Stevens fall symposium: "Guarding Your Business" from cyber attack

"Never has the need for security been so great," says Dr. Edward A. Stohr, Associate Dean for Research and Academics at Stevens Institute of Technology's Howe School of Technology Management. "And never has it been so hard for management to understand the requirements and to allocate the needed resources to safeguard the organization."

Stohr is a principal organizer of a major fall Stevens symposium, "Guarding Your Business: Enterprise Architectures for Security." Over three days, Oct. 22-24, the symposium will examine in detail the threats and risks faced by business in the post-9/11 era, featuring presentations by a spectrum of leaders in the cybersecurity field. "It will provide an overview of the latest security technologies," says Stohr, "and present an information security vision for the protection of corporate assets through an integration of technical and organizational approaches to security management."

The event is one of a series of Management of Technologies Symposia that will be presented by the Howe School. AT&T will co-sponsor the October event with the Center for Technology Management Research, co-directed by Stohr and Dr. Richard Reilly.

The opening day will include expert tutorials in "Security Principles for Managers," "Basics of Information Protection," and "Security at the Systems Level." Speaking also on the first day will be Dr. Sumit Ghosh, Director of the Department of Computer Engineering and Hattrick Chair Professor of Information Systems Engineering at Stevens; and Dr. Manu Malek, Director of the Certificate in Cybersecurity Program in Stevens' Department of Computer Science. Ghosh and Malek are also on the committee organizing the symposium.

Welcoming remarks will be delivered at the Wednesday session by Stevens' president, Dr. Hal Raveche, and Jerry MacArthur Hultin, Dean of the Howe School.

Among the guest speakers will be two distinguished keynoters.

Opening the Wednesday proceedings will be Yalkin Demirkaya, an expert who has been responsible for the formation of national policies and investigative procedures in the area of computer crime. He holds 15 years of law enforcement experience as a detective and a detective squad commander. He also possesses 22 years of computer experience as a white hat hacker. Demirkaya is the founder as well as the Commanding Officer of the Computer Crimes Investigation Unit with one of the largest law enforcement organizations in the world.

The keynoter for Thursday is Sallie McDonald. Ms. McDonald serves as the Assistant Commissioner for the Office of Information Assurance and Critical Infrastructure Protection in the Federal Technology Service, an agency of the General Services Administration. Over three years, McDonald has spearheaded a number of critical infrastructure protection projects for the federal government.
Themes during successive days of the symposium include "Risks and Threats to the Organization," "Legal and Cultural Issues," "Understanding Organizational Requirements," "Protecting Software Applications and Data," and "Protecting Hardware and Networks."

The second day of the event will conclude with a hypothetical financial systems security crisis scenario, posed to chief security officers from Merrill Lynch, Citigroup, J. P. Morgan, and others. Each expert will explicate his organizational approach to resolving the crisis and debate the major information assurance issues in financial services.

The final day will conclude with a panel discussion titled "Putting It All Together," featuring a wide-ranging group of CEOs, CIOs and CTOs, providing a wrap-up perspective on the previous three days of presentations.

For a full symposium schedule, registration, and lodging information, please visit www.stevens.edu/motsymposium. For other information contact Dr. Edward A. Stohr at 201-216-8915 or email estohr@stevens.edu.

About Stevens Institute of Technology

Founded in 1870, Stevens Institute of Technology is one of the leading technological universities in the world dedicated to learning and research. Through its broad-based curricula, nurturing of creative inventiveness, and cross disciplinary research, the Institute is at the forefront of global challenges in engineering, science, and technology management. Partnerships and collaboration between, and among, business, industry, government and other universities contribute to the enriched environment of the Institute. A new model for technology commercialization in academe, known as Technogenesis®, involves external partners in launching business enterprises to create broad opportunities and shared value.

Stevens offers baccalaureates, master’s and doctoral degrees in engineering, science, computer science and management, in addition to a baccalaureate degree in the humanities and liberal arts, and in business and technology. The university has a total enrollment of 2,150 undergraduate and 3,500 graduate students, with about 250 full-time faculty. Stevens’ graduate programs have attracted international participation from China, India, Southeast Asia, Europe and Latin America. Additional information may be obtained from its web page at www.stevens.edu.  

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