October 26, 2020
Tallahassee Community College is recognizing Cybersecurity Awareness month in October. Now in its 17th year, National Cybersecurity Awareness Month (NCSAM) continues to raise awareness about the importance of cybersecurity across the nation, ensuring that all Americans have the resources they need to be safer and more secure online. In the spirit creating our connection to this national effort, students in the College’s Applied Cybersecurity Career and Technical Certificate program are using the skills they have gained and applying them to a virtual platform.
During this designated month of Cybersecurity Awareness, students enrolled in the program are diligently preparing to compete against more than 10,000 students in the National Cyber League (NCL) Competition. As part of the competition, students simulate real-life cyber threats in a safe environment, which they are evaluated on how they combat those threats.
“I was excited because I am a very competitive person,” said Allison Knight, a Cybersecurity program student at TCC. “Just the thought of competition makes my heart palpitate. Extracting passwords, decrypting hidden messages and monitoring network traffic. I was going to see what it was like to be like all those cool hackers/computer experts on TV.”
The NCL challenges highlight nine critical cybersecurity workforce categories: Open Source Intelligence, Cryptography, Password Cracking, Log Analysis, Network Traffic Analysis, Forensics, Web App Exploitation, Scanning and Enumerating and Exploitation.
“As a new student to the field of IT and Cybersecurity specifically, I have found my participation in the NCL to be invaluable as a tool to apply theoretically gained knowledge to real world applications,” said Kendall Randolph, a Cybersecurity program student at the College. I have gained confidence in my skills and abilities as a result in competing.”
The virtual challenge competition is an engaging way for students to apply their cybersecurity awareness training as they learn how to defend organizations against cyber-threats.
“We are excited to connect our students with opportunities that expose them to the real-life scenarios that they’ll face in their future career in cybersecurity,” said Kimberly A. Moore, Vice President for Workforce Innovation &TCC2WORK/Be Essential. “We are committed to providing our students with the training needed to not only compete locally, but globally.”
For more information on the program, contact workforce@tcc.fl.edu or (850) 201-8760.