Education

North Carolina State University, Raleigh, NC

Ph.D., Computer Science, May 2019

Dissertation: Network Access Control through Host and Application Analysis

Advisor: Dr. William Enck

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North Carolina State University, Raleigh, NC

M.S., Computer Science, May 2008

Thesis: Bluetooth Misuse Detection

Advisor: Dr. Douglas Reeves

 

SANS Technology Institute, Bethesda, MD

M.S., Information Security Engineering, 2012

Focus: Digital Forensics

Advisor: Dr. Ray Davidson

 

US Military Academy, West Point, NY

B.S., Computer Science, May 1999

Thesis: Denial of Service Prevention

Advisor: Dr. Jim Jensen

 

Academic and Research Appointments

 

Program Chair, Information Assurance and Cybersecurity, Florida Tech, 2019-Present

Assistant Professor, Computer Sciences and Cybersecurity, Florida Tech, 2019-Present

Department Head, Army ROTC, Military Studies, Florida Tech, 2015-2019

Assistant Professor, US Military Academy, Dept. of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science, 2010-2011

Instructor, US Military Academy, Dept. of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science, 2008-2010

 

Military Assignments

 

Asst. Chief of Staff, G6 Communications, 1st Special Forces Command, 2014-2015

Directorate Signal Officer, Office of Special Warfare, 2013-2014

Group Signal Officer, 10th Special Forces Group, 2011-2013

Battalion Signal Officer, 1/7 Special Forces Battalion, 2003-2006

Battalion Signal Officer, 1/2 Attack Helicopter Battalion, 2000-2002

Platoon Leader, 57th Signal Battalion, 1999-2000

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Selected Publications

1. O'Connor, T.J., Schmith, A., Stricklan, C., Carvalho, M., Sudhakaran, S. "Pwn Lessons Made Easy With Docker: Toward an Undergraduate Vulnerability Research Cybersecurity Class." Technical Symposium on Computer Science Education (SIGCSE TS 24), Portland, OR, March 2024. (acceptance rate=33%) [bib] [pdf]

2. Gough, C., Mann, C., Ficke, C., Namukasa, M., Carroll, M., O'Connor, T.J. "Remote Controlled Cyber: Toward Engaging and Educating a Diverse Cybersecurity Workforce." Technical Symposium on Computer Science Education (SIGCSE TS 24), Portland, OR, March 2024. (acceptance rate=33%) [bib] [pdf]

3. O'Connor, T.J., Mann, C., Petersen, T., Thomas, I., Stricklan, C. "Toward an Automatic Exploit Generation Competition for an Undergraduate Binary Reverse Engineering Course." Innovation and Technology in Computer Science Education (ITiCSE 2022), Dublin, Ireland, July 2022. ACM. (acceptance rate=29%) [bib] [pdf​]

4. O'Connor, T.J. "Helo darkside: Breaking free from katas and embracing the adversarial mindset in cybersecurity education." Technical Symposium on Computer Science Education (SIGCSE TS 2022), Providence, RI, March 2022. ACM.. [bib] [pdf]

5. O'Connor, T.J., Stricklan, C. "Teaching a hands-on mobile and wireless cybersecurity course." Innovation and Technology in Computer Science Education (ITiCSE 2021), Virtual Event, June 2021. ACM. (acceptance rate=31%) [bib] [pdf]

6. Janes, B., Crawford, H., O'Connor, T.J. "Never ending story: Authentication and access control design flaws in shared IoT devices." Security and Privacy SafeThings Workshop (SafeThings 2020), Virtual Event, May 2020. IEEE. [bib] [pdf

7. O'Connor, T.J., Enck, W., Reaves, B. "Blinded and confused: Uncovering systemic flaws in device telemetry for smart-home internet of things." Conference on Security and Privacy in Wireless and Mobile Networks (WiSec 2019), Miami, FL, May 2019. ACM. (acceptance rate=25.6%, Best Paper)   [bib] [pdf]

8. O'Connor, T.J., Mohamed, R., Miettinen, M., Enck, W., Reaves, B., Sadeghi, A.-R. "Homesnitch: Behavior transparency and control for smart home IoT devices." Conference on Security and Privacy in Wireless and Mobile Networks (WiSec 2019), Miami, FL, May 2019. ACM. (acceptance rate=25.6%) [bib] [pdf]

9. O'Connor, T.J., Enck, W., Petullo, W.M., Verma, A. "Pivotwall: SDN-based information flow control." Symposium on SDN Research (SoSR 2018), San Francisco, CA, March 2018. ACM.(acceptance rate=28.6%) [bib] [pdf]

