In recent years, there has been a growing demand for cybersecurity experts, and, according to predictions, this demand will continue to increase. Cyber Ranges can fill this gap by combining hands-on experience with educational courses, and conducting cybersecurity competitions. In this paper, we conduct a systematic survey of ten Cyber Ranges that were developed in the last decade, with a structured interview. The purpose of the interview is to find details about essential components, and especially the tools used to design, create, implement and operate a Cyber Range platform, and to present the findings.

A Smart Campus is a miniature of a Smart City with a more demanding framework that enables learning, social interaction and creativity. To ensure a Smart Campus uninterruptible secure operation, a key requirement is that daily routines and activities are performed protected in an environment monitored unobtrusively by a robust surveillance system. The various components that compose such an environment, buildings, labs, public spaces, smart lighting, smart parking, or even smart traffic lights, require us to focus on surveillance systems, and recognize which detection activities to establish. In this paper, we perform a comparative assessment in the area of surveillance systems for Smart Campuses. A proposed taxonomy for IoT-enabled Smart Campus unfold five research dimensions: (1) physical infrastructure; (2) enabling technologies; (3) software analytics; (4) system security; and (5) research methodology. By applying this taxonomy and by adopting a weighted scoring model on the surveyed systems, we first present the state-of-the-art, and then we make a comparative assessment and classify the systems. We extract valuable conclusions and inferences from this classification, providing insights and directions towards required services offered by surveillance systems for Smart Campus.

The majority of systems rely on user authentication on passwords, but passwords have so many weaknesses and widespread use that easily raise significant security concerns, regardless of their encrypted form. Users hold the same password for different accounts, administrators never check password files for flaws that might lead to a successful cracking, and the lack of a tight security policy regarding regular password replacement are a few problems that need to be addressed. The proposed research work aims at enhancing this security mechanism, prevent penetrations, password theft, and attempted break-ins towards securing computing systems. The selected solution approach is two-folded; it implements a two-factor authentication scheme to prevent unauthorized access, accompanied by Honeyword principles to detect corrupted or stolen tokens. Both can be integrated into any platform or web application with the use of QR codes and a mobile phone.

Despite the rapid development of technology, computer systems still rely heavily on passwords for security, which can be problematic. Although multi-factor authentication has been introduced, it is not completely effective against more advanced attacks. To address this, this study proposes a new two-factor authentication method that uses honeytokens. Honeytokens and Google Authenticator are combined to create a stronger authentication process. The proposed approach aims to provide additional layers of security and protection to computer systems, increasing their overall security beyond what is currently provided by single-password or standard two-factor authentication methods. The key difference is that the proposed system resembles a two-factor authentication but, in reality, works like a multi-factor authentication system. Multi-factor authentication (MFA) is a security technique that verifies a user’s identity by requiring multiple credentials from distinct categories. These typically include knowledge factors (something the user knows, such as a password or PIN), possession factors (something the user has, such as a mobile phone or security token), and inherence factors (something the user is, such as a biometric characteristic like a fingerprint). This multi-tiered approach significantly enhances protection against potential attacks. We examined and evaluated our system’s robustness against various types of attacks. From the user’s side, the system is as friendly as a two-factor authentication method with an authenticator and is more secure.