An Evidence-Based Curriculum Initiative for Hardware Reverse Engineering EducationGlobal
This program is tentative and subject to change.
The increasing importance of supply chain security for digital devices—from consumer electronics to critical infrastructure—has created a high demand for skilled cybersecurity experts. These experts use Hardware Reverse Engineering (HRE) as a crucial technique to ensure trust in digital semiconductors. Recently, the US and EU have provided substantial funding to educate this cybersecurityready semiconductor workforce, but success depends on the widespread availability of academic training programs. In this paper, we investigate the current state of education in hardware security and HRE to identify efficient approaches for establishing effective HRE training programs. Through a systematic literature review, we uncover 13 relevant courses, including eight with accompanying academic publications. We identify common topics, threat models, key pedagogical features, and course evaluation methods. We find that most hardware security courses do not prioritize HRE, making HRE training scarce. While the predominant course structure of lectures paired with hands-on projects appears to be largely effective, we observe a lack of standardized evaluation methods and limited reliability of student self-assessment surveys. Our results suggest several possible improvements to HRE education and offer recommendations for developing new training courses. We advocate for the integration of HRE education into curriculum guidelines to meet the growing societal and industrial demand for HRE experts.
This program is tentative and subject to change.
Thu 27 FebDisplayed time zone: Eastern Time (US & Canada) change
10:45 - 12:00 | |||
10:45 18mTalk | An Evidence-Based Curriculum Initiative for Hardware Reverse Engineering EducationGlobal Papers René Walendy Ruhr University Bochum, Max Planck Institute for Security and Privacy, Markus Weber Ruhr University Bochum, Steffen Becker Ruhr University Bochum, Christof Paar Max Planck Institute for Security and Privacy, Nikol Rummel Ruhr University Bochum, Center for Advanced Internet Studies (CAIS) Pre-print | ||
11:03 18mTalk | Bridging the community college cybersecurity classroom and workplace with the CyberSim LabCC Papers Judeth Oden Choi Carnegie Mellon University, Rotem Guttman Carnegie Mellon University, Matthew Kisow Community College of Allegheny College, Carolyn Penstein Rose Carnegie Mellon University Language Technologies Institute, William R. Nichols Carnegie Mellon University/Software Engineering Institute, James Winyard Community College of Allegheny College, Bruce Li Carnegie Mellon University, Lee Branstetter Carnegie Mellon University, Lauren Herckis CGFNS International, Inc. and Carnegie Mellon University (On Leave) | ||
11:22 18mTalk | Cybersecurity Study Programs: What's in a Name?Global Papers Jan Vykopal Masaryk University, Valdemar Švábenský Kyushu University, Michael T. Lopez II Ateneo de Manila University, Pavel Čeleda Masaryk University | ||
11:41 18mTalk | Strengthening Workforce Education: Excellence in Programming Securely (SWEEPS) Papers Deborah Kariuki University of Maryland, Baltimore County, Ida Ngambeki University of Maryland Baltimore County, Jun Dai Worcester Polytechnic Institute, Matt Bishop The University of California, Davis, Xiaoyan Sun Worcester Polytechnic Institute, Melissa Dark Dark Enterprises, Inc., Jenny Daugherty Dark Enterprises, Inc., Alex Lowrie University of California, Davis, Markus Geissler Cosumnes River College, Phil Nico California Polytechnic State University, Arshad Noor StrongKey, Inc. |