Ethical Hacking - BSc (Hons)

Abertay University

Build on your knowledge of programming taught in earlier modules (e.g. arrays, structures, simple collections). Gain an introduction to the standard data structures and algorithms that form the core of algorithmic thought in computer science and to the idea of reasoning about the behaviour and performance of a computer program. Indicative content - Reasoning about performance: The idea of an algorithm, time and space complexity, abstract data types. - Basic data structures: Linked lists, stacks, queues, hash tables. - Sorting and searching: Exhaustive and binary search, common sorting algorithms. - Trees: Simple trees, tree search algorithms, tree representations (XML, JSON). - Graphs: Simple and directed graphs, graph algorithms.

Dynamic web applications, through client-side and server side internet development on a full-stack platform. Indicative content - Web Standards: Apply HTML5 and CSS to develop responsive and accessible web designs. - Client'Side Technologies: Implement JavaScript, libraries and frameworks to create effective user interfaces within appropriate development practices and methodologies. - Design Techniques: Use suitable techniques for building dynamic and interactive web applications. - Data Persistence: Explore methods of storing and managing data, considering appropriate and secure use. - Server'Side Scripting Technologies: Apply server'side technologies to provide functionality, evaluating the processes involved and the benefits and drawbacks of server'side processing. - Security and Legal Issues: Examine legal and security considerations including privacy, transparency, data protection, GDPR, authorisation and validation. - Practical Aspects of Security: Apply secure programming practices, network protocols and testing strategies to ensure robust and reliable web applications.

This module develops a critical understanding of the tools and techniques used by ethical hackers to assess the security of devices and networks. You will learn how to systematically investigate a computer network for potential vulnerabilities, applying professional practices to identify weaknesses while considering the ethical and legal frameworks that govern penetration testing. Through practical exercises, you will gain hands'on experience with industry'standard tools and approaches, preparing you to evaluate and strengthen network security in real'world contexts. Indicative content - Legal and Ethical Foundations: Explore UK computer security legislation covering penetration testing, data protection and cybercrime, alongside ethical principles and professional conduct in cybersecurity, with emphasis on responsible disclosure and ethical hacking practices (aligned to the CyBoK knowledge area of Law & Regulation). - The Penetration Testing Process: Gain a comprehensive overview of the penetration testing lifecycle, including reconnaissance, scanning, enumeration, exploitation and post'exploitation, aligned to CyBoK knowledge areas such as Adversarial Behaviours, Network Security, Malware & Attack Technologies, and Authentication, Authorisation & Accountability. - Reporting and Communication: Learn how to structure penetration testing reports for both technical and non'technical stakeholders, providing clear recommendations for mitigation and system hardening, aligned to CyBoK knowledge areas of Security Operations & Incident Management and Law & Regulation.

Please note: If you are a Direct Entrant (new student) to this year of study and have not previously taken module ABE101, then you MUST take ABE201 as your Term 2 microcredential module. If you have previously taken ABE101, then you are NOT permitted to take ABE201 in Term 2. Starting university brings new opportunities and challenges, and every student’s journey is different. This microcredential helps you settle into life at Abertay and build the habits that lead to success. You’ll hear from current students sharing their own tips, and reflect on the areas you most want to develop. You’ll get to know Abertay’s systems, explore what makes a successful student and practise core skills such as time management, referencing, academic writing style and using support services. By the end, you’ll have the tools and strategies you need to thrive at university. Indicative content - Navigating Abertay Systems: Get to know the key systems you’ll use at Abertay—such as MyLearningSpace, MS Teams, OASIS and MyAbertay—and learn how to use them effectively. - Expectations of University and You: Explore what’s expected of you as a student and what you can expect from the university. Topics include the code of conduct, independent and blended learning, how courses are structured, health and safety, and the Abertay attributes. - Abertay Discovery Tool: Complete the Discovery Tool to identify your strengths and areas for development across five themes: studying at university, academic skills, digital skills, careers and employability, and wellbeing. - Fundamentals of University: Learn how modules work, how assessments are set, and how to use assignment briefs and feedback to improve your work. - Understanding, Searching and Evaluating Information: Develop strategies for finding and assessing reliable information, building your confidence in research and study skills. - Successful Student Behaviours: Practise the habits that help you succeed: managing time, avoiding procrastination, effective note-taking, preparing for classes, developing a growth mindset, and making use of student support services. - Referencing: Understand academic integrity and why referencing matters. Learn how to avoid plagiarism, create in-text citations and reference lists, and use digital tools to manage your sources. - Sounding Academic: Discover what lecturers mean by “academic style” and how to use the right language in your writing. Learn the rules of academic writing, how to paraphrase effectively, and how expectations differ between school/college and university. You’ll also explore how assessments, marking and feedback work.

