Software vulnerabilities in commercial products are an issue of national importance. The most prevalent breaches are input validation vulnerabilities, and these are easily avoidable. This dissertation contributes to cybersecurity education with a set of hands-on interventions tailored for three CS courses, a set of reflection prompts to encourage…

The meteoric rise in software and technology has altered the paradigm of information security and privacy. Classified information, stored earlier behind locked doors, is now stored on the internet on servers that can be accessed from anywhere on the globe. As a result of these advancements, we are now vulnerable to cyber-attacks. Cyber-attacks are…

Organizations are looking for a well-qualified workforce with the requisite skills, knowledge, and abilities to implement an effective cyber strategy. Academic institutions are facing challenges in meeting the demand for employees with hands-on experience. This exploratory study investigated how academic institutions can use internships to equip…

Engineers have developed innovative hardware solutions to treat various medical conditions that provide medical patients with better health outcomes. These devices can be found in hospitals, medical clinics, homes, and even implanted in individuals. The patients experience freedom from extended hospital stays and can spend time with their family…

Cybersecurity job roles and responsibilities constantly evolve due to technological advancements, complex infrastructure, and increasing cybersecurity threats and regulations. As a result, organizations require a highly skilled and experienced cybersecurity workforce in both the public and private sectors. Many colleges and universities offer…

While the cybersecurity landscape continually evolves, with new technologies, attack vectors, and defense mechanisms emerging regularly, cybersecurity certificate programs remain challenged to stay current and relevant, often resulting in the delivery of outdated course content in existing programs. Scholars note that the absence of standardized…

With the increase in cybercrime costing organizations financial loss and loss to their reputation, the need to hire qualified and experienced employees is paramount. As the gap in the workforce shortage widens, cybersecurity education and training institutions are struggling to produce a capable workforce with enough experience and skills that…

Gamification is a term used to describe the art of taking a process or a task and making it into a game. Using games as a way to make mundane tasks or necessary lessons more fun is used in many aspects of life. Parents often use games to teach children tasks, and teachers use games to enforce learning, and much more. The gamification of Security…

The shortage of qualified cybersecurity professionals is a growing concern in the information technology industry, and the rapid growth of the field exacerbates this shortage. Employers express concern over the shortage of hands-on, practical skills and problem-solving abilities among recent graduates, leading to the "cybersecurity skills…

The U.S. National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) identified that approximately 1.8 million cybersecurity positions were vacant in 2021 because of a lack of professionals with the required skill sets and who remained in their jobs long enough to contribute to their organizations' cybersecurity needs. Also shown was the rising global…

The cybersecurity landscape in the United States has rapidly evolved, marked by risk and novel threats (Georgescu, 2021; Siraj et al., 2021). Today, security mindsets are "widely accepted in the computer security community as … essential … for successful cybersecurity practice" (Peterson, 2021, para. 1), valuable to aspiring…

Many organizations are providing employee training to raise security awareness as data breaches increase. Organizational digital transformation has accelerated, especially during the COVID-19 outbreak. It has made the technology industry a prime target for cyberattacks. Although more organizations invest in cybersecurity training, data breaches…

Educators of graduate cybersecurity education lack decision methodologies to aid in selecting and prioritizing cybersecurity criteria and tools to provide hands-on learning in cyber courses. Educators are challenged with keeping the cybersecurity tools in the education curriculum relevant and updated. The risk of not doing so, is possibly…

The need in the public sector is to help people 60+ years of age in the safe, practical use of technology for business, personal use, and family interaction, as this group is targeted more than others for technology fraud. The practice-focused question centers around which topics need to be part of technology fraud pilot training to reduce the…

This dissertation introduces a comprehensive framework aimed at reshaping applied cybersecurity education to significantly ease the learning curve, at scale, through three synergistic innovations. These methods address the daunting educational barriers in cybersecurity, enabling learners at all levels to understand complex security concepts more…