As an innovator in cybersecurity education and research, UMBC provides faculty, students, and researchers access to a variety of technical platforms that support the university’s mission in this critical industry discipline, including:
Operational Technology (OT) Cyber Range
Located within the UMBC Center for Research in Emergent Manufacturing (CREM) is a state of the art Operational Technology Cyber Range. The cyber range comprises both an Industry 4.0 miniaturized Smart Factory Floor and an Industry 4.0 Smart Grid. The range incorporates both physical and cloud computing systems to support in-person and remote learning, with an emphasis on OT cybersecurity. We are one of only five cyber ranges in the United States that focuses on Industry 4.0, digitization, and Augmented Reality/Virtual Reality systems. (POC: Dr Nilanjan Banerjee)
Retriever Range
UMBC operates a large cluster running Cisco UCS 220 servers that provide faculty a self-hosted virtual capability to enhance cybersecurity courses via hands-on labs (i.e., tool configuration, password cracking, DDOS and MITM attacks, etc.) and support specialized cybersecurity research. Faculty can request (or design) customized labs and virtual machines to meet specific course requirements for over 250 users in virtual machine configurations and over 1000 users via Docker. (POC: Dr Ram Rustagi)
US Cyber Range
Through its Maryland Institute for Innovative Computing (MIIC), UMBC is the executive agent for the State of Maryland’s public K-20 institutions use of the US Cyber Range. This cloud-based capability allows faculty, teachers, and staff across the State to create immersive learning experiences that better prepares students to address modern cyber threats. The platform provides a rich and customizable set of environments to accompany lab exercises in delivering a hands-on experience in cybersecurity for students. Additionally, the range supports online capture-the-flag competition environments for students and competition teams to practice and/or learn basic cybersecurity and networking skills. (POC: MIIC)