Through the Hack the Pentagon program, The Department of Defense (DoD) had asked Synack to look for vulnerabilities left undetected by traditional security solutions in one of their highly complex and sensitive systems. The DoD was going to push the limits of security beyond that of most enterprises, and the results were surprising. Hear from Synack CEO Jay Kaplan how the government can benefit from bug bounty programs, what Hack the Pentagon revealed about DoD security, and why more and more organizations are employing red team penetration testing. 

Jay Kaplan co-founded Synack after serving in several security-related capacities at the Department of Defense, including the DoD’s Incident Response and Red Team. Prior to founding Synack, Jay was a Senior Cyber Analyst at the National Security Agency (NSA), where his focus was supporting counterterrorism-related intelligence operations. Jay received a BS in Computer Science with a focus in Information Assurance and a MS in Engineering Management from George Washington University studying under a DoD/NSA-sponsored fellowship. Jay holds a number of security certifications from ISC(2) and GIAC.

Are you interested in cybersecurity? Have you wanted to learn offensive cyber techniques  but don't know where to get started? The Applied Cybersecurity team is hosting an introductory workshop to get people going with practicing exploitation and offensive cyber techniques in an ethical setting. In particular, we will focus on gaining familiarity with techniques used for competing in Capture the Flag (CTF)* competitions. We'll be hosting the first workshop this Friday, in preparation for the Hitcon CTF next week. Bring a laptop! This workshop will assume no prerequisite experience with hacking or cybersecurity so please attend regardless of how unfamiliar you are with the topic. For this workshop, we will focus on web vulnerabilities, binary reversing, and some basic cryptography challenges. Note that experience equivalent to CS107 will be useful. Food will be provided! RSVP here: https://goo.gl/forms/M5yzuQasIZpL4Ovy1

The Freeman Spogli Institute for International Studies, the Center for International Security & Cooperation, and the Hoover Institution are honored to co-sponsor the 2015 Drell Lecture with The Honorable Ashton B. Carter, 25th U.S. Secretary of Defense, who will speak on "Rewiring the Pentagon: Charting a New Path on Innovation and Cybersecurity." The event will include welcoming remarks by Stanford University President John Hennessy. The talk will be followed by a Q&A session with Carter moderated by Amy Zegart, co-director of the CISAC and senior fellow at Hoover. Questions will be collected from the audience as well as from Twitter, using the hashtag #SecDefAtStanford. 

Drell Lecture Recording: NA

Drell Lecture Transcript: NA

Speaker's Biography: Secretary Carter was the 2014-2015 Payne Distinguished Visitor at the Freeman-Spogli Institute for International Studies until he left upon his nomination by the White House. Ash Carter served in numerous jobs in the Department of Defense, and as the twenty-fifth Secretary of Defense under President Obama. 

Drell Lecture Recording: NA

Drell Lecture Transcript: NA

Speaker's Biography: Vinton G. Cerf has served as vice president and chief Internet evangelist for Google since October 2005. He is also an active public face for Google in the Internet world. Cerf was appointed by President Obama to serve on the National Science Board beginning in February 2013.    

Widely known as one of the "Fathers of the Internet," Cerf is the co-designer of the TCP/IP protocols and the architecture of the Internet. In December 1997, President Clinton presented the U.S. National Medal of Technology to Cerf and his colleague, Robert E. Kahn, for founding and developing the Internet. Kahn and Cerf were named the recipients of the ACM Alan M. Turing award in 2004 for their work on the Internet protocols. The Turing award is sometimes called the “Nobel Prize of Computer Science.” In November 2005, President George Bush awarded Cerf and Kahn the Presidential Medal of Freedom for their work.