News

The 2020 STEM for All Video Showcase: Learning from Research and Practice CyberMiSTS – Cybersecurity Curriculum for Middle School from Secure Decisions will be featured May 5^th-12^th at https://stemforall2020.videohall.com

Senior Researcher Chris Horn spoke this past Friday at AppSec California about a Secure Decisions research project to deliver unbiased measures of software static analyzer performance. Secure Decisions is creating a website called Kompar (pronounced “compare”) to catalog software analyzers and their capabilities.

Laurin Buchanan, Principal Investigator for cybersecurity education research at Secure Decisions and co-chair of the NICE Working Group K12 Subgroup, will be attending and speaking at the 2019 NICE K12 Cybersecurity Education Conference in Garden Grove, California, December 9-10.

Laurin Buchanan, will be speaking on two different topics during the NICE 2019 Conference and Expo in Phoenix, Arizona. The annual NICE Conference and Expo brings together thought leaders from industry, academia, governments, and non-profits to share best practices in cybersecurity education from across the world and across sectors.

Learn how to build a solid Help Desk system for your product in this article written by Program Manager Brianne O'Brien.

Laurin Buchanan will be presenting at the NYS Cyber Security Conference, hosted by the NYS Office of Information Technology Services, the University at Albany School of Business, and The New York State Forum, Inc. The conference will take place June 4th and 5th in Albany, N.Y.

Laurin Buchanan, Principal Investigator at Secure Decisions, will be featured in the 2019 STEM for All Video Showcase funded by the National Science Foundation. The event will be held online May 13th -20th which will feature CyberMiSTS.

Secure Decisions launched the “Cyber Savvy Educators Contest,” which challenges middle school educators to create a branching web comic around the importance of strong passwords for their students. Branching web comics are graphic stories where a reader makes choices on behalf of a character, causing the story to follow a variety of branches that result in different outcomes.

At RSA 2019, SANS Security Insights talked with Dr. Anita D'Amico, Director of Secure Decisions, about DHS-funded startups.

Secure Decisions Researcher, Chris Horn, was invited to present about secure software development at April monthly meeting of the Information Security Community of Practice (IS-CoP) at the New York State Office of Information Technology Services (NYS ITS) offices in Albany, NY.

Comic-BEE has received the Building Tomorrow’s Workforce Award from the U.S. Department of Homeland Security Science and Technology (DHS S&T) Directorate’s Funded Performer Awards. DHS S&T awards this honor to a funded project that best helps develop the next generation of cybersecurity professionals.

Secure Decisions, a division of Applied Visions, Inc. and a leader in cybersecurity research, will be participating in the 2019 S&T Cybersecurity and Innovation Showcase hosted by the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) Science and Technology (S&T) Directorate, March 18-20, 2019 in Washington, D.C.

A case study done by MWR on the ASTAM Attack Surface Detector technology.

The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) Science and Technology Directorate (S&T) recently completed the integration of more than 9,700 real-world software test cases from the Static Tools Analysis Modernization Project (STAMP) into the Software Assurance Marketplace (SWAMP).

Secure Decisions, has developed a new application security testing technology, the Attack Surface Detector (ASD), that enhances and streamlines software penetration testing. Developed under the DHS S&T Directorate’s multi-year funded ASTAM (Application Security Technologies and Metrics) program.

BSidesLI is an information security conference that’s completely volunteer operated and organized. The event is on Saturday, January 26 at 9:30—4:00pm. Select the link below for the listed schedule for Saturday's event.

Chris Horn was invited to participate in a two-day workshop organized by the DARPA ISAT Study Group. The purpose of the workshop is to explore the requirements for AI systems that act as a functioning member of a cyber security team.

A recent Newsday article by Ken Schachter titled "Progress slow in adding women in the boardrooms" includes Secure Decisions Director, Dr. Anita D'Amico.

Secure Decisions has received an award from the NSF under the SaTC: EDU Program. One of only ten projects funded in 2018 under this highly competitive program from NSF, the CyberMiSTS project aims to provide middle school Career and Technical Education (CTE) teachers with knowledge, skills, and tools they need to develop a cybersecurity curriculum that actively engages their students and exposes them to cybersecurity concepts and careers.

This briefing reviewed research results within an emerging area of application security research: the human dimensions that relate to secure code development. These findings were first publicly presented at AppSecUSA 2018.

Dr. Anita D’Amico will be on a panel about Defense Seed Funding at the Columbia University Startup Lab, 11/14. Dr. D’Amico will share her successes with SBIR awards. Register for the event now!

Department of Homeland Security (DHS) has awarded GrammaTech to continue into the next phase of the Static Analysis Tools Modernization Project (STAMP). GrammaTech will perform the work together with its subcontractor Secure Decisions of Northport, NY.

Dr. Anita D'Amico will be speaking on the panel about the subject topic "Are Women in Software Security from Venus or Mars" at 11AM on November 14, 2018.

Laurin Buchanan, Principal Investigator for Comic-BEE, has joined the Editorial Board of Cybersecurity Skills Journal: Practice and Research (CSJ), published by the National CyberWatch Center (NCC).

Join us on November 6th & 7th in Miami for the National Initiative for Cybersecurity Education (NICE) Conference and Expo! Stop by our booth to see a live demo of Comic-BEE and learn how you can use Comic-BEE to create engaging content to educate or evaluate cybersecurity knowledge and skills at any level.

AFCEA Oklahoma City Chapter hosted the 14th Annual Technology Day at Tinker AFB on Thursday 6th of September 2018. Chris Horn spoke on the topic of 'Managing Application Security.'

