Featured – Page 42 – Seidenberg School News

Dr. Hayes on Heartbleed

As you may have heard by now, there’s a huge Web vulnerability called Heartbleed out there that can allow an attacker access to the memory of a server or client, including a server’s SSL private keys. What does this mean for those of us that depend on privacy and security in our everyday online interactions? We decided that there would be no one better to ask than Dr. Darren Hayes, Seidenberg’s expert in cyber security. He stated that,

411px-Heartbleed

“Heartbleed could be the biggest Web vulnerability ever discovered. The problem is that the vulnerability has been around for two years now, so we have no idea what information could have been stolen from big name companies. Furthermore, the message for customers is problematic because a user cannot rush to change his or her password until the Website has patched their system and purged old keys used to encrypt data. Our confidence in transacting business on banking and retail sites and checking our email with well-known service providers has essentially been shattered. Hopefully, companies will keep their customers updated on what is happening and inform their customers on best practices for security.”

It’s important for users to change their passwords on sites that have been approved. There are lists, such as this one on CNET, that state which sites are safe and which could still be vulnerable. Take the weekend to sort through your accounts to make sure your information is secure.

Seidenberg Professor Writes Winning Paper

Dr. Thomas (second from right) receiving her award.

Hamdan Bin Mohammed Smart University (HBMSU) just announced the winners for best paper under the topic of “Leading Transformation to Sustainable Excellence.” Among the winners was Dr. Jennifer D.E. Thomas for a paper entitled “The Effect of Delivery Method on Persistence, Performance and Perceptions,” which she researched and wrote in tandem with two professors, Danielle Morin and Samie Li Shang Ly, from Concordia University, Canada.

The paper took into account the different delivery methods of courses for undergraduate students. With a rise in online classes in today’s culture – especially at Pace, where we rank at 3rd best in the nation for online undergraduate courses – it’s important to study the new methods of learning so that, as challenges and innovations arise, universities can analyze them in order to enhance educational practices. Thomas, Ly, and Morin looked at classes that were completely online as well as classes that were a hybrid between online and traditional practices.

From the extended abstract of the paper, the conclusion of their research is summarized as,

“The results of the studies conducted in this paper support the need for a hybrid model of learning, which augments in-class lectures with a level of online component. This would tend to imply the need to carefully evaluate MOOC’s [Massive Online Open Courses] before widespread adoption of them is made. Monetary expediency should not trump wise pedagogy.”

We extend the heartiest of congratulations to Dr. Thomas and her partners in research for their excellence!

Carol Wolf: A Life in Academia

Carol Wolf, one of Seidenberg’s professors, has had quite a life in academia and education before joining our program in 1986, only a couple years after Seidenberg was founded in 1983. Born during the Great Depression, Professor Wolf grew up with parents who, both being academics, were adamant that she and her older brother receive a full education. Wolf began working at age 16, for a whopping 55 cents an hour (much to her delight), at a local soda fountain and, soon afterward, the library. These jobs were Wolf’s introduction into not only the work-world, but the work-worlds dominated by women, which were rare, given that this was during the early 1950s.

Wolf, in an interview with a student, stated that she knew from an early age that she wanted to be a mathematics professor. She then brought up the obstacles she faced as woman in the male-dominated field of mathematical academia. She started her work in teaching as a teaching assistant for a three-dimensional calculus course at Cornell University. The class she taught was a sophomore-level class of all males who did not trust that a woman could teach engineers. The students tested Wolf on a daily basis, asking her to work through the hardest questions in their textbooks. She explained that she didn’t realize it was a test until two or three weeks in, when the students also realized that she was not only incredibly capable of solving the problems with ease, but also skilled in teaching the material to the class while doing so.

Every year she taught, she experienced a similar series of tests from students who were unaccustomed to having women teach in their field. Wolf points out that she was one of two women in the department, and the only one who taught full-time. Her experience with gender bias at Cornell was not unusual in universities at the time. She mentioned a friend who, while teaching at Harvard, was told by a professor that she had no business being in mathematics — it was not a women’s field.

Things changed when Professor Wolf found Seidenberg. Our school was started by a woman, Susan Merrit, who was once the Chair of CS on Westchester’s campus. Considering the fact that Professor Wolf is still with us at Seidenberg today, it’s clear that this position has been a great fit for her, professionally.

Wolf, in her own words, shares with fellow women who are learning and working in a predominantly male field that, “the thing is, there is this stereotype of the nerd sitting in the basement programming or studying all day, and that’s not what life is like. There are all sorts of interesting things you can do. I think women maybe provide their own reasons not to do it, but as far as any intrinsic ones, the field is open.”

We celebrate Wolf’s talents and enthusiasm here at Seidenberg. It’s not easy to trudge through the politics that can surround academic fields of work, but thankfully Professor Wolf has made it through. There is still progress to be made, especially for women and minorities, but it is pioneers like Wolf who show us how it’s done right.

Students at Nokia’s DVLUP Day in NYC

Just this past Saturday, March 22nd, Nokia hosted DVLUP Day in Manhattan’s new Microsoft offices. A group of students from Seidenberg attended together to learn about mobile development for Microsoft products. The goal of DVLUP Days, as they sweep across the country, is to generate Windows Mobile developers. DVLUP itself is “a loyalty program designed by Nokia to help developers get their ideas into the marketplace, optimize them, and be successful” (DVLUP FAQ).

Undergraduate Seidenberg student, Brooke Ribelin, spoke of her experience at DVLUP Day with all the other Seidenberg attendees. She explained that at the event there were three separate tracks, with different goals for each. Track One was geared towards getting started in App Studio (Cloud-based with HTML5), Track Two was for advanced Windows development, which included working with maps, imaging, and Cloud development, and Track Three taught attendees how to use Unity for game development. Each track suited different skill-sets and interests, so our group of students split up between themselves to work on exactly what they wanted.

