SaTC: EDU: Improving Student Learning through Competitive Embedded System Security Challenges

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Computers touch on nearly every aspect of modern life, from automotive and healthcare, to infrastructure and defense. The recent uptick in cybercrime highlights the increased demand for cybersecurity professionals for all aspects of computing - from software, to networking, and even the hardware itself. New courses are needed to improve existing computer science and engineering programs and provide both theoretical and practical, hands-on security experiences for students in these fields. In addition, new techniques for effective cybersecurity education are needed to improve student learning in this crucial area. This project will develop a hardware security lab course leveraging low-cost, open-source hardware and software, to enable more universities to integrate a hands-on hardware security course into their advanced undergraduate and graduate programs. The course will be used to test the effect of integrating game-based learning into hardware security education through an advanced curriculum of team-based, hands-on laboratory experiments and security challenges. Course materials will be made freely available, and results of this research will be shared widely by establishing new workshops and training seminars, and an annual competition to encourage continuous improvement in this critical area. The objective of this project is to investigate a game-based approach to hardware security education through an advanced curriculum of hands-on laboratory course modules and a final team-based “Hardware Capture the Flag” competition. The curriculum will be suitable for senior undergraduate and graduate students in computer engineering. The planned course modules cover a wide-range of topics related to hardware security, including physical and cross-layer security. Topics will be chosen to ensure that the largest possible number of students can benefit from the course by requiring only “accessible” equipment (i.e., relatively inexpensive, open-source, and easy to use) and providing an opportunity to learn practical skills that are transferable to any hardware-focused career. The impact of gamification on student learning will be tested by integrating game mechanics and competitions into selected labs, including race-against-the-clock, point scoring / leaderboard systems, red team / blue team, and collaborative analysis and learning. By integrating game-based learning in the proposed course, the project will investigate novel approaches to hardware education with a focus on security that can be replicated in other computer science and engineering departments to bolster student engagement and learning. This project is supported by the Secure and Trustworthy Cyberspace (SaTC) program, which funds proposals that address cybersecurity and privacy, and in this case specifically cybersecurity education. The SaTC program aligns with the Federal Cybersecurity Research and Development Strategic Plan and the National Privacy Research Strategy to protect and preserve the growing social and economic benefits of cyber systems while ensuring security and privacy.This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.