We are pleased to announce that Comic-BEE was selected as the Best Student Learning Aid in the 2nd Annual Innovations in Cybersecurity Education Awards from the National CyberWatch Center. The awards were announced on August 2, 2018 at the 2018 Community College Cyber Summit (3CS) at Mt. Hood Community College, in Gresham, Oregon.

Secure Decisions will be exhibiting Comic-BEE at the Community College Cyber Summit (3CS) at Mt. Hood Community College in Gresham, Oregon from August 2-4, 2018. Come see a demonstration of Comic-BEE and learn about how you can use interactive branching comics for cyber security education!

Chris Horn, Secure Decisions Researcher, has joined UAlbany School of Business Cybersecurity Advisory Board. Chris joins more than a dozen cybersecurity professionals on the advisory board, which supports cyber innovation and economic development in the Capital Region.

Chris Horn, Researcher for Secure Decisions, will be talking about the paper he wrote entitled “Measuring Application Security” at the 2018 AppSec Europe Conference in London, England on July 2-6 of 2018. He is scheduled to speak on Friday July 6 between 10:15am - 11:00am.

Lenny Halseth, Senior Software Engineer for Secure Decisions, a division of Applied Visions, Inc., will be presenting a cyber security session titled "The White Hat’s Advantage: Penetration testing tools for web application security" at the 21st Annual New York State Cyber Security Conference in Albany, NY. Register for the conference here.

Chris Horn, Researcher for Secure Decisions, a division of Applied Visions, Inc., will be presenting a paper entitled “Measuring Application Security” at the 9th International Conference on Human Factors in Cybersecurity in Orlando, Florida on July 21-25, 2018. Register for the conference.

Drew Kirkpatrick, Security Researcher for Secure Decisions, a division of Applied Visions, Inc., will speak at the B-Sides Rochester Hacker Conference (B-Sides Roc) on April 14th, at 3 PM. Mr. Kirkpatrick will discuss the ways web application penetration testers can enhance their white box testing process with two open-source tools—the Attack Surface Detector; and OWASP Code Pulse, a Code Dx, Inc. open-source technology.

Secure Decisions was featured in a Newsday Article for securing a Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) contract to study the human factors that contribute to security vulnerabilities and code weaknesses in software.

Laurin Buchanan, was invited to speak at the 2018 CyberUSA Conference on January 30th, in San Antonio, Texas. You can learn more about the event and register for it here.

Secure Decisions has been selected by the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) for a Phase I Small Business Innovation Research (SBIR) contract to research why some software developers write software that is secure and sound, while others write software applications fraught with security vulnerabilities and quality issues.

A recent article from Newsday investigated the exorbitant costs associated with cyber security breaches, and concluded that the majority of these breaches are the result of staff that is poorly trained to identify relevant cyber threats.

Laurin Buchanan, Principal Investigator for Secure Decisions and an industry leader in cybersecurity awareness, will speak at the NICE K-12 Cybersecurity Education Conference on December 5th in Nashville, Tennessee.

The Comic-BEE team will be exhibiting at the National Initiative for Cybersecurity Education (NICE) Conference and Expo November 7-8, 2017.

This years conference will be held in Orlando, FL on September 19th-22nd. Secure Decisions is proud to attend this years AppSec USA 2017 conference. These conferences are the premier gathering for software security leaders and researchers. It brings together the application security community to share cutting-edge ideas, initiatives and technological advancements. You can register here and get additional details about the conference: https://2017.appsecusa.org/register/

On July 11, 2017, Nextgov.com, an all-day information resource for federal technology decision makers, highlighted Comic-BEE and the use of comics to boost cyber training. During a Homeland Security Department conference Tuesday, the company Secure Decisions presented a new interactive tool it’s developed that allows companies and educators to lay out cybersecurity lessons into interactive web comics without hiring a developer or graphics designer.

Secure Decisions has been selected by the Department of Homeland Security Science and Technology Directorate, Cyber Security Division to present their interactive cyber security curriculum development tool and research effort, Comic-BEE, at the 2017 Cyber Security R&D Showcase and Technical Workshop, scheduled for July 11-13 in Washington, D.C.

Laurin Buchanan, Principal Investigator for cyber security education research at Secure Decisions, will be presenting about recent innovations in cyber security education at the 21^st Colloquium for Information Systems Security Educators (CISSE) in Las Vegas, NV. Ms. Buchanan’s presentation on Tuesday, June 13^th will discuss the motivations for Comic-BEE, a web application for creating and using branching web comics for cyber security education and evaluation. To register or find more information about the 21st Colloquium, please visit https://cisse.info.

The L.I. Cybersecurity Conference at Suffolk County Community College (SCCC) is scheduled to be on Friday, June 9, 2017. Suffolk County Community College is launching a Cybersecurity and Information Assurance Associate in Applied Science (A.A.S.) degree program this fall. The conference will take place from 8:30 a.m. to 11:30 a.m. in the Health, Sports, and Education Center (HSEC) at the Michael J. Grant Campus of SCCC in Brentwood, NY. The conference is free to attend, but attendees must register.

Secure Decisions will be attending the Information Assurance Symposium in Baltimore, MD NSA Information Assurance Symposium (IAS) 2017 June 19 – June 21, 2017 – Baltimore, Maryland. https://www.fbcinc.com/e/IAS/

Code Dx will be setting up meetings and conducting demonstrations at the Gartner Security & Risk Management Summit on 12-15 June 2017 | National Harbor, MD. http://www.gartner.com/events/na/security#

Secure Decisions, a division of Applied Visions, Inc. and an industry leader in cyber security awareness, has been sponsored by the Department of Homeland Security Science and Technology Directorate, Cyber Security Division to continue development of Comic-BEE, an interactive cyber security education tool.

