Cybersecurity Blog

On Sunday, March 16, 2025, younger members of Messiah University’s Cybersecurity Competition Team participated in the National Centers of Academic Excellence (NCAE) Cyber Games. This particular competition is designed for first-time competitors and is meant to introduce the typical competition environment, mirroring many aspects of the Collegiate Cyber Defense Competition (CCDC) including the “inherit and defend” style competition where competitors harden vulnerable systems and maintain their secure status as the competition progresses. In addition to scoring points for infrastructure and keeping various services online, this competition also provided the team with capture-the-flag (CTF) style challenges, requiring the use of skills ranging from network scanning to binary exploitation.

Messiah had just one team of 4 members: Brielle, Gabe, Harley and Noah. This was the first experience any of these students had with a cybersecurity competition and they all walked away with valuable information about a variety of topics they are excited to learn more about. Competing against other institutions with larger teams, Messiah’s team performed well. They were able to complete two-thirds of the CTF challenges and managed to get and keep several services online during the competition.

Through competing in this event, the four Messiah students learned a lot about system infrastructure and networking, as well as being able to enhance their skills with Linux operating systems. The team was grateful for the opportunity to participate in the competition and between interacting with NCAE staff and each other they each grew substantially in their technical skills and their teamwork. The team is eager to continue learning and is excited to see what future competitions have in store for them.

Thanks to Harley for providing the summary.

Exciting News from the Cyber Center!

We are pleased to announce that three of our talented students have been awarded the prestigious DoD CSA Scholarship for the upcoming 2025-26 academic year!  Our students’ dedication to cybersecurity and commitment to excellence have truly set them apart.

The scholarship award includes full scholarship, stipend for living expenses, summer internships, and employment after graduation.

Join us in celebrating this significant achievement for our students. Their hard work and passion for advancing cybersecurity are inspiring to all of us.  Here’s to the bright futures awaiting them in the field of cybersecurity! Congratulations!

A Messiah senior cybersecurity student, Carolina Hatch, presented her honors research project at the recent Harrisburg BSides conference, held on April 25 at the PA Farm Show Complex.   Her session was titled “Synthetic vs. Real-World Data: A Study in Data Poisoning and its Effects,” and focused on how the AI models can be susceptible to false information.  Dr. Bibighaus (her research advisor) and a group of Messiah students attended the event to support Carolina and experience the regional conference for cybersecurity professionals, hackers, and enthusiasts.

Congratulations to Carolina on an outstanding presentation!

SESSION ABSTRACT:   As new Artificial Intelligence (AI) models are released seemingly every day, cybersecurity experts are growing increasingly concerned with the data used to train these models. As the pace to develop new models quickens, many are turning to AI-generated, synthetic data to increase efficiency. The use of synthetic data significantly reduces the time spent on data collection and cleaning, allowing for faster creation of new models. However, emerging research suggests that these techniques may be creating insecure, unstable models. To address this growing concern, we created two separate AI models, one trained on synthetic data, the other trained using real-world data and conducted data poising campaigns against each model. Our real-world data collection process focused on movie reviews published in newspapers from 1970-1999. The use of movie reviews allowed us to establish a baseline of truth from which to develop our poisoning campaign, and the period helped ensure each article was human- generated. The synthetic data was generated using GPT-3.5. By training two models trained on the same topic, we were able to directly compare the results of data poisoning in synthetic and real-world data. Our findings revealed the synthetic model was more susceptible to data poisoning than the real-world model, demonstrating a need for further research in this area.

 

On March 21–22, 2025, the Messiah University Cybersecurity Competition Team competed in the in-person Mid-Atlantic Collegiate Cyber Defense Competition (CCDC) regional event, hosted at the University of Maryland. This event brought together ten top teams from across the region who advanced from the virtual qualifiers earlier this year.

As in the qualifier, the competition followed an “inherit and defend” format, simulating a real-world business environment under active cyberattack. This time, however, the challenge increased significantly: in addition to on-premises systems, teams were also responsible for maintaining and defending cloud infrastructure. This added layer highlighted the critical importance of edge and cloud security—skills that are increasingly vital in the cybersecurity field.

Messiah’s team, composed of Chris, Brandon, Carolina, Austin, Ryan, Mitch, Eli, and Ben, held their own against much larger Division I universities. While official rankings were released only for the top three teams, Messiah placed in the middle of the standings—an impressive feat considering the scale and experience of their competition.

The team demonstrated continued growth in system administration, cloud operations, communication, and business process management. They left the competition with valuable insights and a renewed motivation to sharpen their technical skills for future challenges. The results of this competition are a testament to Messiah’s growing cybersecurity program and the leadership of coach Dr. David Bibighaus. The team is already looking ahead to next year’s competition season with excitement and determination.

Thanks to Chris for this summary.

The Cybersecurity Education Program hosted a breakfast event with local Naval Supply Systems Command (NAVSUP) representatives for our students in cybersecurity, computer science and business.  NAVSUP employees Kevin Davis, Camden Ailinger and David Dobos (Messiah ’08) spoke with the students about internship and career opportunities at  NAVSUP facilities in Mechanicsburg.

Students learned about how NAVSUP maintains the IT infrastructure in the Navy’s supply chains, applies cybersecurity fundamentals in everything from testing and building a product to reading and updating policies, and ensures logistics systems are operational.

Beverly Motich, Adjunct Instructor in Computer Science at Messiah, was also on hand to talk about her 30-year career in IT with NAVSUP.

We look forward to continued opportunities for our students to work with NAVSUP as interns and full-time employees!

