The University of Texas San Antonio hosts the 12th National Collegiate Cyber Defense Competition this weekend. Ten teams and 80 students representing schools from Alaska to Alabama have advanced through regionals to Thursday's national competition in San Antonio.
"Teams coming in have no idea what exactly they are going to be doing," says Greg White who runs UTSA's Center for Infrastructure Assurance and Security.
He says the teams will be put on identical networks in separate rooms at the Henry B. Gonzalez Convention Center. They will have to defend those networks from a team of cyber security professionals trying to hack in. Unlike some other national competitions, the NCCDC prefers to keep the work as aligned with future positions students might have as possible. They try and mirror a business.
"One year we pretended to have an online gaming company, so when the teams walked into the room, the games the company was supporting was already up and running and working and functional," says White.
Teams know how they are scored and that they have to protect their client's business from intrusion. But they are also expected to carry out normal work functions of a tech security department. They're given everyday tasks like updating access control lists for people recently hired or fired or bringing a new firewall online, all while being attacked.
"We do capture the flags and other competitions like that, but the NCCDC is the competition we practice for," says Arsh Chauhan, captain of the team from the University of Alaska Fairbanks.
Chuahan says these real-world, worst-case scenarios are the reason the competition is so valuable for students. NCCDC is also the reason he and his teammates have already been interviewed for jobs from large employers including Google.
