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COVID cannot stop us

The cooperation of White Hat IT Security and Obuda University continues uninterrupted in 2021/22


The cooperation of Obuda University John von Neumann Faculty of Informatics and infosec provider and consulting company White Hat IT Security continues despite COVID in the field of cyber security education.

Thanks to the joint efforts of dean Prof. PhD Miklós Kozlovszky and White Hat CEO and co-founder Sándor Fehér (OSCP, OSCE, CISM, ISO27001LA) the popular Blue Team & Security Operations subject was available for the third consecutive year this autumn semester. The curriculum of the subject matches that of White Hat’s Europe-wide unique WHCD – White Hat Certified Defender enterprise defence training.

This cooperation has started back in 2019 under dean Prof. PhD András Molnár, who entrusted the facilitation and strengthening of the relationship to the course representative of cyber security Valéria Póser PhD. The objective of this joint initiative was to give the students hands-on practical knowledge and skills currently lacking from the market and to establish a course that offers the highest niveau available and can keep up with the current cyber market trends – and at the same time is interesting, current and profitable in the short term for students. After finding that almost all available courses are offensive and focus on a small fragment of necessary information in this topic, White Hat had developed its WHCD course and with the university’s open and supportive attitude had integrated it into the academic curriculum – available for free for the top 25 students.

The course offered by White Hat is currently available at the market for a 1M HUF per student gross price. It offers theoretical background lectures and consultations led by experts on the field with 15-20 years of experience, completed by practical lab exercises that build upon own case studies and illustrate and analyse the individual steps of the defence procedure through the incident management of a lifelike APT attack – how the subsequent phases are structured, how they interact, and what roles this necessitates on the personnel side. The training is made more colourful by the guest lectures of internationally acclaimed foreign and Hungarian experts of the field.

Handling the market’s lack of specified human resources and preparing students for real-life tasks and challenges is inconceivable without the symbiosis of the academic and private sectors. This and the aim to keep the knowledge and intellectual capital accumulated over the years here and use it to build this community (despite working mostly for abroad) led White Hat, as this is a cornerstone of White Hat’s social responsibility. Fortunately, the Obuda University has become the ideal partner in this: helping them introduce hopefully hundreds of students and young experts this specific but increasingly important branch of the IT field and cyber security.

Informations regarding the final exams

Due to the emergency situation the order of education changed from the 23rd of March, 2020. The Rector of Obuda University issued instructions about the order of final examinations related to the II. semester of the 2019/20 academic year. Following the instructions, to avoid the personal presence of the students, lecturers, and staff during the final exams to protect the health of the related parties the final exams can be held online. The issued instructions can be found here:

https://neptun.uni-obuda.hu/system/files/4-2020-rektori-utasitas-20200518-OE-ZV-EN.pdf

