UAE university students win cyber warfare challenge

Date

11/10/2015 6:33:48 PM

(MENAFN- Khaleej Times)

American aviation giant Lockheed Martin awarded a group of UAE University students for winning a cyber security competition in which four teams of students had to practise fending off a hypothetical cyber attack on an oil and gas facility.

The challenge was held on Monday and Tuesday at Lockheed Martin's Centre for Innovation and Security Solutions in Masdar City with the award ceremony taking place at the Dubai Airshow on Tuesday.

The 20 participating students were drawn from the UAE University Abu Dhabi Polytechnic Khalifa University and Shaikh Zayed University.

Dr Ahmed Bakhsh Lockheed Martin's Director of International Engineering and Technology said: "We try to make it as real as possible so we used the infrastructure of an oil and gas facility and we simulated a breach into the network that effects its Scada (supervisory control and data acquisition system)" he said.

"The challenge for the students is to detect where the penetration happened in the system and identify who the attacker is."

Among the members of the winning team was 29-year old Seif Alaryani a Masters student in UAE University's information security programme. "I absolutely want this as a career. Cyber security isn't new but the field is developing" he said.

"The UAE is now doing well in this field especially with the creation of the the National Electronic Security Authority" Alaryani added.

Bernd Debusmann Jr. Originally from Mexico City I've been in Dubai since January 2015. Before arriving in in the UAE I worked as a general news reporter in TV and print in Mexico City NYC and Washington DC. I'm interested in defence issues politics technology aviation and history. In my spare time i enjoy traveling and football - I'm a keen fan of Chelsea FC. I developed an interest in the Middle East traveling through Jordan and the West Bank. I have a BA in Political Science from Dickinson College in the USA and an MA in International Journalism from City University London.

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