Build on the earlier module, Data Structures and Algorithms 1. Gain an introduction to parallel programming on shared-memory and GPU architecture, and the design techniques underpinning parallel applications. Use a range of case studies drawn from typical real-world applications. Indicative content - Parallel Programming: Explore the motivations for parallelisation, the concepts of parallelism and concurrency, Amdahl’s Law, high'level approaches to parallelisation and principles of parallel design. - Low'Level Programming with Threads: Learn how to start and join threads, share data safely, apply mutual exclusion, use synchronisation objects, and understand lock'free techniques. - High'Level Parallel Programming: Study task'based and message'passing parallelism, address data'parallel problems, and exploit locality in programming. - Instruction'Level Parallelism: Examine SIMD instructions and automatic vectorisation for performance optimisation. - GPU Programming: Understand GPU architectures, identify algorithms suited to GPUs, and apply GPU profiling techniques. - Parallel Patterns: Apply design patterns for parallel and concurrent programming, with awareness of sorting, numerical, image processing, searching and optimisation algorithms that benefit from parallelisation

This module introduces the fundamental technologies and techniques used to investigate cybercrime. You will learn a systematic approach to planning and conducting a comprehensive computer forensic investigation, with particular emphasis on evidence collection, preservation and the reconstruction of events. The module develops both theoretical understanding and practical skills, preparing you to apply forensic methods in real'world contexts where digital evidence plays a critical role. Indicative content - Computer Crime (Introduction to Digital Forensics): Explore different types of computer crime, the legislation surrounding them, and the use of Linux and associated tools as a digital forensic workstation. - Data Acquisition and Preservation of Evidence: Learn the procedures and theory for imaging a suspect’s computer, including crime scene assessment, disk imaging, evidence collection, maintaining integrity, and working with file systems such as NTFS and FAT32. - Analysis and Reconstruction: Develop digital forensic timelines using Linux and Windows tools, and apply ensemble machine learning models to detect anomalies in timeline data. - Searching for Evidence: Apply physical techniques such as file carving, brute force searching and regular expressions, recover deleted files, use forensic boot disks, and employ logical searching of file systems, including encrypted or hidden data and anti'forensic techniques. - Searching for Windows & Internet Artifacts: Investigate evidence within the Windows registry, execution artifacts, log files, browser caches, histories, cookies, and email or messaging systems. - Memory Forensics: Use tools and techniques to capture and analyse memory dumps for case'relevant evidence. - Using SQLite in a Digital Forensics Context: Gain experience with SQLite databases, particularly in mobile device investigations and browser'based evidence such as Chromium. - Presentation of Evidence: Learn techniques for producing accurate technical reports, including court reports, with appropriate design and layout. - Ethics of Digital Forensics: Discuss the ethical decisions investigators face and how these choices may influence the outcomes of cases

In this module, you will work collaboratively within a team to explore project management concepts and apply them to real'world briefs drawn from industry and research. You will learn how to create a professional project proposal and present your work in a client pitch to stakeholders. As part of your team role, you will be expected to communicate effectively with stakeholders, contribute to project planning, conceptualise artefacts or prototypes, write supporting documentation, and deliver a persuasive client pitch. Indicative Content - Research Project Characteristics: Explore the defining features of research and industry'based projects, including scope, objectives and constraints. - Project Management Concepts: Learn about project management approaches, with a focus on Agile and Scrum methodologies, and how they support effective teamwork. - Activities, Deliverables and Products: Understand how to plan and track project activities, define deliverables, and produce outputs that meet client or stakeholder needs. - Managing Time and Resources: Develop strategies for scheduling, prioritising tasks and allocating resources effectively to ensure project success. - Identifying and Managing Risks: Learn how to identify potential risks, assess their impact, and apply strategies to mitigate them. - Quality Considerations: Apply professional standards and quality assurance processes to ensure outputs are reliable, consistent and fit for purpose. - Developing Artefacts and Prototypes: Gain experience in conceptualising, designing and producing artefacts or prototypes that demonstrate project outcomes. - Interacting with Clients and Team Members: Build skills in professional communication, stakeholder engagement and effective collaboration within a project team.

