Purdue hosts cybersecurity leaders, addresses challenges at CERIAS symposium
WEST LAFAYETTE, Ind. — Purdue University’s innovation leaders in cybersecurity and their counterparts in industry and government recently gathered with about 350 attendees on campus to discuss innovative solutions to the latest threats to digital safety and related implications of AI and cyber-physical fusion.
CERIAS, Purdue’s Center for Education and Research in Information Assurance and Security, hosted its annual cybersecurity symposium on April 1-2.
The symposium, “Cyber Horizons: Bridging Academia, Industry, and Innovation for a Secure Future,” underscored a unifying theme: Cybersecurity is not solely a technical issue but a societal imperative that necessitates collective action. This broad view has been a central theme at CERIAS for its 27-year existence.
The event featured 20 talks and panels by industry and academic experts on the opportunities and challenges in cybersecurity. Topics ranged from privacy and digital forensics to the use of smart sensing against physical AI attacks. Panel discussions focused on the intersection between AI and cybersecurity, and lessons learned from experience protecting critical cyber-physical systems from cyberattacks.
The opening keynote address by Phil Venables, chief information security officer at Google Cloud, addressed the critical intersection of cybersecurity and AI, underscoring its opportunities and risks.
“AI is both our greatest asset and our greatest challenge,” Venables said. “It allows us to detect threats faster than ever, but it also gives adversaries the same power to scale their attacks.”
Venables stressed the need for a proactive and foundational security approach, advocating for a “secure-by-design” philosophy in technology development.
“Security can’t be an afterthought. We need to embed it into the DNA of every product and system — secure by design, secure by default,” he said, adding that security needs to be a concerted effort. “No single entity — whether it’s government, academia or industry — can tackle cybersecurity alone. We need a collective defense model where we share intelligence and best practices.”
Venables’ talk was followed by a panel discussion that delved into key industry challenges. The panel, moderated by Purdue’s Eugene Spafford, professor of computer science in the College of Science and CERIAS executive director emeritus, featured Venables and Kelley Misata, Purdue alumna and founder/CEO of Sightline Security, and Michael Clothier, chief information security officer for the Aeronautics Systems Sector at Northrup Grumman.
The panel expanded on Venables’ points, exploring the need for stronger collaboration between industry and governmental policymakers. They agreed that policy, regulation and innovation must work in harmony to address emerging threats, and that ethical AI development is key in meeting the challenge of balancing security with privacy rights in an increasingly digitized world.
Misata gave a keynote talk titled “Mission Possible: Securing Nonprofits in the Age of AI,” and Clothier gave the final keynote, titled, “IT, OT, IoT — It’s Really Just the “T”: An International and Historical Perspective.” His talk focused on how organizations can rethink their approach to securing technology by shifting away from securing individual components and toward securing their entire technology ecosystems.
As threats continue to evolve, the insights exchanged at the 2025 CERIAS symposium reaffirmed the need for vigilance, innovation and shared responsibility in securing the digital future.
CERIAS, one of the Institutes and Centers at Discovery Park District, has been a pioneer in cybersecurity since the necessity for such security was first acknowledged. Leading the charge in research, education and policy innovation, CERIAS is one of the nation’s foremost cybersecurity centers, fostering interdisciplinary collaboration to tackle emerging digital threats. With leading-edge research initiatives and strong partnerships with government and industry, it plays a pivotal role in shaping cybersecurity standards, developing next-generation security technologies and preparing a skilled workforce to safeguard the digital future.
About Purdue University
Purdue University is a public research university leading with excellence at scale. Ranked among the top 10 public universities in the United States, Purdue discovers, disseminates and deploys knowledge with a quality and at a scale second to none. More than 107,000 students study at Purdue across multiple campuses, locations, and modalities, including more than 58,000 at our main campus in West Lafayette and Indianapolis. Committed to affordability and accessibility, Purdue’s main campus has frozen tuition 14 years in a row. See how Purdue never stops in the persistent pursuit of the next giant leap — including its comprehensive urban expansion, the Mitch Daniels School of Business, Purdue Computes, and the One Health initiative — at https://www.purdue.edu/president/strategic-initiatives.
Media contact: Amy Raley, araley@purdue.edu