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Social Cyberdefense of Critical Urban Infrastructure

Social Cyberdefense of
Urban Critical Infrastructure
A blog discussing how to leverage social engineering to defend against technical cyberattacks

Michigan State University Refuses to Pay Ransom

June 11, 2020

Samuel Zwickel writes for the Detroit Free Press about Michigan State University's refusal to give into a hacker threatening to publish students’ personal records and university financial documents if the university fails to pay an unspecified ransom. Read the full article.

MIT Cybersecurity Clinic

The new MIT Cybersecurity Clinic (11.274 and 11.074) will be offered in both the fall and spring semester at MIT. 

The Cybersecurity Clinic will consist of four-modules : Cybersecurity for Critical Urban Infrastructure: Understanding the Problem; How the MIT Cybersecurity Clinic Makes Initial Contact with potential Client Agencies; Onsite Assessment of Cybersecurity Vulnerability by MIT Clinic Staff; and Prepare and Submit a Final Cybersecurity Vulnerability Assessment to a Client Agency. MIT students who want to take on field assignments with the Cybersecurity Clinic (for academic credit) must pass the certification examination offered at the end of the fourth module. 

Students who have achieved certification, will work in teams supervised by advanced doctoral and post-doctoral students during the last nine weeks of the spring semester to collaborate with an assigned client agency to prepare a Cyberattack Vulnerability Assessment for a client agency.  

Who We ARe

We are developing a new class of non-technical strategies against cyberattacks called Defensive Social Engineering.  Cyber defenders can use Defensive Social Engineering along with technical tools to defeat or compromise attackers. One technique in the Defensive Social Engineering toolbox is Cyber Negotiation. This research is supported by MIT’s Internet Policy Research Initiative (IPRI).  

Resources

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About this Blog

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Recent Blogs

FYI: Cyber-Insurance Conference February 24th and 25th
Mon, 11/30/2020
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Thu, 11/19/2020
Michigan State University Refuses to Pay Ransom
Thu, 06/11/2020
Industrial Control Systems
Sun, 04/05/2020
It's time to cyber-protect Industrial Control Systems
Wed, 03/25/2020
Personal data at risk when cities are attacked
Thu, 01/02/2020
ICT4Peace Now Focusing on Cybersecurity
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Next Target of Cyberattack: electric grids?
Tue, 11/05/2019
FBI's new announcement about ransomware and when to pay ransoms
Sun, 10/13/2019
Smart cities need to spend more on cyber-security
Fri, 08/30/2019
more

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