General rules

  1. The student is responsible for the operation of the technical equipment and the peaceful environment on his/her side.
  2. The student shall identify himself/herself with his/her Identity Card / Residence Permit (or Passport) in front of the board of final examination (examination committee) and/or the rapporteur (court reporter) by request.
  3. Due to the final examination is happening online, the book format of the diploma work is not necessary. The reviewer, the examination committee, and the digital archive of OU get the diploma work in digital format which has been uploaded into the plagiarism checker (in the case of students where the language of instructions is English this action was done by the Diploma Group) and into the Moodle system.
  4. At the beginning of the final exam, the student presents the diploma work/thesis work within max. 10 minutes. The student shall use screen sharing during the presentation. The committee can ask to shorten the presentation and the summarization of it. After, the committee asks questions regarding the presented work. After the presentation, the student shall switch off the screen sharing. The students in the same committee can listen all diploma/thesis defenses (except the classified diploma/these) or can leave right after his/her defense.
  5. The question item / theme / thesis (namely, the topic to be elaborated in front of the committee during oral examination) will be provided after successful thesis defense.
  6. The order of oral examination can be found in the tables of committees.
  7. The student will get a question item randomly (using a random number generator) from the topic pool. There is no preparatory time. The student should summarize the topic in a few sentences and then questions/answer session is coming.
  8. During the exam, the student can use the camera and screen sharing in accordance with the regulations and by order. The student can be asked to show the room environment randomly.
  9. In any case of technical issues after the student gets the question item/theme (e.g. internet went down, lagging, camera/microphone problems, etc.) the connection should be recovered. If the connection cannot be recovered immediately, the committee initiates the recalling of the student two further times. The committee shall try to reach the student by recalling him/her. At least (min.) 5 minutes should be between the two trying. These issues and the facts of recall shall be represented in the minutes. After the connection recovers, the committee can freely ask any questions related to the subject and profession without taking into account the previously selected question item/topic.
  10. An exam that is permanently interrupted due to technical problems is not qualified as an attempt to earn a grade or as an unsuccessful exam.
  11. If a student is not available within half an hour from the beginning of the final exam and the committee has repeatedly called him/her (with a break of 15 minutes between the two calls) without success, the student is considered as missing. An exam for a missing student does not qualify as an attempt to earn a grade or as an unsuccessful exam.
  12. The student is required to send alternative platform suggestions and user names (e.g. Skype, Viber, Messenger) to the Head of the Dean’s Office to through which he/she is available during the final exam (in the case of Teams failure).
  13. To avoid any technical problems the students applied to the final exam shall check their availabilities in Neptun (email address, phone number). The student shall not modify these after the 30th of June, 2020. If modification is necessary on these data the student shall modify them before the 30th of June or if the student cannot change them, then the written request of modification needs to be sent tot he Registrar’s Office before the 30th of June, 2020.
  14. The student is responsible for providing a device from which the video and voice transfer is errorless in prompt quality. During the final exam, only the student can be in the room at the place from he/she login. The committee shall check this through the camera of the student by asking the student to show his/her environment. The student agrees that he/she does not turn his/her camera, microphone off, and does not use any near field voice transferring earphone device. Masking (e.g. with alternative dynamic background) or hiding the of the environment is prohibited.
  15. The student declares that he/she will not use an unauthorized device or the assistance of another person during the final exam. Exceptions are students with special needs if they cannot communicate orally or if they cannot handle the technical equipment. In this case, the chairperson of the committee decides whether an assistive person is able to participate in the environment of the student or not. The committee can ask anytime to show the environment and the student shall act immediately. If the student does not act immediately by showing his/her environment or in any case of lack of action, the committee can suspend the exam and the student can try a new exam in the next final examination period.
  16. A visual or audio recording of the examination is prohibited from both sides in order to protect the rights of the individual.

Place (app) of the final examination

The final examination run in the MS TEAMS APPLICATION. The students applied tot he final examination will be invited into the different committees. The student who does have OU related email address (…@stud.uni-obuda.hu) will be invited to the committee directly. The students with active student status and without an OU related email address can ask an email address via support@uni-obuda.hu. The students without active student status will get an invitation (link) via email (to the email address given in the Neptun) / Neptun to be able to join tot he final examination – he/she will be able to join as a „Guest” via the submitted link in browser or Teams.

Compulsory test: final exam consultation

The technical test and consultation of the final examination will be happening in July 1 from 10.00 (10AM). The participation is COMPULSORY for all students. The students shall be prepared for testing their camera, microphone and screen sharing.

The student shall indicate any technical problem to the responsible of specialization by sending the identification data of the committee and final exam (e.g. time, committee members) prior the main test and ask for help.

