 Oct 2022 18:18:33 +0000

Commonwealth Cyber Initiative CATAPULT fund launches translational research projects Martha Bushong Thu, 10/06/2022 - 14:18

In This Story

Liza Wilson Durant

Learn About the CCI

As researchers and their teams work to answer questions and find solutions for protecting privacy and securing information through cybersecurity innovation, many set their sights on commercialization. Still, the path from research ideas to consumer products can be long and winding. To help straighten the path the Commonwealth Cyber Initiative (CCI) is supporting a Cyber Acceleration, Translation, and Advanced Prototyping for University Linked Technology (CATAPULT) Fund. The fund’s purpose‑‑advance collaborative translational research projects among CCI partners, to speed up the progress of academic research outcomes to the marketplace.

"It is truly exciting to tap into the breadth of innovation from academic institutions across the Commonwealth and introduce these faculty inventors to the opportunity to expand the impact of their research through commercialization,” says Liza Wilson Durant, associate dean, strategic initiatives and community engagement, College of Engineering and Computing. “It is just the right time for Virginia to support and accelerate cybersecurity innovation as the Commonwealth establishes its role as a magnet for new companies with the best and brightest solutions to the nation's greatest cybersecurity challenges."

In July 2022 CCI awarded seven teams from four universities in the Northern Virginia Node funding for their projects. These research teams received up to $50,000, with funding increments released based on the achievement of agreed-upon milestones. The teams and their projects are as follows.

Protecting Smartphones from Fingerphoto Spoofing
��AV Assistant Professor Emanuela Marasco’s the project addresses the urgent need for a mechanism that properly secures smartphone technology. Contactless fingerprint authentication allows faster capture times, unattended operations, and high hygiene. These systems, however, are still in the early stages of development. Although researchers are advancing matching, the risk of spoofing for contactless authentication must be mitigated as well. This project addresses the problem.

Distributed Online Intrusion Detection System for IoT devices via Power Side-channel Auditing
As the number of Internet of Things (IoT) devices has increased rapidly, IoT botnets and information stealer attacks have exploited the vulnerabilities of IoT devices. It is still challenging, however, to detect the initial intrusion on IoT devices before massive attacks. Professor Gang Zhou, from the College of William & Mary, and his partners at Old Dominion University are addressing the challenge of the lack of accurate models in real-time for ubiquitous attack detection with their project.

Algorithm Evaluation for Backdoor Detection and Mitigation in Remote Sensing Systems
Artificial Intelligence (AI) technology has advanced to the point that it is inescapable in life and work. AI models extract knowledge from data to make decisions. Though AI has achieved state-of-the-art performances for many applications, it can be easily deceived by the backdoor attack. Old Dominion University Professor Jiang Li and his partners at Maxar’s project leverages a novel approach to addressing this concern.

RF Fingerprinting Techniques for Millimeter-Wave Device Authentication in 5G/NextG Wireless Communication
Millimeter-wave (mmWave) technology is a key enabler for 5G and NextG wireless communications as it supports applications that require high-throughput and ultra-low latency. Due to the broadcast nature of the wireless medium, however, mmWave communication is vulnerable to various attacks. With this project Kai Zeng, associate professor, ��AV and his team aim to develop robust and efficient techniques to address these vulnerabilities.

Extended Reality Empowered 5G Telemedicine Mentoring
Old Dominion University Associate Professor Sachin Shetty’s project looks at the development and commercialization of a 5G telemedicine platform that leverages Extended Reality technologies and a 5G environment. Because 5G technology supports massive capacity connections and fast data rates it has the potential to transform healthcare training and service delivery. One example, 5 G-enabled telemedicine, connects remotely located medical providers and allows access to near real-time data, and permits split-second decision-making critical in health care environments.

Super Timelines
When a cybersecurity incident occurs, analysts need to quickly construct a forensic timeline of events to assess the impact and plan the response. This effort typically involves extracting logs and other artifacts from various sources and then combining them into a single list, ordering them by date and time. Only then can an analyst look for clues to help better understand the course of events before, during, and after the incident. With Super Timelines, Florian Buchholz, professor at James Madison University, and his partners at Gigasheet (https://www.gigasheet.com) will develop a turnkey solution for this problem, based on a modern cloud-based infrastructure.

“Without this funding from CCI, the research and start-ups that are so critical to Virginia’s strategy of building a high-impact cyber economy would not have the opportunity to meet the wonderful members of the tech community who have rallied around them to provide advice, guidance, and structure to launching new products and companies,” says Associate Vice President of the Office of Research Innovation and Economic Development, at ��AV, Paula Sorrell.

