M.S. in Security Engineering

Introduction

Security Engineering is the computer science and engineering discipline concerned with the design and development of secure systems and applications. Security Engineering covers security of computer networks and systems as well as physical security. In addition to the technical aspects such as cryptography, protocols, and access control, the curriculum deals with the policy and management issues, integration and logistics and budgeting. Centering on the problems of working professionals in the critical field of security, the SMU program in Security Engineering serves the needs of both the full-time and part-time students.

The program requires 30 hours of coursework consisting of 12 hours of core courses and 18 hours of electives.

Admission Requirements

• Bachelor's degree in one of the quantitative sciences, mathematics, or computer science, or in one of the engineering disciplines.
• G.P.A. of at least 3.00 out of 4.00 scale in previous undergraduate and graduate study.
• A minimum of one year of college-level calculus.
• A minimum of one year of experience in software/network development and/or maintenance.
• Satisfactory TOEFL scores for students where English is not the primary language.

Degree Requirements

Thirty term-credit hours of graduate courses with a minimum graduate G.P.A. of 3.00 on a 4.00 scale.

Satisfactory completion of the core curriculum encompassing four courses:

CSE 7339 Computer System Security
CSE 7343 Operating Systems and Systems Software
CSE 7349 Data and Network Security
CSE 7359 Software Security

Satisfactory completion of three advanced elective courses from the following list:

CSE 7314 Software Testing and Quality Assurance
EMIS 7340 Logistics Systems Engineering
CSE 8316 User Interface Design
CSE 8317 Software Reliability and Safety
CSE 8331 Data Mining
CSE 8349 Advanced Network Security
EE 8372/CSE 8352 Cryptography and Data Security
CSE 8377 Fault Tolerant Computing

Satisfactory completion of three elective courses from available graduate-level course offerings in the school of engineering and from the following list of special topic courses with approval from the program director or the department chair.

CSE 8394 (Special Topic) Nano-Security
CSE 8395 (Special Topic) Border and Transportation Security

Articulation

All students entering the program are expected to possess knowledge in the following core areas:

• Discrete Computational Structures
• Programming Languages
• Data Structures and Algorithms
• Computer Architecture
• Computer Networks

Students entering the program with an undergraduate degree other than computer science will be asked to take an articulation course, CSE 5311, Fundamentals of Computer Science, to satisfy core competency in the above topic areas. CSE 5311 does not count toward the 30-hour degree requirement.

Students without CS undergraduate degrees and asked to CSE 5311 as an articulation course will receive conditional admission to the program. Students must receive a grade of B or better in CSE 5311 to continue in the program.