Existing literature show that Escape The Room themed games have not been used much in cybersecurity education and outreach. In this fast pitch talk, we will present an original Escape The Room themed cybersecurity educational game, which consists of a set of nifty cybersecurity challenges in the form of beginner’s puzzles on a variety of introductory cybersecurity topics, including cryptographic ciphers, social engineeringbased phishing attacks, online fake web certificates, and ransomware attacks. We have specifically developed this cyber educational game as an experiential learning activity that is driven by realistic scenario-based cybersecurity challenges, and can be played in teams. We have successfully implemented this game as a team learning exercise that can be offered in a virtual learning setting. We will share our experience (including lessons learned and takeaways) of hosting this game as part of a virtual cybersecurity educational summer camp for a high school audience, where remote learners participated in this game in “Breakout Room” teams within a Zoom meeting session. Our presentation will include an overview of this novel “Escape The Breakout Room” game, and a discussion on hosting this game over Zoom as part of a virtual cybersecurity education camp, or a virtual introductory cybersecurity class. Under the current COVID-19 pandemic situation, when cybersecurity education is going virtual, this new instance of an Escape The Room themed cybersecurity educational game and its experiential team learning approach would be of interest & relevance to the CAE community, including all cybersecurity educators, who are particularly looking for engaging, competitive virtual learning activities at a beginner’s level.
Ankur Chattopadhyay, Meghyn Winslow