Topics

Commonwealth Cyber Initiative (CCI)

Cybersecurity Awareness Month

Cybersecurity Research

Information Sciences and Technology Department

CEC faculty research

Zhisheng Yan nabs Best Student Paper Award

Teresa Donnellan — Wed, 05 Oct 2022 18:57:56 +0000

Zhisheng Yan nabs Best Student Paper Award Teresa Donnellan Wed, 10/05/2022 - 14:57

In This Story

Zhisheng Yan

A recent paper by Department of Information Sciences and Technology Assistant Professor Zhisheng Yan received the Best Student Paper Award at ACM Multimedia Systems (MMSys) 2022 conference held in Athlone, Ireland. ACM MMSys is a premier conference on multimedia. The awarded paper results from a collaborative project between Yan and researchers at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign.

In his paper, Yan writes, “Image compression standards such as JPEG and its variants designed for human viewing are no longer the optimal choice for emerging video analytics applications where machines and computer algorithms are the end consumers. We show in this paper that it is necessary and feasible to achieve fast and compact image compression while maximizing the accuracy of image classification and object detection algorithms through a machine-centered design.”

To read the paper, “Context-aware Image Compression Optimization for Visual Analytics Offloading,” go to https://mason.gmu.edu/~zyan4/papers/cico_mmsys22.pdf.

Topics

Information Sciences and Technology Department

information sciences and technology

Media Research

Fulbright faculty finds Finland, a small nation that punches well above its weight

Martha Bushong — Fri, 06 May 2022 18:02:57 +0000

Fulbright faculty finds Finland, a small nation that punches well above its weight Martha Bushong Fri, 05/06/2022 - 14:02

In This Story

Aditya Johri

As part of my faculty study leave for 2021-2022, I spent the fall 2021 semester in Finland as a Fulbright-Nokia Distinguished Chair at the Department of Computer Science, Aalto University in Espoo, a suburb of the capital city Helsinki. When I mentioned my upcoming trip to colleagues at Mason, friends and colleagues were all curious – what made you apply to go to Finland? Finland was a strategic choice based on a number of factors including the range of Fulbright opportunities available, my experience with a postdoc in my lab who got his PhD at Aalto, and a visit I had made to Helsinki as part of an NSF workshop where I had met many academics from Finland. I was also aware that like other Nordic countries, Finnish people were very comfortable with English removing one potential barrier to travel. But most of all what had attracted me to Finland was the quality and quantity of research that Finland produces in the two fields where my research interests intersect – computing and education.

At Aalto, I worked as part of Learning Technologies or LeTech group led by Prof. Lauri Malmi and in close collaboration with the Critical AI and Crisis Studies (CRAI-CIS) research group led by Professor Nitin Sawhney. The LeTech group is at the forefront of computing education, especially the use of novel technologies for learning programming and abstractions. The CRAI-CIS is a new group at Aalto and group members are engaged in researching and designing AI-driven public services, including public health services related to COVID. During my time at Aalto, I wanted to develop expertise in ethics of AI, especially in educational technology, and was extremely lucky to find such a tight intellectual fit.

Travel preparations for the trip were marked with a lot of uncertainty due to COVID and although when I reached Finland in early August many meetings were online, slowly folks started showing up on campus and I was able to participate in many in-person activities. The opening up of the campus allowed me to attend and give talks and discuss research and teaching with new colleagues and even some old ones like Milos Mladenovic whom I knew from my time at Virginia Tech. Having prior contacts was also helpful with process of settling into a new city and institution.

Beyond my collaborations at Aalto, I was able to travel across Europe and present at different places and attend conferences. The advantage of Europe in terms of proximity cannot be understated. I was able to present papers at reach conferences and give invited talks in Rome, Italy, Stockholm, Sweden, Eindhoven, the Netherlands, and Tallinn, Estonia. These visits also allowed me to showcase the work that my lab does and also publicize ��AV as an institution.

Beyond the academic engagements, there were other factors that had made Finland an attractive place to visit and I was not disappointed. Although I speak multiple languages the ease of doing work and of living in Scandinavian countries with their high level of English adoption was definitely a plus. In this regard I was thoroughly impressed with Finland. Finns are very proud of their language and most public work is carried out in Finnish, but they are fluent in English. Public transport within the city and between cities is superb, and city planning is excellent. In Helsinki most neighborhoods have a grocery store, convenience store, coffee shop and restaurants all within walking distance.

