University to Host International Cybersecurity Conference

The event is attracting industry professionals from around the world

SAN ANTONIO 

The conference is Oct. 23-25 at the A&M-San Antonio campus. The event is co-sponsored by IEEE and the IEEE Systems Council. IEEE is the world’s largest technical professional organization.

“Hosting a conference like this is exciting because it shows how our growing University is involved in cybersecurity research,” said Izzat Alsmadi, an associate professor in the Department of Computing and Cyber Security and senior member of IEEE. “It will also bring other professionals from around the world to the University, which is a great opportunity for our community to collaborate with those from across the globe.”

With a long history of the region’s military, industry and academia collaborating on cybersecurity, San Antonio has been dubbed “Cyber City, USA,” and the region continues to innovate in this arena.

“Most people don’t realize that San Antonio has the largest concentration of cybersecurity activity outside of the Washington, D.C. beltway,” said Nils Smith, IEEE Lone Star Section chair and vice president of the Defense and Intelligence Solutions Division, Southwest Research Institute. “By hosting the 2023 Intelligent Cybersecurity Conference in San Antonio we hope to draw more professionals and companies to San Antonio and continue to grow this important sector of the economy.”

The conference will include multiple presentations, four keynote speakers and a student hackathon.

The keynote speakers are:

• Ibrahim (Abe) Baggili, professor of computer science and cybersecurity at Louisiana State University. He is the founder of the BiT Lab, where he holds a joint appointment between the Division of Computer Science & Engineering and the Center for Computation and Technology.
• Jaime Lloret, professor at the Polytechnic University of Valencia and chair of the Integrated Management Coastal Research Institute (IGIC). He is the founder of the IGIC’s Communications and Networks Research Group and founder and head of the Active and Collaborative Techniques and Use of Technologic Resources in the Education Innovation Group.
• Abdallah Khreishah, professor at the New Jersey Institute of Technology. Khreishah holds a doctoral degree and Master of Science degrees in electrical and computer engineering from Purdue University. He was involved in research projects totaling more than $15 million funded by agencies such as the National Science Foundation and the U.S. Department of Defense.
• Vinay Tripathi, production network engineer at Google Backbone Engineering. Tripathi is a senior IEEE member and an accomplished computer networking professional with 18 years of experience in various networking technologies and automation languages. He is an inventor of four patented networking technologies that have been granted in both the United States and Europe.

Janet Zulu, an A&M-San Antonio computer science major, is leading the student hackathon. She is excited that the international conference will be hosted by the university.

“This conference is a big deal because it will help students see first-hand how theories apply to real-life situations,” Zulu said. “This will open up students to a whole different world.”

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About Texas A&M University-San Antonio

Established as a stand-alone university in 2009, Texas A&M University-San Antonio is a comprehensive four-year public university that reflects the culturally diverse, heritage-rich community it serves. Situated on nearly 700 acres in South San Antonio, the University offers 39 undergraduate degrees and 23 graduate degrees to about 7,620 students. A&M-San Antonio is home to the Henry G. Cisneros Institute for Emerging Leaders and the Cyber Engineering Technology/Cyber Security Research Center. The University holds the Hispanic-Serving Institution (HSI) designation and is one of 39 higher education institutions in the U.S. to have received the Seal of Excelencia certification from Excelencia in Education for its support of Latino student success. More than 77 percent of A&M-SA students identify as Hispanic, and approximately 72 percent are the first in their families to attend college. A&M-San Antonio is a military-embracing institution; the University was recently awarded the 2023 Gold Veteran Education Excellence Recognition Award (VEERA) from the Texas Veterans Commission. Visit tamusa.edu for more information. #onamission