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Reasonably Accurate 馃馃 Transcript
Good morning. How's everyone uh doing, wanted to talk to you today about how to get started in cybersecurity. What you need to get started in cybersecurity. Um Because this is a question, I get a lot and I'm glad that I get it a lot because it shows that there's a lot of interest in this field.
Um And not just because it's uh sort of the hottest field in it right now. Um But because I think it's genuinely challenging, um you know, I ended up in this conversation um with uh the person who was detailing the family van the other day, which was odd.
Um But, you know, as a young student uh covering, um, you know, looking at the local college and trying to decide between going for network architecture um or cybersecurity. And I kind of said, well, hold on a second. It's not even a debate.
You should be going down the cybersecurity route and I wanted to address here um in this one because this is a topic that's on my mind a lot and I think it's important. Um got another little furry visitor this morning. Um The uh let me Say hi.
Hello. Um, the, uh, important ingredients here for cybersecurity. So, first of all, this is just my opinion. Um, there are many ways to get started. If you, um, go to sort of the top 25 or just a random 25 people in cybersecurity, you're gonna hear 25 different stories about how they got started and how they, um, sort of had that spark and how they followed through education experience, all that kind of stuff is going to be very different.
So this is just so in my opinions. Um I've been in the field for 25 years focused almost exclusively on cybersecurity for the last 20. Um So, uh again, my path, my opinions, um please take this with a grain of salt, um but also hopefully expand your perspective.
So I am not a fan of undergraduate degrees in cybersecurity. There you go. Not a fan of them. Here's why I think cybersecurity requires a broad perspective as possible. So, getting experience in all sorts of areas of it and computer science, I think is absolutely critical for um cybersecurity for a successful career in cybersecurity.
If all you do is, you know, finish your um secondary school, go to post-secondary and learn sort of a regimented undergrad in cybersecurity, um or take a college degree in cybersecurity. Uh And then uh so a two year community college in the States, um and then come out and go ready to get in the field, you're basically gonna be um implementing stuff without knowing why um you're gonna be um, sort of limiting your prospects.
I think a cybersecurity professional, the number one thing, a cybersecurity professional has is a broad perspective or a willingness to look at things from different angles. Um So for me, uh, really strong character traits that I think people show, um, you know, as far as um, cybersecurity.
So actually, let me rewind that. I think um if you're interested in a career in cybersecurity, you can come at it from any background. Um Is you can teach the computer stuff, you can teach the it stuff. Obviously, that's a link adjustable timeline depending on where you're sitting for um current knowledge.
But you can always learn how a firewall works. You can always learn how to configure an IP S system or how to deploy a V at scale. Um or you know, how to do threat risk assessments. I think the thought process and the ability to question the ability to learn very, very quickly is far more critical.
So, um things need to be doing all the time in cybersecurity. You need to be learning nonstop, you need to be consuming information from a ton of different sources, researching, pulling stuff in to give you the information you need to make a decision or to give you enough information to brief somebody to have them make a decision within context.
So you need to be able to research, pull information and learn quickly. That's, that's key. Um, you need to have sort of that puzzling, um, tenacious mindset. So, um, you know, number two that puzzling tenacious mindset, I like, uh, people, um, who are doing a lot of games, um, puzzles, crosswords.
Um, just genuinely curious people who want to explore more and this ties directly back to learning. Um. Right. And, I mean, I think those are very important traits. I think those are things that will propel you much further in your career than, um you know, in the early stages of education.
Now, I think education plays a key role. Um I like uh people with a diverse background. So whether they're self taught or formally educated really doesn't matter to me. Um I think if you are going formal education, a strong background in computer science is good.
Um a strong background in finance, um legal, um any of the science, any engineering background for sure. Um Anything that portrays the traits of, you know, insatiable learning and that broad perspective and sort of puzzle challenge, I think are strong, obviously, if you take some courses that are far more practical in like, hey, you know, I took windows internals or Linux internals that will help on the technical side of cybersecurity.
But again, that stuff can all be learned and it needs to be constantly learned. So when I think, you know, back 25 years ago, when I started this, none of the stuff we have on broadcasting from a phone. Um, the concept of said phone didn't even exist 25 years ago.
So, if you can't continually learn cybersecurity is not for you, so it really doesn't matter where you come from. Um, and in fact, I think there may be an advantage of not coming from some of those, uh, standard computer or engineering backgrounds and though I very much appreciate those degrees, um, there is a case to be made for post secondary or for, sorry for graduate work.
Um, I myself went back and did a graduate degree, um, a few years back, um, and did a master's in information security systems and I specialized in digital forensics. Um, I found that quite useful. Um, it was sort of at the graduate level.
It was far more principle based and broadly applicable in law term applicable than at the lower levels where it's a little more nitty gritty and of course, industry certifications play a big role in continuing education, but all this stuff is sort of icing on the cake.
It helps prove and demonstrate some knowledge, but you can get absolutely all of it by simply reading up on your own, getting some hands on experience and working with things. But if you've been following me at all, you know, that I'm a firm believer that security should not be isolated, it should not be on its own.
It can't exist in a vacuum. So I find if you are educating yourself or being educated, make sure you're learning about the latest development, tools and trends. Make sure you're understanding how it operations works. Make sure you understand how business works. That's a huge gap in most people's cybersecurity education.
So they completely ignore the side of the business. So it may seem like I'm all over the place and I kind of am And I think that's the point is that there is no one set path to get into cybersecurity. But there are principles and traits that I believe you need.
And this is just me, I believe this is my personal belief that I, I think you need to succeed. And that's an insatiable appetite for learning, the ability to self learn or drive self driven to seek out new learning and sort of that puzzling tenacious mindset to crack these problems.
If you've got those three principles or attributes sort of working for you, um, your backgrounds will just adjust your timeline. Um They'll also adjust opportunity, um which is huge. So I think a lot of people when they ask me a question of how do I get started in cybersecurity, even though they frame it as an education and skills thing.
It's really, uh how do I get my first job? How do I get out there and help? And um, you know, I'll do another video on that. There's a, there's a lot of stuff in the community that can help jump up. Um But the beautiful thing is this is all digital um starting a blog about your learning, starting a video stream about how you're learning being active on social media, being active in the open source community will help get your name out there.
It will also help create a body of work that you can point to if you don't have the actual um on the job experience that you can reference to employers or potential employers. But we'll dive into that later. I think the biggest thing here for me is that key takeaway that if you want a career in cybersecurity, go for it.
As long as you can uh learn quickly, have an appetite to continue to learn nonstop and have that mindset where you like to crack problems and you will stay on them until they are solved. I think if you've got those three things, you are set up well for a strong career in cybersecurity because you can figure the rest out, you can learn on the fly.
What do you think? Hit me up here in the comments, comments down below, hit me on Twitter at marknca. Just getting started on this topic. But I think it's an important one. We know there's a massive skills gap. But I think if we keep taking the same way to fill that gap, it's never going to get filled.
Um I have met many of crazy background, uh so many a cybersecurity professional with insane background stories. Um and they are among the best in the field. Um So don't be discouraged if you haven't taken a standard route. Um There's uh any path will lead you to a future career in cybersecurity as long as you have that dedication and that mindset, that continuous learning, that problem solving.
So talk to you soon. I hope you're set up for Great Thursday. We will see you tomorrow.
