Matt Bishop, a UC Davis associate professor of computer science, studies and teaches vulnerability analysis -- how to identify the holes in a computer system and plug them. He can discuss security breaches like the recent Microsoft break-in. Bishop teaches vulnerability analysis as a tactical struggle against conventional thinking. He has assigned undergraduate students in his security class to read Machiavelli and "The Art of War" by Sun Tzu. "Understanding the attacker philosophy is fundamental to understanding computer security," Bishop says. "That philosophy is: Attack the power structure using its own tools in ways that it never expected." Bishop wants to teach computer designers and programmers to make new systems more secure. And he's developing a model to make it easier to look for vulnerabilities and fix them. The UC Davis Computer Security Research Laboratory is recognized by the U.S. National Security Agency as a center of excellence.