MSc Cyber Security & Human Factors

• Cyber Security: Develop skills and knowledge for cyber security. Material, lectures and seminars in this unit capture concepts of cyberspace ecosystems and the security of socio-technical systems. The unit also covers the life cycle of cyber security mechanisms, including the design, development, management and, most importantly, how they’re sustained.
• Cyber Psychology: Explore the impact of the internet and social media applications on individuals, groups, organisations and society, and human factors relevant to cyber security and online behaviours. You’ll learn to evaluate the principal features of human factors in current and planned online secure systems and identify means of promoting safer online behaviour.
• Human Factors: Soft systems, human factors integration (HFI), training, trust, organisational learning, information and knowledge management will be examined through case study analysis. You’ll also conduct situational awareness and workload measurements in trials, experiments and exercises, and apply user experience (UX) techniques to evaluate interactive systems.
• Research Methods & Professional Issues: Research requires a structured and disciplined approach at all stages. We’ll help you to develop key research skills in many areas from project proposals and planning to critical analysis of research findings, academic writing and dissemination. We’ll also teach you about professional standards and ethical issues for research.
• Individual Master’s Project: An opportunity to critically investigate and report on a particular issue in depth.

Choose one option unit in semester 1:

• Security by Design: Security must be addressed as early as possible when building a system or planning organisational change. However, security never seems to be a driving concern when engaging in innovation. When security is addressed, we discover how hard building security in really is. In this unit, you’ll have an opportunity to build security into the design and specification of secure systems, and the broader socio-technical context that these fall into.
• Blockchain & Digital Futures: This unit defines Blockchain technology, its business aspect, issues, objectives, and challenges, covering Blockchain horizontal and vertical scaling, key basics of cryptography required for understanding the Blockchain technology concepts, different cryptocurrencies, and their issues, challenges, and networks.

Choose one option unit in semester 2:

• Security Event & Incident Management: Incident management capability means managing computer security events and incidents. Lectures and seminars in this unit will capture the concepts of event logging and collection. You’ll learn to define policies, processes, procedures, roles and responsibilities and understand the issues of lead implementation of ISO 27001.
• Accessibility & Assistive Technologies: This unit is an introduction to the concepts of accessibility and assistive technology and explores how technology can be used to support people with temporary, situational or lifelong disabilities by helping to overcome challenges to their self-care, educational, vocational and recreational independence.

Please note that option units require minimum numbers in order to run and may only be available on a semester-by-semester basis. They may also change from year to year.

You have the option to undertake a 30-week placement at the end of the course, providing an opportunity to apply your acquired knowledge and skills in the workplace. You are required to find your own placement; however, our Careers & Employability Service and your faculty placements office are on hand to support you.

Programme specifications provide definitive records of the university's taught degrees in line with Quality Assurance Agency requirements. Every taught course leading to a BU Award has a programme specification which describes its aims, structure, content and learning outcomes, plus the teaching, learning and assessment methods used.

Whilst every effort is made to ensure the accuracy of the programme specification, the information is liable to change to take advantage of exciting new approaches to teaching and learning as well as developments in industry. If you have been unable to locate the programme specification for the course you are interested in, it will be available as soon as the latest version is ready. Alternatively please contact us for assistance.

The normal requirements for embarking upon this course are:

A Bachelors Honours degree with 2:2 any subject.

If you lack the formal academic qualifications needed to enter a postgraduate or post-experience degree, there are several alternative routes to follow. Some of these are based on experience. Contact the Future Students Enquiry Team for more information.

You can find details of the international qualifications we accept, and what level of study they apply to, on our entry requirements for non-UK students' page.