Anita D'Amico & Ken Parole were at WES19 in the Meeting Suites in Moscone Center West, Level 1 on Feb. 13-16 in San Francisco, CA.

Secure Decisions, the cyber security division of Applied Visions, Inc. and a recognized leader in applying visualization techniques to overcome cyber challenges, has been selected by the Air Force Research Lab (AFRL) for a Phase II Small Business Innovation Research (SBIR) contract to transform cyber data into human-centered visualizations.

Secure Decisions, a division of Applied Visions, Inc. and an industry leader in cybersecurity situation awareness, has been selected by the Department of Homeland Security to lead the development of a new cyber threat management system for application software. The Application Security Threat Attack Modeling (ASTAM) program will produce an integrated, open source system that will increase the accessibility of web application security.

Laurin Buchanan, Principal Investigator for cybersecurity education research at Secure Decisions, was recently interviewed about her experience in the cybersecurity domain, specifically as a cyber practitioner who hired and managed people within the industry. The National Institute for Cybersecurity Education (NICE) Working Group Competitions Subgroup has released a whitepaper discussing the knowledge and training gap between the workforce that is needed and the one that is available. Twenty-eight industry leaders were interviewed for the whitepaper, including Laurin Buchanan...

Recipients include Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory, SUNY Old Westbury, Applied Visions, Inc. Congressman Steve Israel (D-NY-03) announced that the National Science Foundation will award more than $5 million in grants to Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory, SUNY Old Westbury, and Applied Visions, Inc. The grants will allow for key research in several distinct fields: genome research in plants, improving STEM education, and cybersecurity education.

Enhancing Cyber Operational Decisions. Making sense of Network Data.

UPDATE:  February 29, 2016 – Code Dx, Inc. was awarded the Silver Winner in the “Startup of the Year” category! Code Dx, Inc., a provider of an award-winning suite of fast and affordable tools that help software developers, testers and security analysts find, prioritize and manage software vulnerabilities, today announced that it has been named as a finalist for the Info Security Product Guide’s 12th Annual 2016 Global Excellence Awards in the “Startup of the Year” category.

Dr. Anita D’Amico and Code Dx CTO Ken Prole to attend Industry Days for DHS S&T Directorate’s Cyber Security Division (CSD) BAAs for ASTAM and STAMP in Washington, DC on December 8, 2015.

For years application security has been delegated to specialized teams working at the end of the development chain, but a number of developments in recent times have begun pushing security into the laps of developers...

The Code Dx Team will be attending and exhibiting Code Dx at the AITP Long Island Chapter Tech Showcase 2015 at the Huntington Hilton, 598 Broad Hollow Road, Melville, NY on November 17, 2015.

Team Code Dx will be exhibiting Code Dx during AppSecUSA 2015, at the Hyatt Regency Embarcadero Center in San Francisco, CA, September 22-25, 2015.

Code Dx will be sponsoring the next Long Island Chapter meeting of OWASP on September 2, 2015, at the LaunchPad, 315 Main Street, Huntington, NY.  Helen Gao will be presenting Secure Software Development Life Cycle (S-SDLC).

Information Assurance Symposium (IAS) is a biannual forum hosted by the National Security Agency (NSA). IAS events of the past have proven to be the preferred Information Assurance event of the year. Leaders and practitioners will deliver vital and relevant answers, direction, and best practice advice for carrying out the Information Assurance mission.

Dr. Anita D’Amico, CEO of Code Dx, Inc. and Hassan Radwan, Director of Software Development will be speaking at the 18th  New York State Cyber Security Conference and 10th Annual  Symposium on Information Assurance (ASIA ’15) – June 2, 2015.

Cyber security education technology developed by Secure Decisions, the cyber security division of Applied Visions, Inc., will be part of the 2015 National Collegiate Cyber Defense Competition (NCCDC). Participants in this year’s competition will be required to create visually creative training materials using the unique ”CyberWISE” technology developed by Secure Decisions, with assistance from the State University of New York at Stony Brook.

Code Dx, a provider of a robust suite of fast and affordable tools that help software developers and security analysts find, prioritize and visualize software vulnerabilities, today announced that it has been ranked 15th in the Cybersecurity 500 list of hot cybersecurity companies to watch for 2015. Cybersecurity Ventures, a research and market intelligence firm, ranked the companies that provide the best technology solutions for protecting large enterprises, small to mid-sized businesses and consumers. The rankings are based on the feedback from CISOs and end-user practitioners, problem(s) the company solves, online research, product demonstrations, notable implementations, among other criteria...

Integration with Visual Studio, Eclipse, Git, and Jenkins enables the identification of weaknesses throughout the software development lifecycle. Code Dx, a provider of a robust suite of fast and affordable tools that help software developers and security analysts find, prioritize and visualize software vulnerabilities, today announced the release of version 1.6 of its innovative software assurance solution, Code Dx. The robust software tool now offers seamless integration with Visual Studio and Eclipse, as well as Git and Jenkins, enabling developers to more efficiently and effectively identify, report and fix weaknesses throughout the software development lifecycle.

Secure Decisions, the cyber security division of Applied Visions, Inc., has received an award from the Department of Homeland Security, Science & Technology Directorate (DHS S&T) to develop technology for cyber security education. The goal is to develop CyberWISE (Web-based Interactive Stories for [Cyber] Education), a tool to simplify and accelerate the creation and delivery of interactive educational materials for safe computing awareness. Secure Decisions will partner with Stony Brook University under this DHS S&T contract.

