The month long campaign aims to teach students of all technological abilities
The University of Rhode Island Information Technology Department has taken initiative to host an awareness campaign for National Cyber Security Awareness Month (NSCAM) which has provided five new lessons based on the theme “Own It. Secure It. Protect It” for students to learn this month.
Mike Khalfayan, the URI associate director of information security has been looking forward to pursuing the awareness month because of its importance to the modern age.
“I’ve always wanted to do a campaign like this but have been limited due to staff,” said Khalfayan. “It is an important initiative that’s created between the industry in order to make sure that every community member at the University has access to resources that are necessary to have them stay safe and secure online.”
The awareness month started off with a one-minute cyber quiz that was sent to all URI students. Khalfayan sees this as an introduction to the month and a test of their University outreach.
“A short video of around one minute or less was the easiest thing to do in terms of reaching a large number of students and engaging them quickly,” said Khalfayan. “We can more or less use that to measure our reach in how many students responded to that quiz.”
One lesson that is being focused on this month involves two-factor authentication on electronic accounts for cloud and data security. URI Computer Science Instructor Dr. Victor Fay-Wolfe has recommended this security method for years.
“One of the big things that I do whenever I teach is talk about the importance of two factor authentication,” said Wolfe. “Passwords by themselves can be found out, stolen but when you have a second factor it is very strong.”
On the other hand, Robert Viens, who serves as the URI associate director for Media and Technology Services, thinks people could benefit from being prepared for a cyber attack.
“People tend to lose sight of the threats that are out there as they are living their lives and getting their education,” said Viens. “It is something that they react when it happens, but a little bit of awareness and a little bit of preventive preparation can go a long way in keeping our community safe from these types of attacks and incidents that could really affect people’s lives adversely.”
The lessons within the awareness month can help even the most
“There is never a time when there isn’t something you can learn from this and ways that you can correct or improve our own behavior even as IT professionals,” said Viens.
One of the hopes for the month is for students to take an interest in cyber security, as email phishing and cyber attacks become more prevalent.
“My hope is that the help desk does receive calls from students during the month of October and hopefully months thereafter regarding something that they picked up in training during the month of October,” said Khalfayan.
Along with taking an interest in the subject, Wolfe hopes that students may consider studying cyber security in the near future.
“Hopefully some of them think of it as a career opportunity,” said Wolfe. “URI offers one of the best cyber security programs in the country.”
As for the future of cyber security, only time will tell how online security will change.
“In my experience, IT security has always been a reactionary part of the entire IT world,” said Viens. “We are trying to foresee what the issues are going to be and the plan for what the future issues could be.”