Dr. Tirthankar Ghosh

• Position: Professor and Associate Chair
• Department: Computer Science
• Office Location: Building 4, Room 228
• tghosh@uwf.edu
• Campus: 850.474.2137

Biography:

Dr. Tirthankar Ghosh is a Professor and Associate Chair in the Department of Computer Science at UWF. Dr. Ghosh joined UWF in 2018 after spending 13 years at St. Cloud State University in Minnesota as their lead cybersecurity faculty and program director. He has over seventeen years of experience in cybersecurity education and research in network security, ICS security, anomaly detection, and adversary tactics techniques and procedures, and threat intelligence. Dr. Ghosh has received multi-million dollars of grants from NSF, NSA, State of MN, state of FL, and private sectors. He established a funded research lab on industrial control systems using motes from Linear Technologies and Emerson Process Management on St. Cloud campus and has experience in leading several state-funded projects on scenario-based, competency-focused, learner-centric curriculum design using the NIST NICE Cybersecurity Workforce Framework. Dr. Ghosh was the co-founder of a state-wide consortium in Minnesota and a regional cybersecurity consortium in St. Cloud. Dr. Ghosh authored a book titled “Security by Practice: Exercises in Network Security and Information Assurance”, and several journal papers and book chapters. He is also an ABET evaluator for Cybersecurity and Computer Science.

Degrees & Institutions:

Ph.D. Electrical Engineering: Florida International University, Miami, FL
M.S. Computer Engineering: Florida International University, Miami, FL
B.E. Electrical Engineering: Jadavpur University, India

Research:

Threat Intelligence, Intrusion Detection, Autonomous Vehicle Security, Industrial Control Systems Security, Competency-based Curricular Design, Scenario-based Learning in Cybersecurity

Special Interests:

Grant Funding (present and past – last 8 years):

• Building a Sustainable Pathway for Future Cybersecurity Workforce Through Industry Collaboration, Apprenticeships, and Articulation (PI) – funded by Cyber Florida/Florida Department of Education, $489,437, August 2022 – August 2023.
• Connected Vehicle Security Metrics and Threat Intelligence (co-PI) – funded by the Florida Department of Transportation, $278,503.00, March 2022 – January 2024.
• CAE-C Educational Innovation: The NCAE Cybersecurity Curriculum Commission: A Strategic Approach to Building High-Quality, High-Impact Cybersecurity Curriculum for the Nation – funded by the National Security Agency/CAE-C (PI), $97,911, October 2021 – September 2023.
• CAE-C Faculty Development (PI) – funded by National Security Agency, $236,636. October 2020 – September 2022.
• CAE-C Workforce Development (co-PI) – Funded by National Security Agency, $6,000,000. October 2020 – September 2022. 
• Enabling Cyber and Electronic Warfare Advantage Through Cutting-edge Research on Emerging Technologies and Innovative Cybersecurity Scenario-based Training  (co-PI) – Funded by Office of Naval Research (ONR), $249,642. October 2020 – September 2021. Office of Naval Research.
• GenCyber: summer camps on cyber security - Guiding Cyber Mentors (PI) – funded by National Security Agency and National Science Foundation, $50,716.00. 2020 – 2022.
• CyberCorps: Scholarship for Service – Argo Cyber Emerging Scholars Program (ACES) (co-PI) – funded by National Science Foundation, $2.40 million. January 2020 – December 2024.
• GenCyber: summer camps on cyber security - Guiding Cyber Mentors (PI) – funded by National Security Agency and National Science Foundation, $48,711.00. April 2019 – March 2020.
• Competency-based Collaborative Curriculum Development in Cybersecurity (PI), funded by MN IT Center of Excellence, $15,500.00, July 2017 – June 2018.
• GenCyber: summer camps on cyber security (PI) – funded by National Security Agency and National Science Foundation, $100,000.00. May 2016 – December 2016.
• CyberCorps: Scholarship for Service to create a collaborative learning environment between St. Cloud State University and Community Colleges (PI) – funded by National Science Foundation, $3.00 million. January 2015 – December 2019.
• GenCyber: summer camps on cyber security (PI) – funded by National Science Foundation, $150,000.00. January 2015 – December 2015.

Publications:

• Univariate and Bivariate Entropy Analysis for Modbus Traffic over TCP/IP in Industrial Control Systems – accepted for publication in IJCA, September 2022.
• Entropy Analysis for Modbus Traffic over TCP/IP in Industrial Control Systems, in Proc of Computer and its Applications Conference (CATA 2022), March 21, 2022. 
• Analysis of Evolutionary Algorithm Based Optimization for Cyber Threat Modeling, in proc of Southeastconn 2022, Mobile, AL, March 31 – April 2, 2022.
• Assessing Competencies Using Scenario-based Learning in Cybersecurity. Journal of Cybersecurity and Privacy. 2021, 1, pp. 539–552. September 2021.
• Stackable Cybersecurity Pathway Credentials Through Digital Badging – in proc of the 17th International Conference on Frontiers in Education: Computer Science & Computer Engineering, FECS'21: July 26-29, 2021, Las Vegas, USA.
• Cybersecurity Scenario Builder and Retrieval Toolkit. Springer Nature, 2021, https://link.springer.com/chapter/10.1007%2F978-3-030-50244-7_14.
• Multi-stage Detection Techniques for DNS-based Botnets using Bro Scripting. In Proc of Computer and its Applications (CATA’19), March 18-20, 2019, Honolulu, Hawaii.
• Performance Evaluation of Multi-hop WirelessHART Network on a Real-life Testbed. Transactions on Networks and Communications, Society of Science and Education, vol 6(1), Feb 2018.
• Security by Practice: Exercises in Network Security and Information Assurance, Lulu Publishing Services, ISBN: 978-1-4834-6165-6, December 2016.