Graduate Diploma of Cyber Security

In this subject, students gain knowledge and skills that will allow them to address the technical and administrative challenges involved in centrally controlling a multi-user network. Students gain in-depth knowledge of the structure and function of a multi-user operating system, and they gain professional skills in operating system installation, configuration, administration, and maintenance. Students gain skills in access control, including managing accounts and resources.

The subject emphasises the relationship between system management and security. This includes coverage of effective mitigation strategies such least privilege, application and operating system patches, and password/ passphrase management. The subject also covers business continuity issues, auditing, and reporting.

This subject provides students with a comprehensive overview of information and business security. Students gain knowledge and skills to understand, apply, evaluate, and manage information and business security. Students gain an understanding of how a security program needs to support the organisation’s goals and objectives. Students also gain the ability to analyse, evaluate and manage an organisation’s security program.

The subject provides an overview of six of the key domains of security as recognised by the (ISC)2 SSCP CBK: Access Controls, Cryptography, Security Operations and Administration, Monitoring and Analysis, Risk Response and Recovery and Malicious Code and Activity. The seventh domain (Networks and Communications) is covered in ICT806 Overview of Network Security. These domains provide a framework for the discussion, analysis, evaluation, and management of information and business security.

The subject emphasises effective mitigation strategies for cyber intrusions in the present ICT environment, as identified by the Australian Defence Signals Directorate and Australian Government Protective Security Policy amongst others.

This subject provides students with a solid basis in networking and routing having particular regard to network security. Students gain the knowledge and skills to analyse, design, specify, configure, and manage a medium sized network. The unit provides an overview of internetworking topologies and technologies. This involves an examination of networking from the OSI (Open Systems Interconnection) seven-layer model and TCP/IP perspectives. Students will gain knowledge in the function and operation of appropriate equipment from each layer. The subject provides an introduction to router security. The key practical assessment task involves the successful analysis, design, specification, configuration, and management of a medium sized network.

This subject focuses on the processes and technologies required to secure a network. Current issues and emerging trends and technologies are examined. The subject includes security policy design and management; firewalls and secure routers; AAA (authentication, authorisation, and accounting) in a networked environment; intrusion prevention systems; and an overview of virtual private networks (VPN).

The subject begins with an overview of the security vulnerabilities, threats and attacks that are found in computer networks. This includes an overview of the security vulnerabilities found in networked industrial control systems, such as SCADA (Supervisory Control and Data Acquisition). The remainder of the subject concentrates on various technical methodologies and management policies designed to protect networked systems. The emphasis is on higher level activities such as policy decisions, and network design and configuration. The subject also provides an overview of effective mitigation strategies for network attacks, including filtering, whitelisting and network segmentation. Students gain skills in advanced techniques in network security and consolidate these with laboratory and assignment work.

This subject covers the principles of switching and wide area network technologies. The students gain skills in the analysis, design, configuration, and management of switched networks, including Local Area Networks (LAN) and VLANs (Virtual Local Area Networks). Students also gain knowledge and skills in scaling IP addresses, wide area network (WAN) technologies, and key network protocols, such as the Spanning Tree Protocol (STP), the Interior Gateway Routing Protocol (IGRP), and the Enhanced Interior Gateway Routing Protocol (EIGRP). Student assessment includes the analysis, design, configuration, and management of a switched network.

This subject introduces students to key areas of professional practice, professionalism and professional communication associated with network security. The subject covers professional certification, autonomy, reflection, responsibility and accountability. Students will be introduced to research and industry literature as well as research principles which are also key aspects of lifelong professional development. Students gain knowledge and skills in communication and collaboration that will help them to work effectively as network security professionals. These include oral and written communication, research report writing, teamwork, group dynamics, and conflict resolution.

The subject provides students with an overview of the context of network security in Australia and worldwide, including organisational and social issues. The subject addresses specific issues that are particularly relevant to ICT professionals in network security, such as legal and ethical issues, social issues, and privacy.

Through critical engagement with literature, case studies and problem solving, students lay the foundation of professional principles which will inform their practice in a rapidly changing, high risk work context.

This subject provides students with the knowledge and skills to effectively manage IT projects. This encompasses common and emerging concepts, theories, processes, and techniques that are essential to managing IT projects. The subject will help students to understand, analyse, and evaluate the common issues that project team members and stakeholders face, and to design and manage ways to address these issues. The subject covers the key knowledge areas from project management frameworks and methodologies, including the project lifecycle, project selection, project planning, managing project resources, costs, duration, and quality, leadership, risk management and change management. Students gain knowledge in how project characteristics and management differ in the context of outsourcing, off-shoring and international project teams. Group and individual projects are used to assess levels of achievement.

This subject introduces scripting languages used for system administration, networking, and security applications. There is an emphasis on the Perl programming language. The subject provides an overview of the scripting language paradigm, along with abstraction, problem solving, and understanding requirements. The subject focuses on applications of scripting language programming. This includes automating system administration; SQL database administration; SNMP; LDAP; log files; network monitoring; and other security applications. There is also coverage of security concerns with scripting languages, including buffer overflow; SQL injection; and command injection.