Carnegie Mellon’s College of Engineering Develops Media Fellowship For Reporters Covering Cybersecurity, Information Technology Issues

June 18, 2007
Contact: Chriss Swaney
(412) 268-5776

PITTSBURGH—Carnegie Mellon University’s College of Engineering will host USA Today reporter Jon Swartz June 18–19 in a pilot fellowship designed for media to meet and discuss key cybersecurity issues with some of the nation’s leading experts.

“This new fellowship is a great way for media to see some of our best cybersecurity research and discuss ways for countering a variety of threats,” said Pradeep K. Khosla, dean of Carnegie Mellon’s College of Engineering and co-founder of Carnegie Mellon CyLab.

Swartz, 46, an award-winning reporter with more than two decades of experience covering technology and cybercrime for USA Today, The San Francisco Chronicle and the London Independent, will meet informally with a broad range of researchers from engineering, computer science and Carnegie Mellon CyLab.

Carnegie Mellon CyLab is a university-wide, multidisciplinary initiative that focuses the work of prominent information technology researchers on the problems of industry and government, including cybercrime and the creation of survivable systems. As the Internet has grown, so has the potential for crime and even disaster.

“We developed this new media fellowship to help journalists better understand and investigate the security-related issues that impact our daily lives,” said Khosla, who recently received the prestigious Cyber Education Champion Award from the Washington, D.C.-based Business Software Alliance for excellence in teaching students and educators about the importance of technology innovation, cyberethics and intellectual property issues.

Because terrorists can pick targets anywhere, counterterrorism programs and technology must defend everywhere — from office buildings and airports to cargo ships, hospitals and even the Internet itself.

“Today, more than a billion people use the Internet, and that’s why it’s so important for all of us, including the news media, to understand how important it is to have safe, secure information systems — systems that keep our power lines from overloading and our financial institutions and stock exchanges from being sabotaged,” Khosla said.

About Carnegie Mellon: Carnegie Mellon is a private research university with a distinctive mix of programs in engineering, computer science, robotics, business, public policy, fine arts and the humanities. More than 10,000 undergraduate and graduate students receive an education characterized by its focus on creating and implementing solutions for real problems, interdisciplinary collaboration, and innovation. A small student-to-faculty ratio provides an opportunity for close interaction between students and professors. While technology is pervasive on its 144-acre campus, Carnegie Mellon is also distinctive among leading research universities for the world-renowned programs in its College of Fine Arts. For more, see www.cmu.edu.