A one-stop shop for cybersecurity in Evanston, Northwestern student startup Locket Cybersecurity certifies undergraduate members to provide free cybersecurity audits to small businesses.
McCormick Prof. Sara Owsley Sood funds certificates for cohort members, allowing Locket to continue as a free service. According to SESP sophomore, co-Founder and CEO Kris Yun and Weinberg junior, co-Founder and Chief Technology Officer Theo Maurino, bringing accessibility to cybersecurity is the startup’s guiding principle.
Yun said that she witnessed her grandparents experience basic security threats mailed to their laundromat. That motivated her to launch Locket in the beginning of January to use NU’s resources and knowledge to help community members stay safe online, she said.
“I quickly realized that other businesses within the Chicagoland area may not have those resources,” Yun said. “My grandparents own a laundromat and almost every single time they get suspicious physical mail, they call my mom, like, ‘What is this? Are we going to die?’”
Yun said three hackathons in the Major League hacking circuit have gotten hacked — an occurrence that she said proves anyone is at risk of being hacked.
In addition to providing services for small businesses, Locket also acts as an educational opportunity for its cohort members, said McCormick sophomore and cohort member Max Smith.
“You really can’t separate cybersecurity from any industry,” Smith said. “I wanted to have that knowledge. I’m also interested in potentially pursuing a career in cybersecurity.”
Smith said that cohort members are required to earn the Google Cybersecurity Professional Certificate through Coursera. While the members do not get paid, Smith says that this certificate acts as a form of compensation, since it’s an asset in the competitive field of cybersecurity.
Smith said Locket leaders have done a “great job” of inciting excitement and curiosity in the cohort members, who have remained engaged and passionate about Locket throughout the quarter.
Yun said the cohort members’ excitement has helped support her in managing school and simultaneously creating Locket. She began the startup her freshman year, originally naming it “Safe Security.”
“I remember so much fear of no one showing up,” Yun said. “I made my high school friends come here with donuts and sit in on the meeting with me. I remember coming into a room that people were there (for the meeting) before me. … People were really excited for this.”
Maurino said having a co-founder helped him with prioritization and balancing his workload.
“Last quarter, I was overloading classes and working on our website and trying to help Kris manage the curriculum design until she took that over,” Maurino said. “It definitely reached a point where we had to reevaluate what exactly our roles were so that we could actually take this work seriously and tackle it to the best of both of our abilities.”
Maurino said while the founders never required Locket to be a top priority for their team members, it often became a first priority for many.
Yun said she hopes that Locket will be able to spread awareness to the threats of cybersecurity and will be able to keep the community safe.
“Our hopes are to keep learning and growing,” Maurino said. “We’re really excited for Spring Quarter to begin doing audits for local businesses and for any future iterations of the clinic and its cohort.”
Correction: A previous version of this story incorrectly stated that three members of NU WildHacks had been hacked, that The Garage alone funds certificates for cohort members, and that McCormick Prof. Sara Owsley Sood is a faculty advisor to the club. Three hackathons in the Major League hacking circuit have been hacked, and certificates for cohort members are funded by McCormick Prof. Sara Owsley Sood, who is not a faculty advisor to the club. The Daily regrets these errors.
Email: marleysmith2027@u.northwestern.edu
X: @MarleySSmith
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