Hackers and cyber teams do battle at Cal Poly Pomona

POMONA -- Cal Poly Pomona's Classroom, Laboratory and Administration Building turned into the home of six imaginary businesses Friday afternoon.

The businesses were make-believe but the computer systems serving the companies were very real for the six colleges in the 2009 Western Regional Collegiate Cyber Defense Competition.

The three-day competition will produce a winner that will go on in April to the National Collegiate Cyber Defense Competition, which has among its supporters the Department of Homeland Security.

Teams face a group of professionals, known as the Red Team, who work in computer security fields and are familiar with the kind of cyber security problems experts face on a daily basis. It's up to them to break into the college students' systems.

Among the Red Team members is Rodney Kocot, a graduate of Cal Poly who works in the industry.

The competition will be stiff with Red Team members putting the students through their paces.

"It's just like they walked into a business," Kocot said. "We have to protect these systems but we have to keep them running."

Yet it's also a hands-on experience that goes with Cal Poly's philosophy of learning by doing, he said.

The competition scenario calls for each team to take responsibility for operating a system that has deficiencies, identifying them, fixing them and keeping everything operating.

At the same time the team must handle requests such as setting up new employee e-mail accounts or giving employees computer access to programs, fill other requests, and above all keep the system from being broken into.

If there is a breach, they must address and complete a report detailing how the break occurred, the impact on the system and how it was repaired. A top-notch report can be worth 50 points for a team, said Dan Manson, Cal Poly professor of computer information systems.

If all that weren't enough, the teams go through a 24-hour period during which they must keep the system running, scheduling meal breaks and sleep breaks.

"They really have to work as a team to win," Manson said.

This is the second year Cal Poly is hosting the intense competition which attracts a certain breed.

Such a contest "I think attracts the best and the brightest," Manson said.

Jeff Henbest, 21, is among the Cal Poly team members. The Pomona resident, who will earn a bachelor's degree in computer information systems in June, took part in last year's competition.

The team came in second last year, and as intense as it was Henbest has been looking forward to taking part again.

"It's the most stressful 36 hours of your life but also the most fun," he said.

Students including Henbest say a competitive exercise like this one allows them to use all of the knowledge and skills they've acquired up to this point in their education and put it into practice. The contest isn't just about competing, it's also about learning.

"There is so much packed into a short time. It's really awesome," Henbest said.

To do the best job possible Cal Poly students reviewed possible real life security risks and tackled them, he said.

Each team also attempts to find the best use of each team member's talents and specialties, Henbest said.

Also competing are teams from Cal State San Bernardino, Mt. San Antonio College, Sacramento State, Westwood College and Arizona's University of Advancing Technology.

Cal State San Bernardino team member Michelle Behne of Highland focused on keeping track of reports and other paper work.

"I try to be low key," she said smiling. "I don't see myself as overly important to the team."

At 51, Behne is different from most of the competitors who are mostly male and in their late teens and early 20s.

Behne is a secretary at Cal State San Bernardino but she is working toward a degree in information assurance and security management.

Of the team members she is the least technical but she has a grasp of disaster recovery planning and password policy which is what she intends to focus on once she completes her training.

Because the team participated as a club, it's up to the members to find speakers and other experts to help them develop their skills for the competition, Behne said.

For Behne the competition is just one part of cyber security, she said.

"Information security is very, very broad and very, very deep," she said.

Even though she may not be the team's expert on technical issues she looks forward to the competition just them same.

As someone who has grown children and enjoys being around young people, the competition is fun on an additional level for her.

"They're just fun to be around," she said of her team mates who she said she sometimes sees as her children.

As for the prospect of being up all night protecting her make-believe company's security system, Behne said: "I don't know what person I'm going to become at 2 in the morning."