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Forensic Studies - Cybersecurity

  • Minor
Students in the forensic studies - cybersecurity Program students using laptops and listening attentively while other classmates are in the background.
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Integrating Cybersecurity with Criminal Law

The goal of this minor is to provide students with a broad-based understanding of the application of forensic methods to financial activities in order to analyze evidence for the purpose of criminal justice. While cybersecurity forensics deals with the collection and analysis of digital evidence after a security incident such as hacking or malware attacks, the forensic studies cybersecurity minor is not meant to provide students with all of the skills necessary to perform the job of a cybersecurity forensics expert. Rather, the goal is to provide students with a working understanding of the integration of this field with criminal law so that the students may, if they wish, pursue those specializations in other undergraduate or future graduate study.

 

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“The Forensics program has given me real-world, hands-on experience that I know will pay off in the future as a cybersecurity major.”

Joseph Turkovich C 28
Forensics-Cybersecurity Minor

Undergraduate Programs

Highlights

Instructor gestures while lecturing to a classroom of students seated in rows, with a chalkboard and wall-mounted TV in the background.
  • Lawyers who possess a working knowledge of the techniques used in cybersecurity are better equipped to litigate cases accurately and in the interest of justice.
  • The forensics studies- cybersecurity minor pairs nicely with criminology, law, and society, finance, or computer science.
  • Other forensics minors available are: forensics- financial investigation and forensics- natural science.
  • Students who pair this minor with their major or continue onto further education will be more equipped or more marketable for careers as, government employees, expert witnesses, lawyers or consultants.

Curriculum

  • Requirements

    Requirements for a Minor in Forensic Studies -Cybersecurity (18 Credits):

    Choose two of the following CLS courses:**

    • CLS 205 Criminal Trial Evidence 3
    • CLS 227 Criminal Law and Process 3
    • CLS 230 Constitutional Criminal Procedure 3
    • CLS 320 White Collar Crime 3
    • The following four CS courses:
    • CS 102 Fundamentals of IT and Computing 3
    • CS 225 Computer Security 3
    • CS 321 Data Communication and Computer Networks 3
    • CS 325 Advanced Topics in Security 3

    **CS Majors must take three of these four CLS courses. CLS Majors must take CLS 205 and CLS 320 for the minor, and cannot use these courses to count toward the major (CLS students must choose two other courses for their CLS major electives)

  • Key Courses

    White Collar Crime: This course explores crimes committed by corporations and white-collar offenders, examining how these crimes are defined, who commits them, and who is affected by them. Students will analyze the moral, ethical, legal, and social conditions that allow corporate and white-collar crime to occur, as well as how institutions and society respond. The course also addresses key procedural and policy issues involved in investigating and prosecuting these offenses, including legal privilege, the role of the grand jury and other pretrial processes, evidentiary challenges, litigation strategies, and the range of possible sanctions and penalties.

    Constitutional Criminal Procedure This course will engage students in a critical analysis of the limitations imposed on the gathering and presentation of evidence in criminal cases that are imposed by 4th, 5th and 6th Amendments to the United States Constitution and parallel provisions of the State Constitution. It will involve an exploration of the origins and evolution of the exclusionary rule and the particular grounds for exclusion mandated by application of those Constitutional principles. You will gain a practical perspective on the overall process of a criminal case from pre-trial litigation through final appeal, including the process under which the law permits the government to seek the imposition of the death penalty, and the limitations imposed upon that by the 8th Amendment.

    Cybersecurity: This course introduces students to the core concepts and real-world practices that form the foundation of modern cybersecurity. Using the CISSP Common Body of Knowledge as a guide, students explore key topics such as access control, network and software security, risk management, cryptography, security architecture, environmental security and business continuity, and disaster recovery planning.

Undergraduate Programs
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