Code Dx Version 1.5 Offers Small and Medium-Sized Businesses an Easy and Affordable Way to Test the Software They Build or Buy for Vulnerabilities. Code Dx, a provider of a robust suite of fast and affordable tools that help software developers and security analysts find, prioritize and visualize software vulnerabilities, today announced the release of Code Dx Version 1.5 to meet the ever-growing threat of computer attacks initiated through exploitation of vulnerabilities in software.

Secure Decisions, a leading provider of assessment tools to enhance software security, is partnering with the Software Assurance Marketplace (SWAMP) to build a powerful and publicly accessible resource to improve the software that drives everyday life. The SWAMP, implemented by a group of four research institutions and housed in the Morgridge Institute for Research, is funded by the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) S&T to advance software security practices by building a free facility with a diverse repository of assessment tools available for public and private industry use. It is powered by an advanced computing platform that supports continuous software assurance.

Code Dx™ v1.2 adds capabilities for discovering, analyzing and visualizing software vulnerabilities from open source and commercial static application security testing tools. The Secure Decisions Division of Applied Visions, Inc. has released a new version of its software assurance analytics tool, Code Dx Version 1.2. Code Dx, a software assurance analytics tool that consolidates and normalizes software vulnerabilities detected by multiple static application security testing (SAST) tools, was developed under a Department of Homeland Security (DHS) Science & Technology (S&T) Directorate Small Business Innovative Research (SBIR) program. Its visual analytics help engineering professionals – including Software Developers, Security Auditors, Compliance Officers and Quality Assurance engineers - triage and prioritize detected software vulnerabilities for effective remediation.

Secure Decisions, the cyber security division of Applied Visions, Inc., today announced the release of Code Pulse™ v1.0, an open source and free software assurance analytics tool that  provides insight into the real-time code coverage of black box software testing activities. Code Pulse listens in behind the scenes while users perform their manual or automated testing and identifies code coverage in real-time as the tests are being performed. It visually provides an understanding of coverage overlaps and boundaries of multiple different dynamic application security testing (DAST) and penetration testing tools.

Code Dx v1.1 Adds Capabilities for Discovering, Analyzing and Visualizing Vulnerabilities in .NET Source Code. The Secure Decisions Division of Applied Visions has released a new version of its software assurance analytics tool, Code Dx Version 1.1. Code Dx, a software assurance analytics tool that consolidates and normalizes software vulnerabilities detected by multiple static application security testing (SAST) tools, was developed under a Department of Homeland Security (DHS) Science & Technology (S&T) Directorate Small Business Innovative Research (SBIR) program. Its visual analytics help many engineering professionals – including Software Developers, Security Auditors, Compliance Officers and Quality Assurance engineers - triage and prioritize detected software vulnerabilities for efficient remediation.

Division of Applied Visions, Inc. to continue development of a software assurance risk management framework for supporting static and dynamic code analysis to help secure software developed for government, industry and academia. Secure Decisions, a division of Applied Visions and developer of visual analytic tools for cyber security, has received a Small Business Innovative Research (SBIR) Phase II award from the US Department of Homeland Security (DHS) to improve the security of software applications. Under this DHS Science & Technology (S&T) Directorate contract, Secure Decisions will continue development of the Code Ray™ software assurance risk management framework, to correlate the results of static and dynamic software analysis tools towards the goal of improving software vulnerability detection.

The Journal of Cognitive Engineering and Decision Making welcomes submissions for a special issue on cybersecurity decision making. The security of computing systems and networks affects many aspects of life. Confidentiality, integrity, and availability of information systems impact people’s personal lives, work environments, critical infrastructure, government services, and military operations. Because information systems are interconnected, security decisions made on a personal workstation or workplace system can have direct or cascading effects elsewhere. This special issue of JCEDM will focus on the role of human decision making in cybersecurity: decision processes, approaches to measuring decision outcomes, and methods for improving the effectiveness of cybersecurity decisions.

Easier Detection and Faster Triage of Software Vulnerabilities for Developers, Security Auditors, and Compliance Officers. – Secure Decisions, the cyber  security division of Applied Visions, Inc., today announced the release of Code Dx™ v1.0, a software assurance analytics tool that consolidates and normalizes software vulnerabilities detected by multiple code analysis tools. Its visual analytics help to triage and prioritize software vulnerabilities for efficient remediation. Kevin Greene, Software Assurance Program Manager of DHS S&T Directorate, which funded the initial development of Code Dx, said, “Code Dx provides a way to express weaknesses and vulnerabilities in software in a meaningful and consistent way.”

Secure Decisions, a division of Applied Visions, Inc., and Morgridge Institute for Research have entered into a partnership to advance software assurance initiatives of mutual interest towards the goal of providing an operational environment for assessing the security of  software applications.

Secure Decisions’ new software assurance technology Code Dx will be used by the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) to support the evaluation of static source code analysis tool performance during the fifth Static Analysis Tool Exposition (SATE V) and Workshop.

Division of Applied Visions, Inc. to develop a software assurance risk management framework for supporting static and dynamic code analysis to help secure software developed for government, industry and academia. – Secure Decisions, a division of Applied Visions and developer of visual analytic tools for software assurance and cyber security, has received a Small Business Innovative Research (SBIR) Phase I award under a US Department of Homeland Security (DHS) program.

