Preparing Virginia’s Workforce to Secure the Nation’s Election Infrastructure

Principal Investigator:

Massimiliano Albanese, associate director, Center for Secure Information Systems, George Mason University

Preparing Virginia’s Workforce to Secure the Nation’s Election Infrastructure

Fair and secure elections are the backbone of democracy, and threats to their integrity disenfranchise voters and undermine confidence in democratic institutions. 

Threats to election infrastructure were demonstrated by a number of documented security incidents during the 2016 election. 

In 2017, the Department of Homeland Security classified election infrastructure as critical infrastructure. Securing systems that support elections at the federal, state, and local level is as important as securing such vital systems as energy or transportation.  

George Mason University recently joined a coalition of seven Virginia universities and colleges partnering with the Virginia Department of Elections to create and manage the Virginia Cyber Navigator Internship Program. Its goal is to educate students on how to protect our critical election infrastructure through a combination of in-class learning and experiential learning opportunities. 

Students participating in the program must take a gateway course on election security. Selected students are offered a 10-week paid internship with the Virginia Department of Elections. They’ll work in teams supervised by a faculty mentor. 

The program has been successful for Mason and has exceeded expectations both in terms of students enrolled in the course and in qualified internship applicants.

This proposal seeks to expand the election security program at Mason by increasing the number of supported interns, expanding the pool of faculty involved as mentors, and creating an annual Election Security Workshop.

This project, among nine experiential learning projects funded for fiscal year 2022-23, is a part of CCI's strategy to provide students with industry experience and enhance their skill sets to better prepare them to enter the cybersecurity workforce.