Indiana Tech Cyber Warriors repeat as state champions

Indiana Tech’s cyber defense team, the Cyber Warriors, won the state Collegiate Cyber Defense Competition for a second straight year on Saturday, March 19, beating out Rose-Hulman and Indiana University-Southeast for the top spot in the competition. The Cyber Warriors now move on to the Midwest Regional Collegiate Cyber Defense Competition (CCDC), to be held April 1-2 at Moraine Valley Community College in Palos Hills, Illinois.  The Midwest Regional will feature universities from Illinois, Iowa, Kentucky, Michigan, Minnesota, Missouri, Ohio and Wisconsin and will determine the Midwest team that will compete in the National CCDC in April in San Antonio, Texas.

Members of the 2016 Indiana Tech state champion team include Ian Springer (Captain), Carson White, Matt Kowal, Matt Billeck, Nicholas Simmons and Tony Burkhart. Matt Hansen, Adjunct Professor of Computer Sciences, and Julie Mansfield, Associate Professor of Computer Sciences, serve as faculty advisors for the Cyber Warriors.

Based on simulated real-world scenarios, CCDC is a cyber security competition that tests students’ skills in managing a corporate network that is based on actual infrastructure found in industry. The competition pits teams from universities around the state against each other for eight hours, managing information technology systems. During the competition, each team’s system is under constant attack from a team of cyber security professionals actively probing the network and attempting to break into and disrupt each system.

The Cyber Warriors practice up to 12 hours every week, and team members spend as many as 10-20 hours outside of practice, preparing in their individual disciplines and combining classroom and self-taught skills of programming, systems administration, and cyber security. The Cyber Warriors also compete in other competitions throughout the school year, and in recent years have advanced to the national round of numerous other competitions as well.