Please see below some examples of the qualifications for entry:

• India: Bachelor’s degree (4 years) from a recognised HE institution with a minimum overall result of 55%
• China:  学士学位 (Bachelor degree) with a minimum of 65% overall
• Nigeria:  Bachelor's degree from a recognised institution in Nigeria with a minimum classification of 2:2
• Thailand:  Thai Bachelor's (Honours) degree from a recognised higher education institution.
• Vietnam:  Bachelor's degree/Bang tot nghiep dai hoc with an average score of at least 7.0, or a Master’s degree/Thac si.
• Turkey: Bachelor’s Degree (Lisans Diplomasi -four years) to be considered for a postgraduate course at BU.

All applications will be subject to a minimum grade and your degree may need to be in a relevant subject area.

English language requirements

If English is not your first language, you will need to provide evidence that you understand English to a satisfactory level. English language requirements for this course are normally:

IELTS (Academic) 6.0 with minimum 5.5 in each component, or equivalent.

View further information about our English language requirements.

Bournemouth University International College offers a number of pre-sessional English and preparatory programmes to prepare international students for postgraduate study at BU. Admission to the degree is guaranteed on successful completion of your course to the required level. 

If you wish to apply for the full-time or part-time version of MSc Cyber Security & Human Factors, please complete an application using the ‘Apply now’ buttons on this page.

If you would like to take one or more individual units as CPD (with or without academic assesment) please email Future Student enquiries for more information.

There is no application deadline for this course. However, if you will need a visa to come to the UK to study, think carefully about the length of time it will take for your visa application to be processed and make sure your visa will be ready in time for the beginning of your course. 

December and January is one of our busiest application periods and therefore it may take us a little longer to process incoming applications. For courses with a January start date, we recommend submitting your application as soon as possible to avoid disappointment.

Click the green ‘Apply now’ button to submit your application free of charge online through myHub, our application portal. You will create your own myHub account so that you can track the progress of your application. Don’t forget to save your application as you go; you can return to it at as many times as you want before you submit it. For more information visit our How to apply section.

Employment prospects are now truly international and BU encourages students to consider an international work placement or volunteering experience during their degree. One way could be through the EU funded Erasmus mobility programme which supports placements or study exchanges in Europe.

Students can also participate in international placements outside of Europe. There are opportunities to engage with summer schools and volunteering projects. These experiences help students to enhance their global employability skills.

Our Careers & Employability Service and your faculty placements office will support you in finding an appropriate role and help you with your application. And we’ll support you throughout your time working in industry. 

As an MSc Cyber Security & Human Factors graduate, you will be prepared to work across the areas of cyber security, online behaviours and academic research, undertaking roles such as:

• Cyber Psychologist
• Security Designer
• Digital Forensic Investigator
• Incident Manager
• Intrusion Detector.

If you want to continue your studies after achieving your Master’s, you can look into our range of doctoral programmes.

What’s included in your tuition fee?

Your tuition fee covers expenses associated with your course including tuition materials, access to facilities, mandatory field trips and the following:

• Materials for laboratory and mandatory field-based teaching activity.
• Support for finding placements (UK or abroad) and fieldwork, and non-financial support whilst on placement if this is part of your course of study.
• A range of student services – advisors, help desks, counsellors, placement support and careers service.
• The Library – access to a wide range of electronic resources (databases, e-journals and e-books), print and multimedia collections, subject librarians and study spaces.
• Access to Brightspace, our virtual learning environment, which offers a responsive and personalised learning experience with powerful learning analytics
• IT labs (some open 24/7), wireless network, AV equipment to borrow.
• Disability and additional learning support, according to individual circumstances.
• The BU Language Centre to help you develop/improve foreign or English language skills.
• 24 hours a day, 365 days a year security team.