In this module, you will be introduced to the fundamental ideas and concepts of how computers, mobile devices and gadgets communicate with each other through a wide range of communication technologies. You will explore both wired and wireless networking, including Ethernet, VLANs, STP, routing, subnetting and IPv6. You will also learn about essential network services such as SNMP, DHCP and DNS, as well as the role of firewalls and network management in ensuring secure and efficient communication between devices. Indicative Content - VLANs: Understand the core concept of Virtual Local Area Networks (VLANs) and trunking, and explore common attacks that can be used against them. - Spanning Tree Protocol (STP): Investigate how STP is used to create loop'free networks, and examine how attackers may attempt to exploit it. - Static Routing: Learn how routing works, and analyse how static routing can be used to pivot deeper into a network. - Subnetting and Variable Length Subnet Masks (VLSM): Explore classful and classless addressing, the benefits and impact on routing protocols, and how to design LANs using VLSM techniques. - Network Application Protocols: Investigate networking protocols used at the application layer of the OSI model, and identify common security weaknesses associated with them. - Firewalls: Examine both software and hardware firewalls, their applications and uses, and how attackers may attempt to counter them. - Intrusion Detection Systems (IDS): Understand how IDS technologies work, and explore methods attackers may use to bypass them. - Network Management: Study network management protocols such as SNMP, and review current practices in managing and monitoring networks.

In this module, you will develop a critical understanding of advanced techniques used by ethical hackers to assess the security of web applications. You will explore how attackers exploit vulnerabilities, and more importantly, how organisations can defend against these threats through effective countermeasures. By engaging with both offensive and defensive perspectives, you will gain the ability to analyse, evaluate and apply advanced web application security practices. You will also learn how to communicate the results of a security assessment in a clear and professional manner, preparing you for real'world industry scenarios. Indicative Content - Overview of Web Applications: Explore the core defence mechanisms of web applications, including user access, authentication, session management and access control. - Web Application Technologies: Understand the HTTP protocol, requests, responses and methods, along with encoding schemes. Examine server'side technologies such as Java, ASP and PHP. - Injecting Code: Investigate common injection attacks, including SQL injection, email header injection, PHP injection and others. Learn preventive measures to mitigate these vulnerabilities. - Bypassing Client'Side Controls: Analyse techniques such as cookie manipulation, parameter tampering and URL modification, and the use of web proxies to bypass client'side restrictions. - Attacking Authentication: Examine attacks on session management, flaws in authentication mechanisms, and vulnerabilities in forgotten password and password change functions. Learn countermeasures to strengthen authentication. - Cross'Site Scripting (XSS): Study reflected, stored and DOM'based XSS vulnerabilities, and apply countermeasures to prevent them. - Web Server Security: Review popular web servers such as IIS and Apache, common threats against them, and methods to increase security through correct configuration and countermeasures.

In this module, you will work as part of a team to deliver a development project or technical investigation that builds on the planning and prototyping completed in CMP308. The project will be relevant to your programme of study and will give you the opportunity to present and develop a product or technical solution by applying design, development and evaluation principles in a collaborative environment. You will also gain experience in operating professionally as a subject specialist within your team and in engaging effectively with project stakeholders. Indicative Content - Orientation: Consolidate project teams and define the target problem to ensure clarity of purpose and shared understanding. - Project Principles: Apply appropriate development methodologies during product production to guide the project effectively. - Documentation: Understand the importance of requirements specifications and related documentation, and learn how to produce them to professional standards. - Design: Explore the role of design and redesign throughout project development, adapting solutions as the project evolves. - Implementation: Address common implementation issues and approaches, applying practical strategies to deliver functional outcomes. - Quality and Standards: Apply testing and evaluation methods to ensure the product or investigation meets professional standards of quality. - Communication: Develop oral and written communication skills to present findings and demonstrate the software product or technical investigation effectively. - Project Planning and Team Working: Learn how to plan projects, organise teams, support colleagues, devise weekly plans, and maintain accurate progress records. - Self'Evaluation: Reflect on your personal contribution to team progress and identify areas for improvement in professional practice.

