Software Security Foundations

Fee and Application.

This course is offered through the Stanford School of Professional Education as part of the Stanford Advanced Computer Security Certificate.

Applications may be submitted online at anytime. Sample Application

Overview

This course covers 3 specific topic areas:

Computer Security Principles covers security objectives such as authentication, authorization, access control, confidentiality, data integrity, and non-repudiation. The module also covers software design principles including the principles of least privilege, fail-safe stance, and defense-in-depth.

Introduction to Cryptography covers both symmetric encryption and public-key cryptography, discussing how they are used to achieve security goals and build PKI (Public-Key Infrastructure) systems. The module also covers DES, 3DES, AES, RC4, RSA, ECC, MD5, SHA-1, X.509, digital signatures, and all cryptographic primitives necessary to understand PKI. Diffie-Hellman key exchange and man-in-the-middle attacks will also be discussed.

Secure Programming Techniques discusses the threats that worms and hackers present to software and the programming techniques that developers can use to defend against software vulnerabilities such as buffer overflows, SQL injection, and off-line dictionary attacks. The module also covers common mistakes made in using cryptographic libraries and how they can be avoided.