On Saturday, January 18, 2025, the Messiah University Cybersecurity Competition Team participated in the Mid-Atlantic Collegiate Cyber Defense Competition regional qualifier—a virtual cyber competition that determines qualification for the in-person event in the DC area.  The competition is an “inherit and defend” style event where teams are given a simulated business production environment, complete with all the systems a real business would have.  They must harden the systems quickly before attackers attempt to break in.  In addition to securing systems, the team functions as a legitimate business, responding to tasks, and writing business memos to and from the C-suite while keeping all systems online.

This year, Messiah had one team competing, comprised of Chris, Brandon, Carolina, Austin, Ryan, Michael, Eli and Ben.  The team demonstrated significant growth over last year, particularly in communication, task distribution, system administration skills, and incident response.  However, they identified room for improvement in firewall configurations and managing mail servers.  The team is coached by Dr. David Bibighaus.

We are proud to share that Messiah University’s team placed in the upper third of the competition while competing against large Division I schools with significant resources. This qualifies us to compete at a higher level in the in-person regional competition, which will be held March 21st–22nd. This achievement reflects the team’s hard work and dedication, as well as Messiah’s growing Cybersecurity Program. The team looks forward to building on this experience as they prepare for future competitions for many years to come.

Thank you to Chris for this recap… and way to go, team!

#messiahcyber

 

 

We are pleased to announce that Messiah University has been awarded two grants totaling $300,000 this fall, further solidifying our commitment to excellence in cybersecurity education.

Cyber Service Academy (CSA) Grant

This program is designed to recruit the nation’s top cyber talent with the skills necessary to help secure our information systems and networks against emerging threats. Two of our students have been awarded these prestigious full-ride scholarships, which also include post-graduation employment opportunities.  This award is a testament to our students’ academic excellence and the strength of our curriculum in addressing critical needs in the cyber workforce.

National Centers of Academic Excellence in Cybersecurity (NCAE-C) Capacity Building Grant

The second grant, funded by the  NCAE-C program (within the NSA), focuses on capacity building, enabling us to scale and enhance our cybersecurity programs.  With this funding, we will provide new resources for our cybersecurity lab and range, equipping students with hands-on learning opportunities in areas such as IoT security, forensics, and incident response.  This capacity building award will strengthen our ability to train future cybersecurity professionals and contribute to securing the digital future.

To make contributions to Messiah’s cyber program, use our crowdshark page: https://crowdshark.webapps.messiah.edu/CEP/donate/398

The National Centers of Academic Excellence in Cyber Defense designation ceremony for Messiah University took place at the 2024 National  Cybersecurity Education Colloquium (NCEC) on October 9 in St. Louis, MO.  The designation was presented to Messiah University by representatives of the National Security Agency, Department of Homeland Security, Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency, and the Federal Bureau of Investigation.   Lynn Bigelow (center in photo), Director of Cybersecurity Education, represented MU at the event.

With this designation, the opportunities for our students, faculty, and partners are immense.  We look forward to building on this recognition by:

• • Expanding scholarships and internship opportunities for students.
  • Enhancing initiatives in collaboration with government, industry and other institutions.
  • Strengthening our cybersecurity outreach and workforce development.

 

On November 16th, members of Messiah University’s Collegiate Cyber Defense Competition (CCDC) team visited Liberty University for a scrimmage to prepare for the upcoming CCDC competition. Professors Bigelow and Christodoss accompanied the team.

Liberty University, known for its strong performance in national CCDC competitions, provided valuable hands-on training. In a typical CCDC competition, teams secure and manage a small business network while defending against professional hackers (Red Team) and maintaining critical services. The environment is intense, requiring strong technical skills, teamwork, and strategic thinking.

For this scrimmage, Liberty University had students on both the Red Team and the Blue Team. Their Red Team, which trains for the Collegiate Penetration Testing Competition (CPTC), acted as the “hackers” for the scrimmage. Meanwhile, their Blue Team collaborated with Messiah’s Blue Team to defend against the Red Team’s attacks. We formed four teams of three people, each managing their own simulated business environment. This collaboration provided a unique opportunity for both schools to learn from each other and improve their defensive and offensive strategies.

The scrimmage highlighted areas where Messiah needs to improve, particularly in managing Active Directory (AD) joined Linux machines and database management.

Messiah University looks forward to continuing this partnership with Liberty University, with plans for future scrimmages already in the works. We extend our thanks to Liberty for their hospitality and expertise.

Thank you to Chris for this summary!

On October 5th, as part of Cybersecurity Awareness Month, we hosted a Cyber Open House during Homecoming & Family Weekend 2024 from 11 am to 1 pm in our Cyber Center and Security Operations Center (SOC).  Over 45 visitors joined us for an engaging and informative experience.

Guests were given guided tours of our cyber facilities, where they had the opportunity to see firsthand how our student SOC interns monitor and protect the campus network.   Two of our students showcased their projects and demonstrated cybersecurity tools and techniques, including conversations about online safety and the latest challenges.

We also celebrated our recent designation as an NSA Center of Academic Excellence (CAE) in Cybersecurity Defense, a milestone that demonstrates our commitment to excellence in this critical field.  Messiah’s Cybersecurity Education Program is pleased to collaborate with the CAE community to ensure quality, standards-based education for our students with the goal of securing a peaceful digital domain.

Refreshments were enjoyed by all, creating a welcoming atmosphere for guests to mingle with staff and students.  The event was an opportunity to connect, learn, and strengthen our community’s commitment to cybersecurity education and awareness.

Thank you to everyone who attended. We look forward to hosting more events in the future.