Cyber Challenge: 10,000 Security Warriors Wanted

by Dian Schaffhauser?,  Campus Technology

The Cyber Challenge has set as its national goal to identify and train an army of cybersecurity experts to help fill shortages in industry and government. Campuses like Cal Poly are helping to lead the charge.

Karen Evans understands the need for online security–and for people who really know how to implement it properly. Evans, who spent 28 years with the federal government in the Office of Management and Budget as administrator for e-government and IT and CIO for the Department of Energy, among other positions, was in charge of a project during the Clinton administration to bring Internet access to the Department of Justice. Then-Attorney General Janet Reno wanted to be able to send and receive e-mail in the department and to set up an agency Web site. In August 1996, on the weekend before it was supposed to be moved to a 24×7 data center, the site was hacked, and Reno’s picture was replaced with a picture of Hitler. This most infamous of hacking incidents (probably caused by a CGI vulnerability) was a “really good wake-up call for a lot of people,” Evans said, “including my management. It was instrumental in helping me think through how to manage an IT and online services  portfolio.”  Read the Sign up call.