DVLUPDAY2 — From Brooke’s Instagram, as she built games with Unity, featuring one of the many tattoos from the day.

Brooke also mentioned the prizes and raffles that continued throughout the day — from headphones to fun tattoos to new phones to backpacks. Seemingly everyone left the event with all kinds of free stuff. Not only did participants get new gizmos galore, but those who can publish an app in the Windows store will receive a free Windows phone.

After spending the entire day at Microsoft for the event, Brooke says she greatly appreciated the introduction to Unity. Being quite new to the ecosystem of Unity, and by learning about it in a group format, she has the tools to continue using what she built at DVLUP Day to turn it into something for the app store.

PCAP CyberSecurity Workshop Tomorrow

Tomorrow, at Pace’s White Plains campus, the CSIS program will be having a community college outreach event. The event will take place at the Graduate Center (1 Martine Ave) in rooms 430 A and B starting at 10am.

The workshop will begin with an overview of the Information Assurance program and a discussion of Cybersecurity Awareness, including information on careers and scholarships in the Cybersecurity field, especially in reference to programs (of both undergraduate and graduate levels) available at Pace.

Dr. Darren Hayes will also be speaking at the event to share his knowledge and research in Mobile Forensics, which is something he’s been a leading expert on for many years. Not only will this event relate to the technological fields of Computer Sciences and Information Technology, but fields such as Criminal Justice as well.

Along with Mobile Forensics and programs offered, Professor Li-Chou Chen will be discussing Data Privacy and Security on the Web. This discourse will look at the daily activities of an every-day life online and how personal and shared data is handled in terms of security. How many people actually read the entirety of a website’s Privacy Policy? Few people read it all the way through (unless it’s to find the jokes in certain policies — Tumblr’s, for example, which can be worth the read). Beyond this, Prof. Chen will take attendees to a deeper level in Web Security, looking at privacy information as it hides in data.

The concluding topic is to focus on Biometrics, led by Dr. Chuck Tappert, whom many cite for his research on Keystroke Biometrics and Iris Biometrics, to name a few.

The workshop will serve as an introduction to the related fields of study, and anyone who is interested in furthering their knowledge and research on such topics can apply to the PCAP Student Summer Research program.

Does an Apple a Day Really Keep the Doctor Away?

Find Out Which OS Is the Healthiest for Your Cell Phone
by Suhail Bhandari

In 540 AD, a plague near Egypt killed over 100 million people.
In 2003, SARS terrorized nearly 3.5 billion Asians.
Last month, a cell phone virus deleted all my contacts, accessed my bank accounts and reset my passwords – but not before sending out a mass SMS to everyone I know, supposedly “outing” me!

Granted my little epidemic might not have been as horrific as my first two examples, and while the overwhelming, yet misguided, support of my “coming out” was touching, in that moment, losing all my data and nearly $1,000 felt like the worst thing possible. So, here are a few heartfelt words of wisdom and a WARNING! Screen-size, megapixels, and quad core processors are important – BUT don’t forget to take a close look at your phone’s OS before you buy it.

Apple iOS
Gorgeously overpriced, I think this is the only plausible plus to Apple’s restrictive attitude when it comes to their OS. By automatically encrypting every file and “promising” not to keep track of device pins and fingerprint scans, the risk of malware attacks is reduced tremendously, which is why ‘jail breaking’ your iPhone might not be the smartest idea. Jail-breaking allows malicious applications to enter your device when you “accept” third party applications and grants them access to your personal information, including bank account details. These applications are not subjected to the same sheltered limitations that Apple enforces and therefore are easier to get from a rogue reference that will infect your cell phone. Additionally, not changing the password on a jail-broken iPhone makes it easy for malicious attackers to create worms used to infect your operating device.

Windows Mobile
If you plan on closing the door on an Apple or Android and opening a Windows, proceed with caution. When it comes to threats, Windows Mobile takes the cake, attracting a tremendous amount of malware via SMS. Adding further risk, since most of the system calls are shared with its full-featured desktop counterparts, the Windows Mobile OS is susceptible to hundreds of other pieces of malware that originated from the Windows OS and can be ported to the Windows Mobile OS.

BlackBerry
This isn’t 2012, but if you can manage to find one, BlackBerry uses what is arguably one of the most closed-source and secure operating systems of all time. Having done an excellent job of keeping the sensitive inner workings of this smart phone a secret from the public, a Blackberry is still the preferred choice for most government organizations and legal offices.

Android
More than 70% of malware out there exists on Android phones. You may literally be opening up a can of worms! The Android operating system is by far the most popular open-source operating system today. However, being community driven with no real ownership or responsibility, and minimal focus on everyday-app encryption, virtually anyone can submit applications containing malicious functions and most likely get away with it. It is said that Google Play has about 15 malware apps present at any given time. Scary, no? Well, the same research company went on find that from April to June 2013, Android malware increased by 40%, creating over 718,000 new variants.

For those of you looking for a solution, or simply some more information before you decide on a new phone, there will be an interesting discussion on Thursday, April 3rd, from 8am to 10am, at Pace University’s Michael Schimmel Center. In the meantime, while I feel that Apple is your best bet, the trick is to simply stay alert. Be wary of backdoor applications masquerading as secure ones, try not to use a common password for your email and banking requirements, and for the love of God, remember – you are not the lottery-winning, long-lost-cousin of a wealthy Nigerian Prince!

Sources:

CSO Online
Engadget.com
Windows Forums