<html>
<head>
<meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html; charset=us-ascii">
<meta name="Generator" content="Microsoft Exchange Server">
<!-- converted from rtf -->
<style><!-- .EmailQuote { margin-left: 1pt; padding-left: 4pt; border-left: #800000 2px solid; } --></style>
</head>
<body>
<font face="Calibri, sans-serif" size="2">
<div>(Apologies if you receive multiple copies.)</div>
<div><font face="Times New Roman, serif" size="3"> </font></div>
<div><font face="Times New Roman, serif" size="3"> </font></div>
<div><b>VAST Challenge 2012 Call for Participation</b></div>
<div>Mini-challenge 1 data now available! See <a href="http://www.vacommunity.org/vastchallenge2012"><font color="#0000FF"><u>http://www.vacommunity.org/vastchallenge2012</u></font></a></div>
<div> </div>
<div> </div>
<div>This year’s VAST Challenge focuses on visual analytics applications for both large scale situation analysis and cyber security. There will be two mini-challenges to test your visual analytics applications and your analytical skills.</div>
<div><font face="Times New Roman, serif" size="3"> </font></div>
<div><b>Available now: </b>In mini-challenge 1, (the imaginary) BankWorld's largest financial institution, the (fictitious) Bank of Money needs your best situation awareness visualizations to understand the health of its global corporate network. How do you
visualize status data for a network containing nearly <b>a million computers</b> in a way that you can perceive network health and identify problems? </div>
<div> </div>
<div><b>Coming soon: </b>In mini-challenge 2, unusual events are occurring in one of the Bank of Money's regional offices. Some of them may very well wreak havoc across the institution if they turn out to be malicious. What are these unusual events? And if
you were in charge of computer security, what actions should be taken to safeguard the network and quite possibly save the Bank of Money from disaster? (Participants from last year's VAST challenge may find their firewall and IDS log analysis tools useful for
this challenge as well.)</div>
<div> </div>
<div>We encourage participation by individuals and teams in industry and academia. Creative approaches to visual analytics are encouraged.</div>
<div> </div>
<div>Please visit <a href="http://www.vacommunity.org/vastchallenge2012"><font color="#0000FF"><u>http://www.vacommunity.org/vastchallenge2012</u></font></a> for more information about the challenge and to download datasets and instructions. Data for mini-challenge
1 is available now. Data for mini-challenge 2 will be available soon. For more information, please contact <a href="http://visweek.vgtc.org/visweek/2012/info/call-participation/vast_challenge@visweek.org"><font color="#0000FF"><u>vast_challenge@visweek.org</u></font></a>.</div>
<div> </div>
<div>The submission deadline is July 9, 2012.</div>
<div> </div>
<div>We look forward to seeing your creative solutions!</div>
<div> </div>
<div>Kris Cook and Georges Grinstein, VAST Challenge Committee co-chairs</div>
<div> </div>
<div><font face="Times New Roman, serif" size="3"> </font></div>
<div><font face="Times New Roman, serif" size="3"> </font></div>
<div><font face="Times New Roman, serif" size="3"> </font></div>
</font>
</body>
</html>