Boise State University partners with Stellar Cyber to offer training program for state-funded organizations

Boise State University and Stellar Cyber announced the university’s Institute for Pervasive Cybersecurity has adopted the Stellar Cyber Open XDR Platform for its Cyberdome skill development program.

The move is expected to help increase the number of graduates while providing enterprise-level Security-as-a-Service to rural and remote communities across the state, improving the cybersecurity posture of these communities.

“The cybersecurity market has evolved rapidly since the beginning of the pandemic, especially when it comes to identifying and developing talented cybersecurity personnel, and providing them an environment where they can make an impact, be challenged and feel successful,” said Edward Vasko, CISSP, Director, at the Boise State Institute for Pervasive Cybersecurity. “Today, Boise State and Stellar Cyber have teamed up to help our partners and our customers resolve these critical challenges.”

Under this partnership, Stellar Cyber will provide its Open XDR Platform for use as both a teaching tool, but also as the center of Boise State’s Cyberdome, available to any rural or remote community that wishes to utilize it. The Cyberdome is Boise State’s newest cyber initiative, a collaborative hub for competency-based training, with the mission of reducing cyber risk in rural communities and helping expand the cyber workforce in sync with Idaho’s business, technology and government sectors. Stellar Cyber’s intuitive dashboard and built-in multi-tenant facilities make it easy for Boise State’s students and mentors to support dozens of different organizations through a single interface.

Already, the City of Sun Valley, Idaho has selected a Security-as-a-Service relationship with Boise State. “Cities and public agencies across the country are increasingly falling victim to sophisticated ransomware attacks, and we want to be fully prepared to address them,” said Walt Femling, City Administrator at the City of Sun Valley. “Boise State’s new Cyberdome program enables us to outsource our cybersecurity preparedness and enhance our protection against such attacks.”

The Stellar Cyber Open XDR Platform is ideally suited for this application, because of its ease of use, suite of built-in tools – including Network Detection and Response (NDR), Security Information Event Management (SIEM), and Threat Intelligence Platform (TIP) – and deep integration with third-party security tools like End-point Detection and Response (EDRs), that students already have been trained to use.

“We see our platform as a great fit for universities that want to accelerate learning and give their students real-world experience in managing cybersecurity operations,” said Jim O’Hara, Chief Revenue Officer at Stellar Cyber. “As a national leader in cybersecurity education, Boise State leverages the Stellar Cyber platform to expand educational opportunities and significantly expand its student base, to meet the critical nationwide demand for cybersecurity professionals.”