The Secure Decisions Division of Applied Visions has been awarded the Long Island Software Award. Code Dx^™ was selected as one of “Long Island’s Top Software Products” and will receive the award at the Long Island Software and Technology Network (LISTnet) event to be held on May 1st, 2013.  The Long Island Software Award mission is to “showcase the strength and diversity of Long Island's software industry by recognizing excellence in a wide range of software products”. Secure Decisions has previously won this award for their MeerCAT^®, VIAssist™ and SecureScope^™ products.

The Secure Decisions Division of Applied Visions has released a new version of its wireless network security visualization tool, MeerCAT Pro Version 4.1. MeerCAT^®, a visualization tool to help identify wireless vulnerabilities and threats, and assess the risks to an organization was developed as part of a DARPA-funded research effort. It has helped many security professionals – including information security auditors, penetration vulnerability testers, and computer network defenders – conduct post-hoc analysis of data acquired from wireless site surveys and security audits.

Secure Decisions was featured in the March/April 2013 issue of IEEE Security & Privacy magazine. This special issue of S&P focused on the transition of security technologies from the laboratory and into operations.  An article on page 14 written by Douglas Maughan of DHS Science and Technology, on increasing the success rate of technology transition, listed Secure Decisions as one of 13 organizations with DHS transition successes.

The Department of Homeland Security has chosen to feature Code Dx, software assurance visualization technology developed by the Secure Decisions division of Applied Visions, on its Build Security In website. The DHS National Cyber Security Division maintains the Build Security In site as a resource to software developers, with the mission of “setting a higher standard for software assurance.” Code Dx is the only technology specifically highlighted in the Technologies and Tools section of the site.

Division of Applied Visions, Inc. to develop software assurance tool for supporting dynamic code tracing analysis to help secure software developed for government, industry and academia. Secure Decisions, a division of Applied Visions and developer of visual analytic tools for software assurance and cyber security, has received a Broad Agency Announcement (BAA) award under a US Department of Homeland Security (DHS) program. The company was selected for the software assurance contract by the DHS Science & Technology Directorate Washington, DC. Under the contract, Secure Decisions will develop the Code Pulse™ dynamic code tracing tool, which will complement Secure Decisions Code Dx™ static source code analysis technology.

Michael Rosenstein attended this year's USENIX conference on August 6th, 2012 to deliver a paper written by himself and Frank Corvese on the work they completed for National Cyber Range. The paper, "A Secure Architecture for the Range-Level Command and Control System of a National Cyber Range Testbed" was selected for EXTRA time during presentations at the CSET '12, 5th Workshop on Cyber Security Experimentation and Test held in Bellevue, WA.

The Secure Decisions Division of Applied Visions has released a new version of its wireless network security visualization tool, MeerCAT Pro Version 4.0. MeerCAT, a visualization tool to help identify wireless vulnerabilities and threats, and assess the risks to an organization was developed as part of a DARPA-funded research effort. It has helped many security professionals – including information security auditors, penetration vulnerability testers, and computer network defenders – conduct post-hoc analysis of data acquired from wireless site surveys and security audits.

The Secure Decisions Division of Applied Visions, Inc. will be presenting their newly developed software assurance visualization technology, “Code Dx,” at the Software Assurance Working Group Summer Session on June 28, 2012 at MITRE-1, 7525 Colshire Drive, McLean, VA. The presentation will describe two related Department of Homeland Security (DHS) Science & Technology (S&T) initiatives — Code Dx and TOIF — aimed at using multiple security analysis tools to increase identification and coverage of software weaknesses. KDM Analytics’ Tool Output Integration Framework, “TOIF”, is an open-source standard-based framework for integrating and normalizing code weaknesses reported by multiple detection tools (commercial and open source).

On June 22nd, 2012 Secure Decisions will deliver computer security awareness education as part of a Continuing Law Education (CLE) program offered at the Applied Science Foundation for Homeland Security. The “Protecting Electronic Information in the Law Office” course is designed to educate practicing attorneys about their legal and ethical responsibilities to protect electronically stored information. Secure Decisions will be delivering an interactive educational session that focuses on understanding how easy it is for confidential data to be inadvertently released in the electronic workplace, an essential first step to ensuring adequate protection for electronic information.

Applied Visions, Inc. was featured in a Newsday column on February 23rd, 2012.

Secure Decisions will exhibit three technologies at the USCYERCOM Cyber Flag Industry Day on February 7^th, 2012. The Secure Decisions division of AVI, a provider of research and advanced technology in cyber situational awareness, has been selected to demonstrate its technologies at the U.S. Cyber Command (USCYBERCOM) Cyber Flag Industry Day on Feb. 7. Secure Decisions will exhibit in three technology areas: analytics for wireless threat detection, NetFlow visual analytics, and cyber mission assurance.

Secure Decisions, a division of Applied Visions, has developed a wireless security system that supports real-time monitoring, alerting, analysis, and reporting of IEEE 802.11 (“Wi-Fi”) threats and vulnerabilities. The system was developed under sponsorship of Department of Homeland Security Science and Technology (DHS S&T). Secure Decisions recently completed a 14-month effort to develop “WildCAT”, a turnkey system that provides cost-effective, frequent surveillance of an organization’s IEEE 802.11 (“Wi-Fi”) wireless space. WildCAT streamlines the process of detecting, locating, and analyzing wireless threats and vulnerabilities. It has been designed to be used in a standalone configuration, or to augment a wireless intrusion detection/prevention system (WIDS/WIPS).