10. O'Connor, T.J., Sangster, B. "honeym: A framework for implementing virtual honey clients for mobile devices." Conference on Security and Privacy in Wireless and Mobile Networks (WiSec 2010), Hoboken, NJ, March 2010. ACM.(acceptance rate=21%) [bib] [pdf]

11. O'Connor, T.J., Reeves, D. "Bluetooth network-based misuse detection." Annual Computer Security Applications Conference (ACSAC 2008), Anaheim, CA, December 2008. ACSAC. (acceptance rate=24%) [bib] [pdf]

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Service

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• Co-Chair, The Human Element in Autonomous Cyber Security Workshop (2021)

• Organizing Committee Member, ACM Special Interest Group on Computer Science Education (SIGCSE) (2024)

• Program Committee Member, USENIX Workshop on Cyber Security Experimentation and Test (2020, 2021)

• Program Committee Member, Silicon Valley Cybersecurity Conference (2021-2023)

• Program Committee Member, ACM Innovation and Technology in Computer Science Education (ITiCSE) (2022, 2023)

• Program Committee Member, ACM SIGCSE (2022)

• Program Committee Member, Conference on Security and Privacy in Wireless and Mobile Networks (WISEC) (2023)

• Program Committee Member, IoT Security and Cyber Threat Intelligence (2023)

• Program Committee Member, International Workshop on Cyberspace Security and Artificial Intelligence (CAI) (2023)

• Reviewer, ACM Transactions on Internet of Things (2019, 2020)

• Reviewer, ACM Transactions on Security and Privacy (2020)

• Reviewer, IEEE Transactions on Industrial Informatics (2020)

• Reviewer, ACM Transactions on Dependable and Secure Computing (2021)

• Reviewer, National Science Foundation (NSF) (twice in 2022)

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Honors

 

• Kerry Bruce Clark Award for Excellence in Teaching, Florida Tech, 2024

• Teaching Award, Department of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science, Florida Tech, 2023

• Best Student Paper Award, Computing Conference, 2023

• Professor of the Year Award, Florida Tech Student Government Association, 2022

• Best Faculty Award, International Student Community, Florida Tech, 2020

• Best Paper Award, ACM Workshop on Security and Privacy in Wireless and Mobile Networks (WiSec), 2019

• National Cybersecurity Innovation Award, March 2013

• Excellence in Education: Clark K Ray Award, US Military Academy Department of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science (D/EECS), May 2010

• Bronze Star, Operation Enduring Freedom, US Army, June 2004

• Bronze Order of Mercury, US Army Signal Regiment, May 2010

• Cyber Challenge Champion, National Defense University, 2009

• National Cyber League Championships Winning Coach, 2021, 2022

• NSA Cyber Defense Exercise Winning Co-Coach, 2009, 2011

• SANS NetWars Competition Record High Score, 2012

Affiliations

 

• Upsilon Pi Epsilon Honor Society

• Special Operations Support (K9) Identifier

• Association for Computers and Machinery, Member

• Wolfpack Security and Privacy Research Lab

 

Professional Activities

 

• Head Coach, US Cyber Games National Team, 2021-2022 Season

• SANS Institute Cyber Guardian Red and Blue Teams, 2011-Present

• Northeast Regional Collegiate Cyber Defense Competition (NECCDC), Red Team, 2010-2011

• Southeast Regional Collegiate Cyber Defense Competition (SECCDC), Red Team, 2016-2019

• Southeast Regional Collegiate Cyber Defense Competition (SECCDC) Director, 2024.

• Cyber Patriot (National Youth Cyber Education Program), Mentor, 2015-2016

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Public Speaking

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1. O'Connor, T.J. [2024]. Teaching Pwn in the Classroom. Presented at the NSA Center of Academic Excellence Cyber Operations Workshop, April 15.

2. Skoudis, E., O'Connor, T.J., Swenson, M., Rubler, L., & Willkerson, B. [2024]. SANS Orlando Featured Keynote Panel Discussion: Ask the Experts: How to Grow Your Success in Cybersecurity. March 25.

3. O'Connor, T.J. [2023]. Pwn My Ride: Introduction to Aarch64 Return Oriented Programming. Guest Lecture, US Military Academy, West Point, NY, October 24.

4. O'Connor, T.J. [2023]. A Case Against Smart Things. Controlled Unclassified Information (CUI) Conference, Melbourne, FL, February 24.

5. O'Connor, T.J. [2022]. Keynote Address. 780th Military Intelligence Brigade Ball, Baltimore, MD, December 3.

6. O'Connor, T.J., Moussouris, K., & Ahern, C. [2022]. Crowdsourcing CyberConflict. AvengerCon, Columbia, MD, December 3.

7. O'Connor, T.J. [2022]. Pwn My Ride: Aarch64 Return Oriented Programming. Guest Lecture, US Naval Academy, Annapolis, MD, November 29.

