In 2023, UCCS students won USCYBERCOM Analyst Award at the Cyber Recon 2023, a research competition organized by the USCYBERCOM Academic Engagement Network (AEN). This year, UCCS students won the USCYBERCOM Hunter Award at the second edition of the USCYBERCOM Cyber Recon 2024 conference held on the campus of the U.S. Naval Academy from April 16-18.
The winning team consists of undergraduate students and VICEROY Scholars Caleb Chang, Jackson Bulter, Juan Mejia, and Ph.D. student and VICEROY mentor Ekzhin Ear, and academic advisor Dr. Shouhuai Xu, Gallogly Endowed Engineering Chair in Cybersecurity and professor in computer science, together with USCYBERCOM Mentors Haley Echelmeier and Nicole Wells.
The title of the project was “Characterizing Russia’s Cyber Operations in Ukraine through the Lenses of Cyber Attack TTPs,” which offers deep insights into Russia’s cyber capabilities.
“Receiving the Analyst Award in 2023 and the Hunter Award in 2024 shows that our students continue to do outstanding research in cybersecurity,” Xu said. “We look forward to having more students participate in the USCYBERCOM research competitions in the future.”
USCYBERCOM issued a call for research competition among its AEN member institutions, which include more than 100 universities and colleges in the United States. The call issues a list of research problems of interest to them. Each AEN member institution was encouraged to submit research proposals with respect to some of the academic research questions selected by the participation team.
“The USCYBERCOM research competition is an important venue to motivate our students in pursuing careers in cybersecurity,” said Xu. “This year, most of our participants are VICEROY Fellows, and some Fellows were already motivated to continue to pursue PhD.”
The VICEROY Scholars also showcased their research at the Spring 2024 Forum organized by the National Security Strategic Studies Partnership (N3SP) on the campus of the United States Air Force Academy (USAFA), April 22, 2024. VICEROY Scholars served as panelists on a panel dedicated to the VICEROY program to share their experience with the audience.
Learn more about USCYBERCOM at https://www.cybercom.mil.