Spring 2023 Semester Close Out
With final presentations wrapped up at Rochester Institute of Technology, Hacking for Diplomacy has come to a close for the Spring 2023 semester! From the entire program team, thank you for your support for H4Diplomacy, and we look forward to you joining us for a future semester.
Special thanks to DAS Ron Stuart, DAS Gharun Lacy, Director Ralph Gaspard, Director Rahim Theriot, and all of the DOS employees and industry mentors (listed below) who coached the student teams throughout the semester.
Below is a recap of RIT's final presentations. To watch the full recording of the event, click here.
Interested in having graduate and undergraduate students work on a problem with you?
We are recruiting DOS employees for H4Diplomacy's Fall 2023 semester. Schedule a 30 minute call with one of our program analysts to get started:
“Hacking for Diplomacy is an opportunity to gain an academic and research perspective and analysis on a real world challenge that you are dealing with.” -Danh Nguyen-Huynh, Technical Director, Office of Cyber Monitoring and Operations
“That outside objectivity provided great insight for us.” -Jake Trigoboff, CIRT Cloud Lead, Office of Cyber Monitoring and Operations
Final Presentations Recap
The event at RIT was kicked off by John Bass, Under Secretary for Management at the State Department. The Under Secretary spoke on the importance of technology, and keeping cutting edge new ideas in sight to protect DOS personnel overseas from a wide range of rapidly evolving threats.
“I want to salute all of you for first and foremost your interest in taking on this challenge," Under Secretary Bass said, addressing the three student teams, "I want to salute your creativity, your tenacity, your problem solving, to come up with some great ideas here to work through these challenges that we put to all of you.”
H4Diplomacy class picture at Rochester Institute of Technology
Drone Detection Challenge
Sponsored by the Office of Security Technology
DOS problem sponsor: Tyler Wood, Security Engineering Officer
DOS senior leader: Rahim Theriot, Division Director, Office of Security Technology
Industry mentors: Rob Mennell, Chief Growth Officer at Synertex LLC and Eitan Danon, Team Lead at Chainalysis Inc.
This student team was tasked with finding a better way to detect drones that could cause harm to people inside U.S. embassies. They conducted 51 unique discovery interviews with industry experts, radar and RF sensor operators, and an array of DOS engineers and contractors. Their proposed solution is to supplement the current drone detection system at high-risk embassies with upgraded infrared camera systems and perimeter microphones to detect drones’ unique audio signatures.
To view the Drone Detection team's full presentation, click here.
This semester, 13 university students conducted 162 discovery interviews with DOS personnel, academics, and industry experts, and provided 3 solutions to DOS problems.
Drone Detection team
Locating Imminent Threats Challenge
Sponsored by the Office of Security Technology
DOS problem sponsor: Mario May, Security Engineering Officer and Lucinda Selk, Security Engineering Officer
DOS senior leader: D’vetrio Baugh, Branch Chief, Technology Development Branch
Industry mentors: Michelle Saks, Founder of Apricot Endeavors, and Justing Ronning, overseas personal security independent contractor
This team spent the semester looking for a way to locate guards at U.S. overseas offices when they trigger the emergency alarm system. The students conducted 50 unique discovery interviews with DSS security engineering officers, local law enforcement officials, university professors, and campus safety representatives. To address the issue of locating threats to U.S. overseas offices, the team recommended using facility-mounted repeaters that use trilateration formulas to quickly pinpoint the location of guards who activate the facility's alarm system.
To view the Locating Imminent Threat team's full presentation, click here.
Locating Imminent Threat team
Data Architecture for Cybersecurity Challenge
Sponsored by Directorate of Cyber and Technology Security
DOS problem sponsor: Nick Swindell, IT Specialist, Jake Trigoboff, CIRT Cloud Lead, and Danh Nguyen-Huynh, Technical Director
DOS senior leader: Roy Matthews, Division Chief, Office of Cyber Monitoring and Operations
Industry mentor: Robert Leonard, Naval Program Manager at BMNT Inc.
The students on this team sought a way to improve the response capabilities of network defenders who address cybersecurity incidents. The students conducted 63 unique discovery interviews with consultants, security engineers, and educators. They planned to include a new data normalizer in the State Department's cybersecurity event logging process. This normalizer would filter logs into appropriate data lakes so that network defenders are presented with only the most relevant information to make decisions about incident response.
To view the Data Architecture for Cybersecurity team's full presentation, click here.
Data Architecture for Cybersecurity team
