Cyber Security!

Recent security breaches perpetrated by rogue or organized entities should be a serious concern to us all. The United States is the most vulnerable to cyber attacks and it is clear that our government does not want to engage in a cyber war, especially vs. state organized entities. As a computer science instructor and supporter of a FREE and SAFE internet, I feel obligated to not only encourage our young American students to become more computer/programming literate, but also consider the social/political impact that they can make by participating in the security of our country and that of the internet to which we ALL have an invested interest in keeping open, viable.

I am currently researching opportunities for students to engage in encryption, security programming practices in a safe and contained environment. Cyber Security will be an important discipline in more advanced programming courses.

It is also my intent to develop a school-wide, if not local/district-wide programming community for local students to engage in programming education and challenges.

UPDATE as of 10/6/2016.

I have begun the feasibility and planning process of the an internal security or hacking environment. The idea would be to allow teams to hack one another's local environment with code. In return, the hacked team would need to create counter code to stop it. Multiple paradigms to consider. It would be a local server-based environment, of course.