Additional costs

We are committed to offering you value for money and ensuring there are no hidden costs while you are studying with us, therefore we have listed below any additional costs you may incur that are not covered by your tuition fee:

• Laptops, tablets and mobile devices and any software used on personal devices. Access to a personal computer is strongly recommended for your study. If you are experiencing financial difficulty, visit our website for information regarding hardship funds.
• ​Textbooks, general stationery and other supplies. Our award-winning library is stocked with a large range of textbooks and online resources, free of charge. The Students’ Union shops stock a wide range of stationery supplies on both campuses.
• Accommodation and living costs. Please visit our website for more information.
• ​Travel costs for optional field trips, outdoor wear and footwear for mandatory and optional field trips (if applicable).
• Travel costs to and from the University campus. An annual bus pass can be purchased alongside your rent if you are living in halls of residence/Unilet accommodation or may be purchased separately.
• ​Travel costs to and from your placement (both in the UK and overseas) if this is part of your course of study. Placement year funding information can be found on our website.
• Clothing or equipment costs required for your placement if this is part of your course of study. 
• SportBU membership.

While all aspects of the programme, including required field trips, are included in the fee, additional, optional or extra curricula activities may be available for which a student contribution is required.

If you need to repeat one or more units during the course of your studies (with or without attendance) the pricing will be pro-rata of the full time fee

International (not Rep. of Ireland) students need to pay a non-refundable £3,000 deposit to secure their place on a postgraduate course. You will need to pay your deposit by the date stated in your offer letter. The remainder of your fee will be payable on registration/enrolment. There are two exceptions to the non-refundable rule on the deposit:

• You fail to meet the academic or English requirements of your offer
• You are refused a visa to enter the UK, provided the reason for the refusal is not a fraudulent application.

We offer a range of scholarships to students who are beginning their studies at BU. Our fees and funding pages also provide details on living costs, budgeting and paying your tuition fees.

Through our outreach programmes, we invite schools and businesses to use our labs, and we have a 10-week summer school for BU students. Our previous guests include the Police Volunteer Service.

We have some remarkable software that’s used for protecting and testing systems. This includes:

• CISCO FlexPod – this connects all the PCs in our labs together. Combined with a Blade server, it allows us to run all our machines and store up to 50G of RAM.  
• OPNET – improves network strengths, and helps us turn 50 PCs into 50 million.
• NetBrain – this configures networks automatically.
• FireEye – we use this to check for intruder activity and to analyse cyber attacks on BU’s system.

Duncan is a Lecturer in Computer Science and Security in the Department of Computing & Informatics at Bournemouth University. Previous research completed in his PhD was specifically focused towards Security Risk Assessment in Systems of Systems (SoS), whilst integrating the use of tool-support with CAIRIS. Duncan’s work has appeared in leading security and system engineering venues such as Computers & Security and the IEEE SoSE, in addition to ESPRE 2017 and ESPRE 2018.

Vasilis is a certified Computer Hacking Forensic Investigator (CHFI) and has experience as an Information Security Consultant. He has served as an expert witness in Information Security for a criminal court in the UK.

Dr Huseyin Dogan is a Principal Academic in Computing. His research focuses on Human Factors, Assistive Technologies and Systems Engineering. He is the Co-Chair of the Human Computer Interaction (HCI) research group.  

Dr Dogan received his Engineering Doctorate (EngD) in Systems Engineering from Loughborough University, MSc in Human Computer Interaction with Ergonomics from University College London, and BSc in Computer Science from Queen Mary University of London. He was the General Co-Chair for the 30th International British Computer Society Human Computer Interaction Conference (BCS HCI 2016).

Dr Dogan has over 100 publications which include journal papers, conference papers, and technical reports. His research on Assistive Technologies (with Dr Paul Whittington) featured on the BBC South, BBC Radio Solent, The Ergonomist, Auto Express, Bournemouth Echo and The Sunday Times magazine.

Dr Abir is a Principal Academic in Cyber Security at Bournemouth University.

Dr Hasan Tahir has a bachelors and MS in Software Engineering. His PhD is from the University of Essex, UK in the field of Security. He actively researches the security of cyber physical system like IoT, Industry 4, healthcare systems, etc. His teaching interests also include information security management, cloud computing security, network security, computer security, human computer interaction.