In this module, you will develop your understanding of the methods, knowledge and techniques associated with offensive attacks targeting computer systems. You will explore how attacks are developed, performed and analysed, while also examining the countermeasures organisations can use to minimise their impact. Alongside this, you will have the opportunity to undertake an individual project, allowing you to critically evaluate an advanced security topic and apply your skills in a practical, independent context. Indicative Question - Scripting Basics: Learn the fundamentals of scripting languages, including syntax, functions, modules, packages and libraries, to support automation and problem'solving in cybersecurity contexts. - Coding and Scripting Techniques: Develop skills in exception handling, testing and debugging to produce reliable and maintainable scripts. - Code Execution Vulnerabilities: Explore how vulnerabilities in web applications can arise from insecure code execution, and understand their implications for system security. - Automating Tasks Using Python: Use Python’s OS modules and filtering techniques (e.g. Grep and Sed) to automate common cybersecurity and forensic tasks. - Reporting: Learn how to generate clear and professional reports from automated tasks to communicate findings effectively. - Network Programming: Gain experience in developing servers and clients, and understand the principles behind command'and'control style software in a controlled, academic context. - Buffer Overflow Exploits: Study how buffer overflow vulnerabilities are detected and exploited, and examine the role of shellcode in these attacks. - Malware Evasion Techniques: Investigate anti'reversing strategies such as anti'disassembly, anti'debugging, VM detection and packing, alongside covert behaviours and deception techniques used by malware to evade detection. - Assembly Language Logic: Understand assembly language structures and code constructs, and learn how to interpret them using a disassembler. - Advanced Dynamic Malware Analysis: Explore advanced malware analysis techniques, including the use of debuggers, decompilation, automated analysis and the application of machine learning.

In this module, you will develop the analytical and practical skills needed to rigorously assess cybersecurity audits and evaluate compliance with established standards. You will learn how to examine empirical evidence, identify gaps in existing tools through hands'on compliance analysis, and integrate technical findings with policy considerations. By combining technical and strategic perspectives, you will gain the ability to provide actionable insights that support both operational improvements and long'term organisational resilience. Indicative Content - Foundations of Cybersecurity Audit & Compliance: Introduce the principles of cybersecurity audit and compliance. Explore Cyber Essentials, Windows domains, Active Directory and Group Policy configurations as the basis for secure system management. - Secure Systems Administration & Network Defence: Develop skills in managing network services and secure configurations. Learn advanced administrative techniques and enterprise'level security measures to strengthen system resilience. - Incident Management & Forensic Analysis: Examine the processes of incident response planning, forensic review and malware analysis. Apply risk assessment approaches aligned with ISO standards to support professional practice. - Audit Review & Compliance Reporting: Learn how to conduct comprehensive audit reviews, perform policy gap analysis, and synthesise findings into clear, actionable compliance reports for stakeholders.

Gain an in-depth understanding of system programming and the security challenges that exist in both kernel and user space. You’ll explore how operating systems and devices work at a low level, gaining insight into areas such as kernel operation, device drivers and hardware communication. You’ll also learn how to design and build secure systems for embedded and IoT environments, and how these interact with cloud and web technologies. Through practical and theoretical work, you’ll develop the skills to analyse, implement and secure complex systems in real-world deployment scenarios. Indicative Content - System Programming: C programming, compiler, linker and loader. Static and runtime analysis of binary files. System development kits, kernel headers and cross complier environments. - Hardware: ASIC,MCU,CPU, SOC, assembly, component security, pcb security, sniffing wire traffic, radio traffic, Types of communication (I2C, SPI, UART, RS232) and security challenges - Operating systems: I/O Manager, Memory Manager, Scheduler, .s file, init file, boot loader, boot process, ROM, RAM, execution rings - Kernels: Types of kernel, real time, unix, Windows, mac, linux, user space vs kernel space, shell, native applications, dll, registry/proc. Security landscape in user and kernel space. - Auditing and Debugging: User and kernel space debugging, Remote kernel debug setup, Analysis of precompiled binaries - Loadable modules: Linker, stack and memory layout, Interrupts, IRQ table and priorities. Introduction to device drivers, Types of driver, lifecycle, portability. Security risks associated with loadable modules. - Cloud Platforms: Setup and use of cloud platforms such as AWS. Cloud platform utilisation fundamentals and business considerations. - Web Technologies: TCP/IP protocol with understanding of application protocols such as HTTP, FTP, SSH etc. Understand web server and common gateway interface (CGI).

