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National Collegiate Cyber Defense Competition champion crowned

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[April 23, 2008]  SAN ANTONIO -- Baker College of Flint, Mich., Texas A&M University and the University of Louisville took first-, second- and third-place honors in the third annual National Collegiate Cyber Defense Competition April 18-20 at the Airport Hilton Hotel in San Antonio. The winning team received an invitation from the Department of Homeland Security to attend the March 2010 Cyber Storm III National Cyber Security Exercise in Washington, D.C.

"We've competed in these collegiate cyber defense competitions for the last three years and have never made it past the regional level," said Brandon Hladysh, Baker College team captain. "I'm really proud of my teammates and they truly are the best of the best."

Closing ceremonies included an awards presentation and keynote address from Cornelius Tate, the newly appointed director of the Department of Homeland Security's National Cyber Security Division. According to Tate, the primary focus of his division is to work on preventing a cyber version of 9/11 by ensuring that all systems of either a federal or critical infrastructure nature are being protected appropriately. Tate does not want to see a situation arise in which these systems are not able to operate due to a malicious attack, natural disaster or other incident that is of a catastrophic nature.

The National Collegiate Cyber Defense Competition, hosted by the University of Texas at San Antonio's Center for Infrastructure Assurance and Security, a nationally recognized leader in cyber security education and research, featured six eight-member teams that were scored on their ability to operate and maintain a business network while under hostile cyber attack.

The competition has grown from five participating schools in 2005 to 56 schools in 2008, with six regional competitions taking place nationwide. This year the national competition featured Baker College of Flint, Mich., Texas A&M University, University of Louisville, Rochester Institute of Technology, the Community College of Baltimore County and Mount San Antonio College of Los Angeles County. The participants advanced to the national level after winning regional competitions against opposing teams in the Southwest, Midwest, Mid-Atlantic, Southeast and West Coast regions.

The competitive program is the first cyber defense competition allowing teams of full-time college students from across the country to apply their education in information assurance and technology in a competitive environment. While similar to other cyber defense competitions, these competitions are unique because they focus on business operations and incorporate the operational aspect of managing and protecting an existing network infrastructure. The teams inherited an "operational" network from a fictional business, complete with e-mail, Web pages, data files and users.

Each team was required to correct problems on their network, perform typical business tasks and defend their networks from a red team that generated live, hostile activity throughout the competition. The teams were scored on their performance in those three areas, and the team with the highest score at the end of the competition, Baker College, was crowned the champion.

The National Collegiate Cyber Defense Competition is sponsored in part through donations from leading businesses in the communications and information technology industries. Donated hardware and software from leaders in the IT industry was used during the competition to provide students with the opportunity to work with technologies they would never see in a typical classroom environment.

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"For the first time ever, we had two, two-year colleges win their region and compete, so it was exciting to see them competing right along against the other four-year universities," said Gregory White, director of University of Texas at San Antonio's Center for Infrastructure Assurance and Security. "We've had three competitions with winners representing three different regions, so it's good to see that there's bright, sharp, computer-security-savvy individuals all over this country."

The National Collegiate Cyber Defense Competition is sponsored in part through donations and volunteer support from the AT&T Foundation, Department of Homeland Security, Cisco Systems, Acronis, Northrop Grumman, Accenture, Information Systems Security Association, Core Security, G-C Partners, SecureLogix, ThinkGeek, CoDe Magazine and Pepsi.

For more information, visit http://www.nationalccdc.org/ or contact the Center for Infrastructure Assurance and Security at 210-458-2118 or info@nationalccdc.org.

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History and fact sheet: UTSA's Center for Infrastructure Assurance and Security

Established in 2001, the University of Texas at San Antonio's Center for Infrastructure Assurance and Security leverages San Antonio's infrastructure assurance strengths and bolsters research and educational initiatives in the field. The multidisciplinary research center is a partnership between academia, the information technology security industry and the local Air Intelligence Agency. The center addresses the technical and policy issues of information assurance and security and provides training.

In 2002-2003, the center led the highly successful Dark Screen cyber terrorism exercise for San Antonio, bringing national attention as the first city in the nation to conduct a cyber security exercise.

Over the last three years, the center has been awarded more than $8 million through defense appropriations to support community cyber security defend-and-attack exercises and infrastructure assurance and security research.

Personnel from the center have conducted exercises for the various critical infrastructure information sharing and analysis centers as well as for states and communities around the nation.

In February 2008, personnel from the center participated in the Department of Homeland Security's CyberStorm II National Cyber Security Exercise in Washington, D.C.

The University of Texas at San Antonio was the first Texas university with the national "Center for Academic Excellence in Information Assurance Education" designation by the Department of Homeland Security and National Security Agency. The designation means the university's curriculum and faculty meet or exceed national standards to teach information assurance security.

[Text from file received from the University of Texas at San Antonio]

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