Under a DHS S&T Phase II SBIR, the Secure Decisions team will develop a Software Assurance Visual Analysis Tool that visualizes and correlates weaknesses in software. This DHS S&T-funded project will visualize vulnerabilities in software systems, which can be exploited to attack information systems. Some of these vulnerabilities are found as part of systems development and testing, but most are not identified until systems are deployed – when these software vulnerabilities jeopardize the security of other information systems.

A paper titled “Integrating Physical and Cyber Security Resources to Detect Wireless Threats to Critical Infrastructure” was accepted for presentation. A paper written by a team from Secure Decisions was presented as part of the Cyber Security track of the 2011 IEEE International Conference on Technologies for Homeland Security (HST2011) held in Greater Boston, Massachusetts, on November 15-17^th, 2011.

Dr. Anita D’Amico,  an information security  and visualization specialist, Director of the Secure Decisions Division of Applied Visions Inc., was invited to participate in DARPA’s first  Cyber Colloquium on November 7^th, 2011. The DARPA Cyber Colloquium will investigate future techniques and technologies for securing the Nation’s cyber infrastructure and assuring the Department of Defense’s cyber capabilities.

MeerCAT was nominated as a finalist in the Best Intrusion Detection/Prevention Solution category. The Secure Decisions Division of Applied Visions has been selected as a finalist in Government Security News’s (GSN) 2011 Homeland Security Awards Program. The winners’ trophies will be presented at the 2011 awards dinner, which will take place in Washington, DC, on Monday evening, November 14.

SBIR Phase 1 award funds development of new techniques for visual representation of the interdependencies between information networks and the other critical infrastructure upon which they rely for continues operation. The research project, dubbed Cascade, involves design and development of a display system that visually depicts the electronic and physical vulnerabilities of a network, and how those vulnerabilities can be magnified by the network’s dependence on other critical infrastructures (e.g. power).

The Secure Decisions Division of Applied Visions has been awarded the Long Island Software Award. MeerCAT^® was selected as one of “Long Island’s Top Software Products” and received an award at the Long Island Software and Technology Network (LISTnet) event held on May 11th, 2011.  The Long Island Software Award mission is to “showcase the strength and diversity of Long Island's software industry by recognizing excellence in a wide range of software products. Secure Decisions has previously won this award for their VIAssist^™ and SecureScope^™ products.

Division of Applied Visions to advance its visualization technology for state and local cybersecurity preparedness. Secure Decisions, a division of Applied Visions, Inc. and developer of visual analytic tools for cyber defense, has taken residence in the Morrelly Homeland Security Center in Bethpage, NY as a Resident Research Partner.  The Morrelly Center is owned and operated by the Applied Science Foundation for Homeland Security (the Foundation).  The Foundation has been bringing together public and private organizations to accelerate research and development of technology for local and state first responders and law enforcement.

Laurin Buchanan,  a subject matter expert on information security with the Secure Decisions Division of Applied Visions Inc., was invited to participate in NITRD’s Cyber Security Assumption Buster Workshop on Defense-in-Depth (DiD) on March 22nd, 2011. The workshop was the first in a series of four cybersecurity workshops conducted by The Federal Special Cyber Operations Research and Engineering (SCORE) Interagency Working Group.

Secure Decisions, a division of Applied Visions, Inc. (AVI) and developer of visual cyber defense and decision support tools, today announced that its MeerCAT-FS product has been granted the Authority to Operate (ATO) on U.S Department of Defense information systems. MeerCAT-FS obtained the ATO under the Department of Defense Information Assurance Accreditation and Certification Process (DIACAP).

Wireless security visualization product is available for U.S. Government users on Naval Research Laboratory website. Secure Decisions, a division of Applied Visions, Inc., has released a government off-the-shelf (GOTS) version of MeerCAT to the U.S. Naval Research Laboratory (NRL) in Washington, DC. MeerCAT is a visual analytics tool that helps users locate and assess the security risks of IEEE 802.11 wireless networks. The GOTS version, known as MeerCAT-FS, was initially developed under a Defense Advanced Research Project Agency (DARPA) SBIR award.

Controller, Operations Manager and Facility Security Officer positions are filled in this expanding small business. Significant changes have occurred in the day-to-day management of Applied Visions Inc., the software engineering and research and development firm headquartered in Northport. Ms. Cathleen Ebert-Velardi has taken on the positions of Operations Manager and Facility Security Officer (FSO), and Ms. Kelly Bostwick has been promoted to Controller.

Secure Decisions invites IAE participants to select name for new SwA visualization tool. Secure Decisions, a division of Applied Visions, Inc. (AVI) and developer of visual cyber defense and decision support tools, is seeking the perfect name for its forthcoming software assurance (SwA) visual analysis product. Secure Decisions will be holding the product-naming contest at the 2011 Information Assurance Exposition (IAE) on March 8-10 at the Gaylord Opryland Convention Center in Nashville, TN. All 2011 IAE attendees are invited to participate.

Division of Applied Visions on winning team led by ATC-NY to develop interactive visualizations to improve acquisition of forensic analysis skills. Secure Decisions, a division of Applied Visions, Inc. (AVI) and developer of visual cyber defense and decision support tools, has been awarded a contract to support the development of a new digital forensics training system for the U.S. Air Force. As a member of the ATC-NY team that won the Phase II SBIR project, Secure Decisions is developing the visualization technology that will be integrated into the online forensic training program known as Alcuin.

8TH International Symposium on Visualization for Cyber Security to be held at Carnegie Mellon University in Pittsburgh, PA. Organizers of VizSec2011, the international conference on information visualization for cybersecurity, today announced its “Call for Papers”. The 8th Annual International Symposium on Visualization for Cyber Security (VizSec) will be held July 20, 2011 at Carnegie Mellon University in Pittsburgh, PA. VizSec2011 will be held in conjunction with the Symposium on Usable Privacy and Security (SOUPS 2011).