The responsible persons by specialization can be reached as follows:

BSc

Informatikai biztonság és Rendszermérnök specializáció,
Kiberbiztonsági szakmérnök/szakember SZT:

Dr. Póser Valéria poser.valeria@nik.uni-obuda.hu

Vállalati információs rendszerek specializáció:

Dr. Holyinka Péter holyinka.peter@nik.uni-obuda.hu
Dr. Fleiner Rita fleiner.rita@nik.uni-obuda.hu

Beágyazott rendszerek és Mobil informatika specializáció:

Dr. habil. Molnár András molnar.andras@nik.uni-obuda.hu,
Lovas István lovas.istvan@nik.uni-obuda.hu

Szoftverrendszerek fejlesztése specializáció,
Robotika specializáció (BSc),
Informatikai és automatizált rendszerek specializáció:

Dr. habil. Szénási Sándor szenasi.sandor@nik.uni-obuda.hu

IT Security and Systems Engineer Specialization:

Dr. habil. Lovas Róbert lovas.robert@nik.uni-obuda.hu,
Vörösné Dr. Bánáti-Baumann Anna banati.anna@nik.uni-obuda.hu

MSc

Robotics specialization,
Robotika specializáció,
Biomedical engineering specialization,
Orvosi mérnökinformatikai specializáció:

Dr. Eigner György eigner.gyorgy@nik.uni-obuda.hu

The students shall upload their presentations into the Moodle until 20.00 (8PM) until the previous day of the final examination. The recommended PPT template can be downloaded from: https://to.nik.uni-obuda.hu/szakdolgozat-tajekoztato/

Procedure of the final exam

  • The examiners get the documents with the necessary information.
  • In the staging “room” the rapporteurs check the identities of students by asking the students to show their Identity card/Residence permit/Passport through the camera.
  • Everybody logs in the “defense” (védés) room (the students, supervisors and others shall mute their microphone and switch their camera off).
  • The defense is running based on the predefined schedule – except in the case of classified diploma work. The classified diploma defenses will be at the end of the defense session.
  • The defending student shall turn the camera and microphone on. From him/her showing the environment can be requested.
  • The presentation is running in the computer of the defending student using screen sharing. The presentation has to be the same as uploaded into the Moodle.
  • At the end of the defenses, all students have to leave the defense room and entering the staging room – and wait there.
  • At the end of the public defenses, the classified defenses are going if there is any.
  • The committee evaluate the defenses.
  • After, the chairman of the committee introduces who are permitted to continue the final examination in the staging room (namely, who are those who successfully defended their work).
  • The committee divided into two subcommittees (min. 2-2 persons). The chairman can participate in both / can select in which he/she wants to participate freely.
  • 2 students enter to the Architectures exam room. One student gets the question item / theme using a random number generator, then prepares himself/herself under max 10 minutes. From the advanced architectures, the students can use the usual figures, tables during the preparations and exams. The second student gets the question item / theme using a random number generator and prepares himself/herself during the examination of the first student. The first student leaves the exam room when he/she finished and the third student enters and gets the question item / theme using a random number generator and prepares himself/herself during the examination of the second student, etc. The penultimate student waits in the exam room until the last student finishes with his/her exam.
  • 2 students enter to the Specialization exam room. One student gets the question item / theme using a random number generator then starting the exam – in the meantime, the second student waits. After the first student finishes, he/she leaves the room and a third student enters. The second student gets the question item / theme using a random number generator then starting the exam – in the meantime, the third student waits. After the second student finishes, he/she leaves the room and a fourth student enters, etc. The penultimate student waits in the exam room until the last student finishes with his/her exam.
  • The question item / theme is provided by the rapporteur using the random number generator from random.org in screen sharing mode. Then he/she read the question item / theme loudly and show it in his/her screen.
  • The rapporteur records the provided question item / theme.
  • After all students finish with the exams, the committee enters the Defense room and evaluate the results. Finally, the chairman of the committee introduces the results of the final examination in the staging room.

Result of the exam

The result of the final exam is calculated based on the training and outcome requirements.

The final exam is not successful if any of the grade is “Failed”. The results are introduced by the chairman of the final defense committee after the evaluation.

Attention! Work schedule change

Dear Students!

To respect Government Decree 40/2020. (III.11.) and  2/2020. (III.11.),  3/2020. (III.12.) and the 5/2020. (III.16.)  rector-chancellor instruction to prevent further spread of the coronavirus and to protect health of the employees (and their families) of the University as a primary priority the John von Neumann Faculty of Informatics orders “home office” policy to all administrative workers from 19th March onward.

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