The other attraction was being able to spend time in a country where public services are strong. It isn’t surprising that other Fulbright Scholars came explicitly to study these services In Finland. A new friend and colleague, Fred Markowitz, from Northern Illinois University was studying mental health and deviant behavior, including studies of prison systems in Finland. Finns are proud of their social innovations, women have had a right to vote since the inception of the country 100 years ago, and of public sharing of common resources such as mushrooms and berries in the wild.

In terms of my time on campus, I was pleasantly surprised by the support that faculty and students have their needs – from technical support, building managers, to support for labs and paperwork. This something that is increasingly amiss at U.S. academic institutions. Public funding for education in Finland means more resources for those who work and learn there. The building where I had my office had a break area with coffee machines, hot water for tea, and all utensils. It also had refrigerators and dishwashers. Compared to American campuses, the campus there was a lot more homogenous in terms of student and faculty population and this is downside that the university and workforce there realizes.

A Fulbright experience is unique and I highly recommend others to look into the opportunity. In addition to the Fulbright Scholars, Finland also supports those who are not in academia to visit the country. Students, of course, have their own program and there is also funding for short visits. Finally, the Fulbright Specialist program allows one to travel for specific projects that include workshop, curriculum development, and others. Finding a partner in the host nation is important and every country does it differently so there is a bit of legwork involved but the Fulbright website of each country provides information on staff that can help you make connections.

Finally, as I write this in April 2022, the war in Ukraine is at the forefront of international news. It reminds me of a lot of conversations with colleagues in Finland. Finland shares a long border with Russia and was ruled by the Russian empire for almost 200 years. Therefore, it is not surprising that geopolitics in relation to Russia is never far from the minds of Finnish people. They never joined NATO, something they are now considering, and have often maintained a neutral stance in matters related to Russia. This time that is not the case and University of Helsinki and Aalto University are offering free education to Ukrainian students. It is easy to forget when one lives in a country with oceans on two sides and relatively friends nations across the borders that when you share borders, you need to have a very different mindset. It is good to be reminded that we all have our own constraints.

Topics

Fulbright

Information Sciences and Technology Department

CEC faculty research

Persistence and perseverance pays off for IT graduate

Martha Bushong — Fri, 06 May 2022 16:35:51 +0000

Persistence and perseverance pays off for IT graduate Martha Bushong Fri, 05/06/2022 - 12:35

Benhur Hadgu describes his college journey as an uphill battle that taught him never to give up. He says, “It's easy to start anything but hard to finish.” Like many Mason students, he started his journey at Northern Virginia Community College so he could develop the habits and learn material that would prepare him for higher education.

Benhur Hadgu

“When I entered NOVA, I was determined to be successful and reach my goals. I worked hard to build good habits and routines to study and learn,” he says. “I took advantage of NOVA's opportunities, and I started to develop my mindset. I took Math and English courses from the beginning and worked hard to overcome my challenges. I always wanted to be in technology.”

After completing his Associate of Science degree, he found he still was not quite ready for a four-year college. He decided to get experience in IT and enrolled in Year Up (a program within the Cisco Networking Academy) which provided hands-on training and prepared him for an internship at Blue Cross Blue Shield.

When Hadgu enrolled full-time at Mason he was working part-time, but when he registered, he found out that some credits did not transfer from NOVA and had to retake core prerequisites and core programming courses. “I struggled the first semester due to the intense curriculum requirements, but I persisted, adapted, and did well in my courses after adjusting to Mason’s higher standards and more serious environment.” He says, “I made sure I was always around positive associations with people that stretch me and bring out the best in me.”

It took Hadgu four and a half years to complete his bachelor’s degree from ��AV, but he says it was all worth it. “Mason is a good school that gives students a lot of opportunities. I now understand why it's essential to go to a good school. My life has improved. I have learned, grown, and become a better human being due to being challenged, disciplined, and pushed academically.”

Topics

transfer students

Information Sciences and Technology Department

Northern Virginia Community College

New Mason IT grad says ‘just go for it’

Rena Malai — Mon, 25 Apr 2022 19:59:42 +0000

New Mason IT grad says ‘just go for it’ Rena Malai Mon, 04/25/2022 - 15:59

It was a friend’s serendipitous homework assignment that had Dania O Abu-Irshaid, upcoming George Mason graduate from the Department of Information Sciences and Technology, switch her undergrad work from pre-law to a STEM path.

