Military personnel are facing an increasing security threat posed by their smart phones and other mobile devices, argues an article on DefenseSystems.com. While the potential of mobile devices to leak personal secrets has been a cause for concern for all, the issue has the potential to be devestating for soldiers who could unwittingly leak crucial information to the enemy through compromised networks.

In the article, our very own Richard Forno, graduate program director for cybersecurity, shares his own concerns about cloud safety:

“One key area of emerging concern is data-in-motion within a cloud — i.e., ensuring that data is protected as it transits and/or exists in multiple servers at the same time, and by extension, the issue of ‘availability’ of data in a cloud environment,” Forno said. “The more moving parts you have to deal with, the easier it is to gum up the works, inadvertently cause self-inflicted problems, or make it easier for an adversary to do the same thing.”

Check out the entire article: "Smart phones pose emerging security threat."

Congratulations to CSEE Professor Tulay Adali, who has been named a 2012 IEEE Signal Processing Society Distinguished Lecturer. Nominated by the Machine Learning for Signal Processing Technical Committee, Dr. Adali is one of only five Distinguished Lecturers appointed this year.

The position commits Dr. Adali to travel around to world to present her current research, which focuses on data-driven and complex-valued signal processing and their applications in medical image analysis.

Her lectures will revolve around the following topics:

• Data-driven Analysis and Fusion of Medical Imaging Data
• Complex-valued Adaptive Signal Processing: When and How to Take Noncircularity into Account
• ICA, ISA, and IVA: Theory, Connections, and Applications in Medical Image Analysis
• Optimization in the Complex Domain using Wirtinger Calculus: Applications to ICA
• Joint Blind Source Separation: Applications in Medical Image Analysis

“My research group,theMachine Learning for Signal Processing Lab [MLSP-Lab], has been conducting research in two of the most active areas in my field: data-driven signal processing and medical image analysis and fusion,” explains Dr. Adali. “I am looking forward to telling a wider audience than I have in the past about the exciting research results we have, as well as better introducing these important areas to new audiences.”

The appointment will last from January 1, 2012 until the end of December 2013.

Jaws Film Screening

Student Events Board
Thursday, March 1, 2012
10:00pm
Shuttle from The Commons Circle begins @ 9:00pm
All Guests = $3.00

Ticket #: 2

Norouz

Persian Student Association

Saturday, March 3, 201

8:00pm

University Center, Ballroom

UMBC ID = FREE (limit 1 per ID)

General Admission = $15.00

Ticket #: 38

fun.

Student Events Board

Sunday, March 4, 2012

8:00pm (doors open at 7:00pm)

University Center, Ballroom

All Guests = $10.00 (must show UMBC or photo ID)

Ticket #: 1355

D. C. Bus Trip

Student Events Board

March 31, 2012

Bus departs The Commons Circle @ 10:00am

All Guests = $15.00

Ticket #: 39

Thanks to NPR

Is the air in your neighborhood toxic?

For thousands of Americans the answer to that question is “yes”.

Americans living near power plants endure cancerous pollutants and the subsequent illnesses due to the compromised atmosphere.

The evidence is staggering. Now citizens are increasingly demanding the Environment Protection agency (EPA) live up to its name.

A particular case is in Tonawanda, NY . Jeani Thomson who survived multiple cancers has rallied for over 30 years asking the EPA to notice the needs of her community:

Her voice has that raspy smokers sound although she has never had a cigarette.

On the other hand, there are problems regulating toxic emissions…particularly if the monitoring is left to the polluting companies themselves.

Coincidentally, a documentary was just released that is sure to make a splash discusses “one of the largest water contamination incidents in US history,”which, to boot, harmed our own service men and women.

It appears the much maligned (and under staffed) EPA has got its work cut out for it.

EE Graduate Seminar

Spectrum Wars: LightSquared vs. GPS

Professor Chuck LaBerge
Professor of the Practice, CSEE Dept/UMBC

11:30am-12:45pm Friday, 2 March 2012, ITE 231

The radio-frequency spectrum is a limited resource. Within the US, commercial use of the spectrum is administered by the Federal Communications Commission (FCC), while government use of the spectrum is administered by the National Telecommunications and Information Administration. Currently, the regulatory community is locked in a battle about spectrum utilization in the vicinity of 1.5 GHz. This struggle pits millions of users of GPS technology for position and time information against technical innovators desiring to bring 4G wireless communications to millions of users in underserved populations. So who wins the spectrum wars?

The talk will outline the technologies involved, and provide a time-line of the regulatory actions to date. There are some innovative things going on here, and some simple analysis will show why there are points of contention. A final resolution cannot be provided at this time, because the issue is currently an open discussion in FCC. And, as might expected, there are financial and political ramifications as well.

This talk will provide an interesting insight into how the 'real world' works.

Dr. LaBerge is Professor of the Practice of Electrical and Computer Engineering in the CSEE at UMBC, where he teaches a wide variety of courses ranging from Introductory Circuits to Error Correcting Codes. From 1975-2008, he was employed by Bendix, which became AlliedSignal, which became Honeywell through a series of corporate mergers. He retired in July 2008 as the Senior Fellow for Communications, Navigation, and Surveillance in Honeywell's Aerospace Research and Technology Center.

Dr. LaBerge has worked on precision landing systems and a wide variety of aeronautical radios and applications. He's recognized as an expert in issues involving interference to aeronautical systems. His technical, writing, and editorial contributions have received numerous citations from regulatory bodies, and he was the winner of the Best Paper of Conference at the 2000 IEEE/AIAA Digital Avionics Systems Conference.

Dr. LaBerge is a Senior Member of IEEE, a member of Tau Beta Pi, and an inductee in the Order of the Engineer. He received his BES-EE and MSE-EE, degrees, both with Honors, from The Johns Hopkins University and the PhD. in Electrical Engineering from UMBC. His three kids are older than his students. He's been married to his patient wife for almost 38 years.

Host: Prof. Joel M. Morris