8. O'Connor, T.J. [2022]. A Case Against Smart Things. Tampa Armed Forces Communications Association, Tampa, FL, October 19.

9. O'Connor, T.J. [2022]. Keynote Address. Central Florida Cybersecurity Summit, Lake Mary, FL, October 7.

10. O'Connor, T.J. [2022]. Modern Cyberwarfare: Lessons from the Ukrainian Conflict. Invited Guest Speaker, 1st Special Forces Command Communications Conference, Tampa, FL, September 14.

11. O'Connor, T.J., Brown, D., & Schmelk, S. [2022]. Going for the Gold! Insights and Lessons Learned from Coaching the First-ever US Cyber Games Team. NICE Conference and Expo, June 7.

12. O'Connor, T.J. [2022]. The Picture is Incomplete. Fort Gordon Innovation Day Guest Speaker, May 17.

13. O'Connor, T.J. [2021]. The Threat of Ransomware: What Does it Mean for Small Businesses?. Service Academy Monthly Invited Speaker, Virtual Event, September.

14. O'Connor, T.J. [2021]. Towards Labeled IoT Datasets. NSA CAE-R Workshop, Virtual Event, September.

15. O'Connor, T.J. & Jackson, J. [2021]. The Road to Athens: What Does it Take to Lead the US Cyber Team to victory?. ITSP Magazine Podcast, September.

16. O'Connor, T.J., Campos, D., & Jessee, D. [2021]. IoT Dataset Findings IoT Man-in-the-Middle Vulnerabilities. Presented Technical Cyber Technology Branch, CO2 Division, C5ISR Center, May.

17. O'Connor, T.J., Campos, D., & Jessee, D. [2021]. IoT Dataset Findings IoT Man-in-the-Middle Vulnerabilities. Presented to US Army Cyber Command, May.

18. O'Connor, T.J. [2021]. Backdoors in IoT Devices: Accidental or Intentional. Podcast Interview with REFirmLabs (now acquired by Microsoft), May.

19. O'Connor, T.J. [2021]. Examining IoT Security Weaknesses. Device Security IO Podcast, March.

20. O'Connor, T.J. [2021]. A Case Against Smart Things: Reversing IoT Devices for Vulnerabilities. Southwest Florida Information Security Conference, Virtual Event, February.

21. O'Connor, T.J. & Campos, D. [2021]. Students help build the IoT lab in their cybersecurity program. A conversation with Florida Tech's Dr. T.J O'Connor and Daniel Campos, ITSP Magazine Podcast, January.

22. O'Connor, T.J. & Campos, D. [2020]. Vulnerabilities in Commercial Smart Home Cameras and Doorbells. Presented to US Army Cyber Command, December.

23. O'Connor, T.J. & Campos, D. [2020]. Methods for Labeling IoT Traffic Datasets. Presented to Technical Cyber Technology Branch, CO2 Division, C5ISR Center, October.

24. O'Connor, T.J. & Enck, W. [2017]. "Classifying and Enforcing Network Profiles of Smart Home IoT Devices". SELIoT: Securing Lifecycle of Internet of Things, Aalto University, Finland, September.

25. O'Connor, T.J. [2016]. "Ethical and Technical Considerations of the FBI's iPhone Writ". US Military Academy Cyber Defense Laboratory Invited Guest Speaker, March.

26. O'Connor, T.J. & Burhop, D. [2016]. "The Hacker Always Gets Through". American Association of Motor Vehicle Administrators, Louisville, KY, June.

27. O'Connor, T.J. [2013]. "Why Every Defender Should Know How To Write Exploits". B-Sides Augusta Security Conference, Augusta, GA, September.

28. O'Connor, T.J. [2013]. "Don’t Pull Your Goalie: The Role of an Active Defense". ForenSecure Security Conference, Wheaton, IL, April.

29. O'Connor, T.J. & Tomes, T. [2013]. "Hide and Seek: Post-Exploitation Style". ShmooCon Security Conference, Washington DC, February.

30. O'Connor, T.J., Wertheimer, M., DiGiovanni, F., Papay, M., Brown, J., & Mahaffey, K. [2012]. "Cyber Security Training". I/ITSEC, Orlando, FL, December.

31. O'Connor, T.J., Bassel, E., Carroll, O., Denman, B., Fanelli, R., & Runyan, S. [2012]. "Keys to Fighting and Winning a Cyber War". AFCEA Homeland Security Conference, Washington DC, February.

32. O'Connor, T.J., Grunzweig, N., & Brasefield, D. [2010]. "honeyM: A Framework for Implementing Virtual Honeyclients for Mobile Devices". ShmooCon Security Conference, Washington DC, February.