U.S. cybersecurity leaders to examine lessons learned and set strategies for future risk
WEST LAFAYETTE, Ind. – CERIAS, Purdue’s Center for Education and Research in Information Assurance and Security, is inviting its partners in industry, government and higher education to the West Lafayette campus to level up their cybersecurity knowledge and strategies.
The theme, “Using Past Lessons to Thwart Future Threat,” will set the tone for the center’s upcoming 24th-annual symposium, set for March 28-30. The theme’s “past lessons” refers, in part, to CERIAS’s 25th anniversary and its history of leading the cybersecurity field by identifying and building defenses against ever-evolving digital security threats.
The symposium will bring together experts and practitioners from all areas of cyber and cyber-physical systems who have interests in security, privacy, resiliency, autonomy, trusted electronics and trustworthy artificial intelligence. It will feature representatives from academe, industry, government and the military who are charged with learning and implementing new and innovative security methods.
“CERIAS has been in operation for 25 years, and the field has advanced considerably in that time, in no small part as a result of efforts by our students, faculty and partners,” said Eugene Spafford, director emeritus of CERIAS and professor of computer science. “We’re now looking ahead to what’s next — to make computing even safer for everyone. As leaders, we need to understand the past to shape the future.”The two-day symposium will feature panel discussions, keynote talks, networking opportunities, a poster session and vendor fair. Topics will include grand global challenges, space cyber and the next decade in cybersecurity.
During the first morning, the focus will be on how industry can benefit from engaging with academia on cybersecurity. In addition to representatives from both Purdue and Indiana universities, there will be representatives from the University of Notre Dame and Indiana University-Purdue University Indianapolis. Chetrice Mosley-Romero, the Indiana cybersecurity program director for the Governor’s Executive Council, also will participate.
The following day will feature two keynote talks. The first will be from Wendy Nather, who leads the Advisory CISO team at Cisco. She was previously research director at the Retail ISAC (Retail and Hospitality Information Security and Analysis Center), and research director of the Information Security Practice at 451 Research, a technology research group within S&P Global Market Intelligence. Nather led IT security for Europe, the Middle East and Africa, for the investment banking division of Swiss Bank Corp. (now UBS), and served as a chief information security officer for the Texas Education Agency. She was inducted into the Infosecurity Europe Hall of Fame in 2021.
Also providing a keynote address is Robert M. Lee, CEO and co-founder of Dragos Inc., a firm that provides industrial cybersecurity for operational technology environments. Lee also serves as vice chair of the subcommittee on Grid Resilience for National Security for the U.S. Department of Energy’s Electricity Advisory Committee and is a member of the World Economic Forum’s subcommittees on Cyber Resilience for the oil, gas and electricity communities. He is routinely sought after for guidance on cybersecurity for industrial infrastructure. He testified to the U.S. House of Representatives Committee on Energy and Commerce–Subcommittee on Oversight and Investigations, and to the U.S. Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee, to advise on policy issues related to critical infrastructure cyber threats.
Find a full outline of the symposium agenda here. The symposium is open to the public and continuing education credits are available. In honor of CERIAS’ 25th anniversary, all registration fees have been waived. Registration is available here.
About CERIAS
The Center for Education and Research in Information Assurance and Security (CERIAS), a cross-cutting Institute at Purdue University, is the world’s foremost interdisciplinary academic center for cyber and cyber-physical systems. More than 100 CERIAS researchers address issues of security, privacy, resiliency, trusted electronics, autonomy and explainable artificial intelligence. CERIAS brings together world-class faculty, students and industry partners to design, build and maintain trusted cyber/cyber-physical systems. CERIAS serves as an unbiased resource to the worldwide community.