She says she’s always had a natural knack for coding, and it’s something that’s always interested her. But when she helped a fellow Mason student with a Python coding exercise, that’s when it clicked.

“I was thinking about pre-law, but after taking a class in it, I didn’t feel like it suited me. I was undecided,” says Abu-Irshaid. “Then my friend was struggling with this homework assignment and I ended up finishing it for her in five minutes. She looked at me and said, this is what you should be doing.”

When Abu-Irshaid made the move to study IT, with a concentration in cybersecurity, that’s when things really picked up for her. As the oldest child in her family, she was relied on to be the tech savvy expert and help fix wifi routers in the house or explain internet nuances to her parents. Although she is the first female in her family to study and work in STEM, she’s confident of the opportunities coming her way.

After graduation, Abu-Irshaid will enter a ten weeklong internship with the Virginia Department of Elections, where she will work in the cybersecurity sector. She also sees potential for a corporate position with one of the big contenders—namely Walmart. As a resident advisor at Mason to freshman engineering students, Abu-Irshaid says some of her mentees good naturedly tease her about her Walmart aspirations to this day.

“I’m like, guys, Walmart isn’t just about celery and sticky buns, they have a corporate side,” she says. “But they’ll still ask me how Walmart’s going and what kind of merchandise I have.”

With a bright future ahead, she says she’ll miss her time at Mason, particularly the diverse community and her role as an advisor.

“I love the community and culture at Mason. There’s always something to do, and something to look forward to on campus. But I’ll hopefully be back, in some capacity,” says Abu-Irshaid.

Her message for future grads is to just go for it, whether it’s a job, course of study, or opportunity.

“It’s really as simple as that, and it’s what got me everywhere,” she says. “Just go to that club meeting, go to that class, ask your professor that question. You’re not going to get the results unless you go for it.”

Topics

Information Sciences and Technology Department

Graduation

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CSIRTs protect cybersecurity; expand job opportunities

Rena Malai — Fri, 11 Mar 2022 20:05:11 +0000

CSIRTs protect cybersecurity; expand job opportunities Rena Malai Fri, 03/11/2022 - 15:05

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Sherif Hashem

Cybersecurity is a growing concern for anyone using technology—which is pretty much everyone. It’s an area that has seen tremendous research since the first global attacks surfaced in the late 1980s and early 1990s.

Low-income countries can have challenges with getting appropriate cybersecurity protective measures in place and developing much-needed cybersecurity talents. To address this concern, George Mason Information Sciences and Technology professor Sherif Hashem was part of a team that produced a report ‘Cyber Incident Management in Low-Income Countries.’ The report was funded by Global Affairs Canada, and presented last month in an international webinar by the Global Forum on Cyber Expertise.

According to Hashem, having Computer Security Incidence Response Teams (CSIRTs) in place can greatly help in handling and preventing cyber attacks. He says Computer Incidence Response is a term that popped up globally about 30 years ago, and it is associated with professionals who respond to the threats made over computer systems and networks.

“Established CSIRTs can help detect a cyber attack when it happens, and greatly minimize its impact,” Hashem says. “Cyber attacks against critical national infrastructure can be some of the most impactful as they can potentially affect everyone in society.”

One recent example is the Colonial Pipeline ransomware attack in 2021, the largest cyber attack on an oil infrastructure target in U.S. history, says Hashem.

“CSIRTs across the globe work together to mitigate such cyber attacks and help bring the criminals to justice,” he says. “Without CSIRTs in situations like this, the aftermath of a cyber attack can be devastating. It’s better to be prepared and minimize any losses; recover quickly.”

The ‘Cyber Incident Management in Low-Income Countries’ report showcases CSIRT models and structures that are workable within limited budgets. The report also provides guidance on developing technical skills within CSIRTs and highlights a wide range of training programs and tools.

“Our research findings can be used holistically by any entity looking to establish CSIRTs, whether there is a limited budget or not,” says Hashem.

The first CSIRT was created by Carnegie Mellon University over thirty years ago, says Hashem. Since then, the cybersecurity space has become an area rich with job opportunities. An estimated 400,000 open cybersecurity jobs are available today in the United States alone.

“I hope this motivates students to consider information security as a part of their education and career plan,” says Hashem. “The opportunities are endless.”

The full webinar is available to view on You Tube. Part 1 and part 2 of the report are also available to view.

Topics

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