M.S. Cybersecurity and Privacy - Professional Science Master's (PSM) Cyber Defense Option

Cryptography and Security

• Understand the difference between the symmetric key and public key cryptography approaches.
• Select appropriate symmetric and public key cryptography protocols for a given application.

• Develop an efficient implementation of a cryptographic protocol based on a Discrete Logarithm Problem, RSA (Factoring) Problem or Elliptic Curve Discrete Logarithm Problem.

Security and Privacy in Computing

• Understand the various models to evaluate the security of computer systems.
• Interpret security guarantees and assess the level of security provided by a cryptographic protocol.
• Understand the various security goals for communication over an insecure network.
• Identify the appropriate types of cryptographic primitives that should be used to achieve each of these goals.
• Understand the advantages and limitations of using symmetric key versus public-key cryptography.

Network Protocols Security

• Identify the appropriate security primitives that should be used to achieve specific security goals for communication over insecure networks.
• Analyze the security of the main mechanisms used on the internet to secure communication between computer systems at various network layers, including physical, network, transport and application layers.
• Describe common attacks against wired and wireless network protocols using standard terminology, allowing them to communicate effectively with other security professionals.