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Individual Course

CS50’s Introduction to Cybersecurity

Course Length

5 weeks

2-6 hours a week

Featuring faculty from:

Harvard John A. Paulson School of Engineering and Applied Sciences LogoHarvard John A. Paulson School of Engineering and Applied Sciences

Enroll as Individual

Certificate Price:

$ 449

Enroll on edX

Enroll as Individual

Certificate Price:

$ 449

Enroll on edX

An introduction to cybersecurity for technical and non-technical audiences alike in an online course from Harvard.

This is CS50's introduction to cybersecurity for technical and non-technical audiences alike. Learn how to protect your own data, devices, and systems from today's threats and how to recognize and evaluate tomorrow's as well, both at home and at work. Learn to view cybersecurity not in absolute terms but relative, a function of risks and rewards (for an adversary) and costs and benefits (for you). Learn to recognize cybersecurity as a trade-off with usability itself. Course presents both high-level and low-level examples of threats, providing students with all they need know technically to understand both. Assignments inspired by real-world events.

Self-Guided

edX

Learning Outcome

hacking, cracking, social engineering, phishing attacks, passcodes, passwords, SSO, brute-force attacks, dictionary attacks

Learning Outcome

biometrics, multi-factor authentication, password managers, ethical hacking, (distributed) denial-of-service attacks, viruses, worms, botnets, SQL injection attacks

Learning Outcome

port-scanning proxies, firewalls automatic updates, secure deletion hashing, encryption, ransomware cookies, incognito mode anonymization, de-identification verification operating systems

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Faculty

Your Instructor

David J. Malan

Gordon McKay Professor of the Practice of Computer Science, Harvard University

David J. Malan is Gordon McKay Professor of the Practice of Computer Science at Harvard University in the School of Engineering and Applied Sciences as well as a Member of the Faculty of Education in the Graduate School of Education. He teaches Computer Science 50, otherwise known as CS50, which is among Harvard University's largest courses, one of Yale University's largest courses, and edX's largest MOOC. He also teaches at Harvard Business School, Harvard Law School, Harvard Extension School, and Harvard Summer School.

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Ways to take this course

Audit or Pursue a Verified Certificate

A Verified Certificate costs $449 and provides unlimited access to full course materials, activities, tests, and forums. At the end of the course, learners who earn a passing grade can receive a certificate.

⁠Alternatively, learners can Audit the course for free and have access to select course material, activities, tests, and forums. Please note that this track does not offer a certificate for learners who earn a passing grade.

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