VizSec, the international conference on information visualization for cybersecurity, announced its Organizing Committee Chairs for the 8th Annual International Symposium on Visualization for Cyber Security (VizSec2011). The top-tier list brings together experts in information visualization and security to provide the only international forum on innovations in visualization technology to advance cyber security. This year’s event will be held July 20, 2011 at Carnegie Mellon University in Pittsburgh, PA, in conjunction with the Symposium on Usable Privacy and Security (SOUPS 2011).

Secure Decisions, a division of Applied Visions, Inc. and developer of visual cyber defense and decision support tools, has received a Broad Agency Announcement award from the Office of Naval Research (ONR). Under the ONR contract, Secure Decisions will model the decision processes of computer network defenders in the U.S. Navy.

Division of Applied Visions selected by LIFT to help physical security forces identify suspicious wireless intrusion under the U.S. Department of Homeland Security program. Secure Decisions, working with the Long Island Forum for Technology (LIFT), has been awarded a contract funded by the U.S. Department of Homeland Security (DHS).  Under the project called “WildCAT,” Secure Decisions will conduct research on detecting rogue wireless access points near high-value targets. The work includes instrumenting security patrol cars with wireless intrusion detection tools to detect unauthorized wireless devices near critical infrastructure.

Secure Decisions, a division of Applied Visions, Inc. and developer of visual analytic tools for cyber defense, has joined the Chesapeake Innovation Center (CIC) in Anne Arundel County, MD to accelerate the development and use of new cyber security visualization technology. The Center’s proximity to the U.S. Department of Homeland Security (DHS), Fort Meade, and defense and intelligence agencies, will allow Secure Decisions to better serve its government clients.

Visualization system correlates vulnerabilities from multiple software analysis tools to improve software security. Researchers from Secure Decisions, a division of Applied Visions, Inc. and developer of visual analytic tools for cyber defense, presented “Visual Analysis of Code Security” at the 7th International Symposium on Visualization for Cyber Security (VizSec 2010). The symposium draws researchers and practitioners in information visualization and security and focuses on new visualization techniques to solve cyber security problems.

Division of Applied Visions, Inc. to adapt its network security visualization product VIAssist™ to improve the identification of cyber threats for Air Force analysts. Secure Decisions, a division of Applied Visions and developer of visual analytic tools for cyber defense, has received a Broad Agency Announcement (BAA) award under the US Air Force Firestarter program. The company was selected for the cyber defense contract by the Air Force Research Laboratory in Rome, NY. Under the contract, Secure Decisions will modify its VIAssist product to augment the analysis of security information and event management data.

Division of Applied Visions to deliver, maintain and support GOTS version of its wireless security assessment tool for government users of Flying Squirrel. Secure Decisions, a division of Applied Visions, Inc. and developer of visual analytic tools for cyber defense, has received an U.S. Naval Research Laboratory (NRL) Broad Agency Announcement (BAA) award. Under the contract, Secure Decisions will deliver MeerCAT-FS, a government off-the-shelf (GOTS) version of the company’s wireless security visualization tool.

Secure Decisions award-winning network security visualization product will be presented by Netezza at ArcSight Protect ’10, being held at the Gaylord National Resort & Convention Center in National Harbor, MD on September 19-22, 2010.

Division of Applied Visions, Inc. is the only New York company participating in this program in support of the nation’s cyber security. The Secure Decisions Division of Applied Visions, Inc. (AVI) has been awarded a contract of approximately $1 million to support the Phase II development of the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA)-sponsored National Cyber Range (NCR) program. The Range will be a national asset for evaluating technologies to enhance the security of our country's cyber infrastructure.

DARPA singles out wireless security technology developed by Applied Visions, Inc. division as one of its success stories for 2010. The MeerCAT^® wireless analysis tool depicts network usage patterns and potential vulnerabilities. For the second time in its history, the Secure Decisions Division of Applied Visions has been honored by DARPA for its small business success gallery. The Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA), research and development arm of the U.S. Department of Defense (DoD), selected MeerCAT, along with a few other select DARPA-sponsored projects, to receive this recognition.

A Secure Decisions paper will be presented at the New Learning Technologies Conference 2010 sponsored by the Society for Learning Technology in Orlando. The paper reviews successful uses of Domain-Specific Language Systems and illustrates how the method can be more widely employed to facilitate just-in-time workplace courseware. Effective, less costly just-in-time workplace courseware remains an elusive goal.  Given limited instructional design resources, alternatives more fully integrated with day-to-day knowledge work processes hold promise.  A paper titled "Diamonds in the Sawdust: Courseware as Reusable Task Artifacts Orchestrated by Domain-Specific Language Systems" will be presented by Secure Decisions analyst Mark Underwood at the New Learning Technologies Conference 2010.

"Software is a mature discipline, yet more than 98 percent of all PCs have one or more vulnerable programs, and in the US there are 2.7 billion programs open for attack."  That was the startling fact cited by Secure Decisions in their proposal for a recently awarded project with the Department of Homeland Security’s Science and Technology Directorate.  Secure Decisions, a division of Applied Visions, has been awarded the first phase of the DHS research contract under the Small Business Innovation Research (SBIR) program.

