Cybersecurity Competitive Labs-as-a-Service

Hempenius, Nicholas; Chou, Te‐Shun; Toderick, Lee

doi:10.1145/3241815.3241825

Cited by 4 publications

(3 citation statements)

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“…Due to CSX complexity, a single score or measurement cannot capture every ability learned, and different learning objectives call for different scoring approaches (Andreolini et al, 2020). However, as the CSX scoring consists of various elements, often the research focuses only on a specific element or its technical solution(s), such as availability scoring (Hempenius et al, 2019;Pihelgas, 2019).…”

Section: Related Workmentioning

confidence: 99%

Trends and challenges for balanced scoring in cybersecurity exercises: A case study on the example of Locked Shields

2022

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Cybersecurity exercises (CSXs) enable raising organizational awareness, testing capabilities, identifying strengths and weaknesses, and gaining hands-on practice in building resilience against attacks. Typical CSX execution is designed as a competition or a challenge with gamification features to increase participant engagement. Also, it requires a significant amount of human resources to ensure up-to-date attack simulation and proper feedback. The usual concerns related to CSXs are how many points the team or participant received and the reason behind the particular evaluation. Properly balanced scoring can provide valuable feedback and keep CSX participants engaged. An inadequate scoring system might have the opposite effect—spread disorder, cause discontent, decrease motivation, and distract the participants from the event's primary goal. Combining both technical and soft sides in CSX makes it increasingly complex and challenging to ensure a balanced scoring. This paper defines scoring challenges and trends based on the case study of one of the largest international live-fire cyber defense exercises, Locked Shields (LS). It reviews the CSX scoring categories of the recent LS executions and provides the most common participant concerns related to scoring. The feedback shows that clarity and transparency of the scoring system together with providing feedback and justification to the scores are one of the top concerns. The design choices of the scoring system are explored to demonstrate the subtle variations of balanced category scoring and make a basis for future discussions. The chosen contrast and comparison approach enabled distinguishing four parameters for design decision categories: complexity, transparency, level of competition, and automatization. The research results demonstrate that learning facilitation requires system simplification and decisions regarding trends of the scoring curve. Even though transparency is a critical issue, concealing some scoring logic details can ensure more flexibility during the event to stimulate participants, support learning experiences, and cope with unexpected situations. Time as a central dimension enables the implementation of complex scoring curves for automated assessment. Our study contributes to the community of higher education institutions and all organizers of cybersecurity challenges for skill development and assessment.

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Section: Related Workmentioning

confidence: 99%

Trends and challenges for balanced scoring in cybersecurity exercises: A case study on the example of Locked Shields

2022

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“…This gamebased learning strategy not only stimulated interest in learning the subject matter but also made learning more exciting. Figure 1a shows the Score and Message Board [7,8] that displays the instant messages and the scores of learners.…”

Section: Cybersec Labsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Lab Performance Evaluation via a Workshop Survey

Chou,

Yang

2021 ASEE Virtual Annual Conference Content Access Proceedings

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He serves as the program coordinator of the Master program in Network Technology for TSYS and the lead faculty of Digital Communication Systems concentration for the Consortium Universities of the Ph.D. in Technology Management. He is also the point of contact of ECU National Centers of Academic Excellence in Cyber Defense Education (CAE-CDE). Dr. Chou teaches IT related courses, which include cyber security, intrusion detection and incident response, wireless communications, and network management. His research interests include machine learning, wireless communications, technology education, and cyber security, especially in the field of intrusion detection systems.

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“…In addition, learners who successfully passed a quiz received ten points for each question. A Score and Message Board was implemented in the GUI application [10,11]. When an attack/defense/quiz occurred, related messages were displayed on the Board.…”

Section: • Browser Attacks Andmentioning

confidence: 99%

Self-assessment of Knowledge Levels in the Subjects of Cyber Attacks and Defense in a Cybersecurity Awareness Education Workshop

Chou,

Mohammed

2021 ASEE Virtual Annual Conference Content Access Proceedings

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During the past couple of years, an online virtualized student-centric based learning system, Competitive Labs-as-a-Service (CLaaS), for cybersecurity education has been developed to prepare students with both theoretical knowledge and practical skills. The system included ten identical learning environments that allowed for interaction among each environment, which made the learning system as a whole more like a realistic network environment. The system could be used in any cybersecurity related undergraduate and graduate courses. It would help students understand the latest cybersecurity technologies. Furthermore, it would provide oncampus and distance education students with opportunities to learn and practice cyberattack and cyber defense techniques used in the real world.In order to maximize the positive impact of the system on cybersecurity education, a two-day workshop was held at East Carolina University (ECU) in the summer of 2019. The workshop was hosted by the Department of Technology Systems (TSYS) and executed in a train-the-trainer format. Nineteen college instructors from Southeast United States attended the workshop and participated in an exit survey. The survey included a set of categories each containing questions to evaluate the workshop design and whether the participants thought the system would be suitable and helpful to students' learning cybersecurity. Based on the survey outcomes, the development team could then make proper adjustments to improve the effectiveness of the system. In this paper, the design of the workshop was described. In addition, the paper discussed the survey results and focused on the self-assessment of knowledge in the subjects of cybersecurity category.

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Cybersecurity Competitive Labs-as-a-Service

Cited by 4 publications

References 0 publications

Trends and challenges for balanced scoring in cybersecurity exercises: A case study on the example of Locked Shields

Trends and challenges for balanced scoring in cybersecurity exercises: A case study on the example of Locked Shields

Lab Performance Evaluation via a Workshop Survey

Self-assessment of Knowledge Levels in the Subjects of Cyber Attacks and Defense in a Cybersecurity Awareness Education Workshop

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