USCC's Quest for Cyber Kids

Like the impetus behind the Science, Technology, Engineering, and Math (STEM) program, turning kids onto the jobs of the future is not only good for the kids but it's good for the industries, the same philosophy of the US Cyber Challenge.

Being that I'm a part of SANS, one of the US Cyber Challenge's sponsors, I've been working hard to promote, grow and retain future cybersecurity talent. It hasn't been easy. This is a field for which the demand is large, and growing disproportionately to the number of interested individuals. But the mission is crucial. Until agencies and organizations have the bright minds to sustain and advance industry change, there isn't much the U.S. can do to make security omnipresent and adaptive. Though as of today, I'm happy to report the USCC is growing stronger.

"Considering we don't have a major marketing strategy in place yet," said Karen Evans, director of USCC "we've been quite successful."

Though funding and marketing strategy are still works in progress, USCC has explored plenty of innovative approaches to recruitment. Beyond it's competitive competitions, USCC has worked with the Common Knowledge Scholarship Fund (CKSF) to promote new scholarship programs. CKSF is driven by online quizzes. High School and college students with interest in USCC can take open book quizzes, measured in accuracy and time. Not all of the quizzes are set up for cybersecurity wiz kids. Some are stressing the basics of security, and kids who score high are invited to partake in the more vested USCC competitions -- speaking of which are thriving as well.

DoD's DC3 Forensics Challenge, for example, already has more than 500 teams competing this year, and runs until Nov. 2. Additionally, the Security Treasure Hunt, a competition designed to challenge participants to identify security flaws on a target system and answer questions based on those issues, is thriving.

California, New York and Delaware just finished the first run through of the competitions, and all indications are participation was greater than expected. Top performers in each state will be invited to Cyber Summer Camps where they will take class from some of the field's most sought after instructors. Delaware's was the first state to catch on, and its recruitment has gone better than expected. Delaware program managers originally expected to only identify 15 or less treasure hunt participants for its camp at Wilmington University in Dover in August, but had such a nice turn out it plans to invite 20.

I'll continue to write updates on the program. It's something worth following as many of the policy initiatives discussed in this blog will only go as far as the people who implement them. The future of cybersecurity is tied to the future of these kids.