A paper authored by a team of Secure Decisions researchers has been accepted for presentation at the Fifth International Conference on Information Warfare and Security (ICIW)  to be held at the Air Force Institute of  Technology, Wright-Patterson AFB in Dayton, Ohio. The presentation by Anita D'Amico, Laurin Buchanan, John Goodall and Paul Walczak at the April 2010 conference is titled "Mission Impact of Cyber Events: Scenarios and Ontology to Express the Relationships between Cyber Assets, Missions and Users."

The 2009 Military Communications Conference (MILCOM) was the setting for a presentation by Secure Decisions entitled "CAMUS: Automatically Mapping Cyber Assets to Missions and Users." Beneath the banner of this year's theme "The Challenge of Convergence," the annual MILCOM conference featured military, government and homeland security specialists.

A white paper authored by Ron Keys and Larry McKee proposes a different approach to improve situation awareness for cyber defense.  In their paper titled "Concept for Possible Cyberspace Shared Situational Awareness Joint Concept Technology Demonstration," Keys and McKee argue that most current approaches are focused on technology rather than processes.

Dr. Anita D'Amico's testimony before the U.S. House Science and Technology Subcommittee on Research and Education last June is the subject of a recent APA story. Appearing in the September 2009 (Vol 40:8) issue of Monitor (print and online), the APA's Geoff Mumford reported on Dr. D'Amico's attempt to underscore "that psychology must play a key role in the evolution of cyber security."

Anita D'Amico, Director of the Secure Decisions division and a human factors psychologist, gave testimony before the Subcommittee on Research and Science Education of the House Committee on Science and Technology on cybersecurity research and development.

A report appearing shortly after the House Science and Technology Committee's Research and Science Education subcommittee hearings on cybersecurity research repeated several recommendations by Secure Decisions.  The report, published by Federal Computer Week, summarized the testimony of several experts from industry and academica, concluding that all agreed upon the need for the government's involvement in cybersecurity research, development and education programs to be expanded.

Dr. Anita D’Amico, Director of the Applied Visions’ Secure Decisions Division, today provided expert testimony before the House Committee on Science and Technology, Subcommittee on Research and Science Education at a hearing entitled “Cyber Security R&D” which addressed issues of education, public-private partnerships, and research and development for cyber security to help combat the increased risks of cyber threats. Dr. D’Amico discussed the need for a multi-disciplinary approach to technology and security, involving the social sciences to improve the usability and security of technology by understanding how it is actually used by people. Continuing her focusing on the people and process side of Information Security, she spoke of the need for mentorship in training the next generation of cyber warriors. She also addressed questions from the Subcommittee regarding cyber security research and the state of security education at the university level and for the general public.

The Secure Decisions division of Applied Visions, Inc. conducted a workshop on mapping cyber assets to missions and users. The workshop addressed how to map the relationships between cyber assets such as network devices and the users, missions, business processes and other entities that depend on those assets. This mapping will enable computer network defense (CND), information technology (IT) and disaster recovery (DR) practitioners to understand the impact of the loss or degradation a cyber asset.

Dr. Anita D’Amico, Director of the Secure Decisions Division of Applied Visions, Inc., has been invited to participate on the Defense Advanced Research Project Agency (DARPA) panel at the 2008 SBIR Beyond Phase II Conference hosted by the Department of Defense.

DARPA recognizes Secure Decisions technology as having provided significant value to the warfighter. In 2007, the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) published a catalog of DARPA Success Stories.

'Balancing Interactive Data Management of Massive Data with Situational Awareness through Smart Aggregation' published in the IEEE Symposium on Visual Analytics Science and Technology (VAST) Conference Proceedings

SBIR Research Project Creates Mapping between Military Missions and the Cyber Assets Required to Complete Those Missions. The Secure Decisions division of Applied Visions, Inc. has been awarded the first phase of an Air Force research contract, under the Small Business Innovation Research (SBIR) Program, to improve the effectiveness of computer network defenders in protecting critical cyber assets. Secure Decisions will research and develop the Cyber Asset-to-Mission Mapping Model (CAM3), a system to automatically relate cyber assets to higher-level network capabilities and missions dependent upon those assets.

The Secure Decisions division of Applied Visions, Inc. has been awarded the first phase of an Air Force research contract, under the Small Business Innovation Research (SBIR) Program, to develop new tools and techniques for training cyber warriors. Secure Decisions will research and develop SimBLEND (Simulation-Based Learning Environment for Network Defense), an innovative training environment integrating game-based simulations and computer-based courseware for training Computer Network Defense (CND) specialists.

Secure Decisions visualization product offering recognized at annual awards banquet for excellence among Long-Island based software technology offerings. Long Island Software and Technology Network (LISTnet) announced its 2007 LISA award winners. Among the winners was VIAssist, a Secure Decisions product that helps computer security specialists protect their networks. LISTnet's 2007 Long Island Software Awards – LISA WinnerVIAssist presents massive amounts of network traffic and security event data as synchronized visual representations.

SBIR Research Project Will Develop a Visual Analytics System for Visualizing Mobile Cyber Assets. The Secure Decisions division of Applied Visions, Inc. has been awarded the second phase of Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) research contract, under the Small Business Innovation Research (SBIR) Program, to improve the effectiveness of computer network managers in detecting and managing mobile cyber assets that are connected to the networks under their control. Secure Decisions will research and develop a Mobile Cyber Asset Tracking system, called MeerCAT, that will provide an integrated visual analytics environment for analysis of mobile cyber assets from a variety of data sources.

SecureScope received an Honorable Mention distinction at the eleventh annual IEEE Symposium on Information Visualization. InfoVis is the primary meeting in the field of information visualization, held in conjunction with the IEEE Visualization 2005 (Vis05) conference.