The Center provides various types of support for undergraduate and graduate students who are interested in becoming cyber security professionals, investigators or researchers.
The Speaker Series has proved to be a valuable resource for students and attracts not only John Jay students but students from throughout the CUNY system. Instructors frequently bring classes to Center lectures or ask students to attend Center lectures as a supplement to course work. The Series has been a hit with the students at the College and many are regular attendees.
Center staff currently mentor undergraduate, graduate and Ph.D. students. Center sponsored graduate theses have examined cyber terrorism, the use of the IPAD as a forensic device, SQL injection attacks and Web 2.0 insecurities. One current M.S. student is examining recent Distributed Denial of Service attacks in the financial sector. Another is exploring security and fraud issues surrounding the on-line currency bitcoin.
The Center supports Ph.D. students in Computer Science and Criminal Justice. In her thesis one Center sponsored Ph.D. developed a data clustering technique for use in crime data analysis. A Ph.D. student currently supported by the Center is using his data analysis and statistical background to analyze deviance in social networks. Undergraduates routinely work for the Center helping to maintain its database and network systems. Several have gained valuable experience that has led to rewarding careers in the IT field.
In a joint effort with NYU-Polytechnic University, which is funded by a major NSF IGERT grant, the Center and the Digital Forensics and Cyber Security graduate program developed a Fellowship program. The goal of the program was to encourage M.S. students to pursue research early in their careers and go on to a Ph.D. in computer science with a specialization in cyber security. Fellows received a full tuition waiver and sizeable stipend. Four Fellows participated in the program and completed the M.S. degree.
Information on the Digital Forenscis and Cybersecurity Program is available here.
Information on the Computer Science and Information Secuirty undergraduate major is available here.