Skip to main content
  • Home
  • About
  • Faculty Experts
  • For The Media
  • ’Cuse Conversations Podcast
  • Topics
    • Alumni
    • Events
    • Faculty
    • Students
    • All Topics
  • Contact
  • Submit
STEM
  • All News
  • Arts & Culture
  • Business & Economy
  • Campus & Community
  • Health & Society
  • Media, Law & Policy
  • STEM
  • Veterans
  • University Statements
  • Syracuse University Impact
  • |
  • The Peel
  • Athletics
Sections
  • All News
  • Arts & Culture
  • Business & Economy
  • Campus & Community
  • Health & Society
  • Media, Law & Policy
  • STEM
  • Veterans
  • University Statements
  • Syracuse University Impact
  • |
  • The Peel
  • Athletics
  • Home
  • About
  • Faculty Experts
  • For The Media
  • ’Cuse Conversations Podcast
  • Topics
    • Alumni
    • Events
    • Faculty
    • Students
    • All Topics
  • Contact
  • Submit
STEM

Sowing Cybersecurity

Wednesday, May 20, 2015, By Jay Cox
Share
College of Engineering and Computer Science
Professor Du

Professor Wenliang “Kevin” Du

When computer science Professor Wenliang “Kevin” Du discusses the importance of cybersecurity, he likens it to building a beautiful house and forgetting to put a lock on the door.

“The people who write codes and develop systems often don’t know the potential risks,” Du says.

“The developer is creating a system in a benign environment—and never thinks to put a lock on it, a filter that will block potential attacks. That’s a common problem. We want our students to learn about all these potential attacks, so they can identify existing attacks and also have the skills to see other security vulnerabilities.”

Since arriving at the College of Engineering and Computer Science in 2002, Du has been on a mission to teach others how to prevent cyberattacks. As a complement to the computer security and Internet security courses Du teaches to a mix of undergraduates and graduate students, he has developed a free series of 30 hands-on Security Education (SEED) labs designed to help students master the intricacies of cybersecurity and apply their skills to solve real-world problems.

With the support of National Science Foundation (NSF) awards in 2002 and 2014, Du has expanded his reach, sharing the open-source SEED labs with more than 250 educators in more than 26 countries. As part of his 2014 NSF award, Du, an expert on Android system security, is also developing SEED labs for mobile platforms and will host a workshop on campus this summer.

The instructional labs are done in a contained environment, using virtualization software that students download onto their personal computers, basically creating a computer within their computers that allows them to do such things as form networks, launch attacks on one another and learn how to defend against them. “We want to teach the students to be good defenders, but part of that is knowing how to attack,” Du says.

Computer science doctoral student Xiao Zhang, a teaching assistant for Du, says the labs’ practical training reinforces the classroom concepts. “In transferring the theory into practice, sometimes there are unexpected difficulties,” Zhang says. “You want to achieve one thing, but in that process you may make some mistakes, which lead to other security vulnerabilities.”

The labs present an array of different security situations that students would not encounter elsewhere, according to Carter Yagemann ’15, a computer science major who took Du’s Internet Security course and worked on his research team. “You learn about specific attacks and really build up practical skills,” Yagemann says. “If you’re not very systematic and don’t approach the scenario with the right mindset, you’ll leave holes, and then you have problems.”

Electrical and computer engineering doctoral candidate Paul Ratazzi credits the labs for expanding the depth of his knowledge and enhancing his interactions with colleagues when he learns about their projects at the Air Force Research Laboratory in Rome, N.Y., where he is a computer security expert. “I can keep up with the technical details,” Ratazzi says. “There’s no way to get through those courses and labs without really understanding every aspect of not only the labs, but also the actual details of the implementation.”

Whether hack attacks are known ones, such as Heartbleed or Shellshock (which was used against SONY Pictures), or new ones, Du is poised to ensure others are well versed in knowing how to counter them. “When you’re dealing with real hackers,” he says, “they don’t care about the difficulties, they will take it on.”

This story originally appeared in Syracuse University Magazine.

  • Author

Jay Cox

  • Recent
  • NSF I-Corps Semiconductor and Microelectronics Free Virtual Course Being Offered
    Wednesday, July 16, 2025, By Cristina Hatem
  • Jianshun ‘Jensen’ Zhang Named Interim Department Chair of Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering
    Wednesday, July 16, 2025, By Emma Ertinger
  • Traugott Professor of Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering Bing Dong to Present at Prestigious AI Conference
    Wednesday, July 16, 2025, By Emma Ertinger
  • Lender Center Researcher Studies Veterans’ Post-Service Lives, Global Conflict Dynamics
    Tuesday, July 15, 2025, By Diane Stirling
  • Maxwell’s Robert Rubinstein Honored With 2025 Wasserstrom Prize for Graduate Teaching
    Tuesday, July 15, 2025, By News Staff

More In STEM

NSF I-Corps Semiconductor and Microelectronics Free Virtual Course Being Offered

University researchers with groundbreaking ideas in semiconductors, microelectronics or advanced materials are invited to apply for an entrepreneurship-focused hybrid course offered through the National Science Foundation (NSF) Innovation Corps (I-Corps) program. The free virtual course runs from Sept. 15 through…

Jianshun ‘Jensen’ Zhang Named Interim Department Chair of Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering

The College of Engineering and Computer Science (ECS) is excited to announce that Professor Jianshun “Jensen” Zhang has been appointed interim department chair of mechanical and aerospace engineering (MAE), as of July 1, 2025. Zhang serves as executive director of…

Star Scholar: Julia Fancher Earns Second Astronaut Scholarship for Stellar Research

Julia Fancher, a rising senior majoring in physics and mathematics in the College of Arts and Sciences (A&S), a logic minor in A&S and a member of the Renée Crown University Honors Program, has been renewed as an Astronaut Scholar for…

Traugott Professor of Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering Bing Dong to Present at Prestigious AI Conference

Professor Bing Dong was recently selected to lead a workshop on artificial intelligence (AI) at NeurIPS, the Conference and Workshop on Neural Information Processing Systems. Founded in 1987, NeurIPS is one of the most prestigious annual conferences dedicated to machine learning and AI research. Dong’s workshop…

6 A&S Physicists Awarded Breakthrough Prize

Our universe is dominated by matter and contains hardly any antimatter, a notion which still perplexes top scientists researching at CERN’s Large Hadron Collider. The Big Bang created equal amounts of matter and antimatter, but now nearly everything—solid, liquid, gas or plasma—is…

Subscribe to SU Today

If you need help with your subscription, contact sunews@syr.edu.

Connect With Us

  • X
  • Facebook
  • Instagram
  • Youtube
  • LinkedIn
Social Media Directory

For the Media

Find an Expert Follow @SyracuseUNews
  • Facebook
  • Instagram
  • Youtube
  • LinkedIn
  • @SyracuseU
  • @SyracuseUNews
  • Social Media Directory
  • Accessibility
  • Privacy
  • Campus Status
  • Syracuse.edu
© 2025 Syracuse University News. All Rights Reserved.