This module will look at the forensic investigation of a network and the challenges analysts face when investigating network traffic. It'll provide you with an understanding of the underlying network principles important to comprehending network evidence. At the end of the module, you'll be able to perform an investigation with a comprehensive, systematic approach to discover and examine evidence from networking infrastructure. Indicative Content - Digital forensics: Investigation Need, Taxonomy, Forensic Process and Methodology, Forensic Laboratory (i.e., Lab Requirements, Equipment Requirements, Person Specification - Network forensics overview: Technical Fundamentals, Foundation - Practical Investigative Strategies, Principles of Networking - e.g., protocols, ports, TCP/IP, OSI model. - Intrusion detection systems: IDS/IPS (i.e., Types, Functionality, modes, Placement), Evidence acquisition, Snort, Wireshark - Snort: Writing snort rules, Configurations, Deployment, and deployment scenarios, Snort performance, - Packet analysis: TCP/IP, intrusion analysis tools (e.g., Wireshark, TCPdump), Snort + Wireshark - Network traffic analysis: TCPdump filter, Examination of datagram fields, Packet crafting, Nmap, OS fingerprinting - Honeypots: Architecture, Types of honeypots, Pros, Cons, Level of interaction, Honeypot hunters, Honeytokens, Honeynet - Statistical flow analysis: Generation and collection, Analysis, Techniques and Tools - Switches routers firewalls: Storage media, CAM tables, Manages switches, Router evidence, Firewall evidence, Logging - Wireless forensics: Wireless network forensics, Forensics cases, Protocol series, Frame types, WAPs, Rogue wireless access points - Event logs: Logs, Windows and Unix logs, Logging architecture, Log analysis methodology, The aftermath-post attack

This module gives you the chance to design, develop and deliver a substantial individual project related to your programme. You’ll normally propose your own idea, carrying out initial research and proof-of-concept work in Term 1 to produce a detailed project proposal. In Term 2, you’ll focus on the main development phase, applying your knowledge and skills to complete the project to a professional standard. Indicative Content - Investigation, Research and Selection: Initial investigation of project topic, Background research of project topic and Selection of project topic - Evaluating: Methods of evaluating a project. - Legal, Social, Professional and Ethical Issues: Consideration of Legal, social, ethical and professional issues. - Proposal: Production of a project proposal. - Project Feasibility and Proof of Concept: Demonstrate Feasibility of Project - Self-directed problem solving, Originality and Creativity - Self Motivation, Initiative and Insight - Software Design Skills - Recording, Reporting and Communication Skills - Employability and professional development

This module gives you the opportunity to present a major individual project as a formal dissertation. You’ll normally propose your own topic, drawn from a current industry or research problem within your field. You’ll be expected to present your work in a clear, structured and academically rigorous way, demonstrating critical insight and evaluation of both your project and the artefact produced. The final dissertation will be written in an academic style appropriate to your discipline. Indicative Content - Introduction: Introduce the topic of the project and the problem area with and appropriate research question. - Investigate: Investigate previous work in the chosen project area, and show how the work of the project relates to it. - Justify: Demonstrate a sound justification for the approach and methodology adopted. - Document: Document the output of the project with some originality. - Evaluate: Critically evaluate the output, using third party evaluation where appropriate, and recognise the strengths and limitations of the work. - Communicate: Demonstrate an ability for independent learning and linkage to future work and career aspirations.

Examine social and technical approaches to better security resilience in systems through consideration of methods of attack and defence. Indicative Content - Principles of Secure Software Development: The relationship between correctness, security and performance. Defence in depth. Input, output and state validation. Minimal privilege and privilege separation. - Language and API Design for Security: Inherent security problems with widely-used languages, and why people still use them. Undefined behaviour and compiler optimisations. Enforcing security properties using better type systems and language semantics. DSLs for security. - Secure Software Engineering: Security within the SDLC. Specifying security requirements. Secure coding standards. Code review for security. - The Ingredients of Machine Learning: Overview of the different 'aspects' of machine learning. All machine algorithms are not created equal. Applications of machine learning for cyber-security. Review of the various types of algorithms and the mathematics behind the algorithms. Exploration of supervised and un-supervised classifications. Creation of a spam filter such as SPAM-Assassin and applications of Machine Learning to Network Forensics. - Support Vector Machines for Cyber Security: Exploration of classification and regression analysis. Overview of the mathematics behind Support Vector Machine and the application of the SVM algorithm in the context of networking security. Introduction to non-linear classification and high-dimensional feature spaces to improve intrusion detection systems, mitigate security vulnerabilities and identify data exfiltration. - Neural Networks for Cyber Security: Exploration of neural networks for threat analysis and malware detection. Exploration of the propagation models, weights and learning rules. The mathematics and models behind the different algorithms are explored and applied to the classification of network traffic, identify threats, computer misuse, and improve network security. - Human-Centred Security: An introduction into the human side of security, and into how humans make security and privacy-related decisions. - Authentication Design: How authentication mechanisms ought to be chosen with the human in mind. The differences between what you own, what you are, and what you know, and how to judge which one is best to be used in a particular context. If passwords are chosen, how password requirements ought to be defined, how these ought to be communicated to the users. Design of secure password replacement.