Cyber Ready - rune-seregina/sys-255-fa24 GitHub Wiki

I attended Cyber Ready talks during Champlain College's family weekend to learn about cybersecurity topics and see what current Champlain students or alumni are accomplishing in their cybersecurity careers.

I attended 2 presentation sessions, including Artificial Intelligence: Does it Change Society's Perception of Reality? and Shhh... It's Classified.

The first presentation was about the downsides of AI integration into everyday life, including misplaced trust in AI to always be accurate, unbiased, and use common sense (none of which are 100% true). The presenter focused on multiple aspects of AI, such as AI ethics (predictive healthcare, administrative processes, and telemedicine) and AI profiling (AI in finance, denying loans, etc.). He highlighted how often technologies or companies focus primarily on production and quick profit, with cybersecurity as an afterthought, when cybersecurity can be immensely important and profitable to overall success. From this presentation, I learned more about the harmful effects of AI, some of which I was at least partially aware of, and some of which not at all. While I had heard about deepfakes, I had never heard of the "virtual kidnapping" phenomenon (threat actors using AI to mimic real voices in order to hold ransom), which is a scary thought. If I had asked a question to the presenter, it would have been "What steps can companies take to prioritize cybersecurity alongside AI development and implementation?".

The second presentation detailed an alum's experience working for the government and multiple risk management frameworks he had worked with throughout his career so far. He covered DAAPM (The Defense Security Service Assessment and Authorization Process Manual) and NIST (National Institute of Standards and Technology) most notably. This was a more technical, but still broad, overview about the types and implementation of controls and why they are necessary. He also spoke about various general tools he used and tied them into his Champlain College experience. There was definitely new terms that I had never heard of before in this presentation, and I feel like I gained some insight into how jobs and internships in and after college can greatly affect knowledge and experience. If i had asked a question to the presenter, it would have been "How has your understanding and application of risk management evolved throughout your career, and would you recommend researching any outside of a strictly workplace setting to gain experience?".