cybersecurity career

So You want to Work in Cybersecurity, eh?!

cybersecurity, education

There is a massive need for cybersecurity professionals today and the need is only growing. We’ve seen estimates of anywhere between 2-3 million vacant jobs over the next three years. The demand is definitely bullish and showing no signs of stopping. With this being said, breaking into an industry is always a difficult thing to do and nothing should be assumed, even with the massive demand of unfilled positions. Here are a few areas I’d suggest if you’re looking to not only get into security, but become successful.

site reliability engineering

Site Reliability Engineering – From DevOps to NoOps

Cloud Computing, Infrastructure

Site Reliability Engineering (SRE) is a practice that combines software development skills and IT operations into a single job function. Automation and continuous integration and delivery are used to reach the goal of improving highly dynamic systems. The concept originated with Google in the early 2000s and was documented in a book with the same name, Site Reliability Engineering (a must read). SRE shares many governing concepts with DevOps—both domains rely on a culture of sharing, metrics and automation. SRE can be thought of as an extreme implementation of DevOps. The role of the SRE is common in cloud first enterprises and gaining momentum in traditional IT teams. Part systems administrator, part second tier support and part developer, SREs require a personality that is by nature inquisitive, always acquiring new skills, asking questions, and solving problems by embracing new tools and automation.

Multi-cloud

Azure Goes Boom to Remind Us Infrastructure and Multi-cloud Still Matter

Cloud Computing

Microsoft’s had significant difficulties recovering from its most severe Azure outage in years. On September 4, 2018 there was a weather related power spike at Microsoft’s Azure South Central U.S. region in San Antonio. That surge hit crippled their HVAC system. The subsequent rising temperatures triggered automatic hardware shutdowns. More than 30 cloud services, as well as the Azure status page were taken out in the process.

MTTD and MTTR

What You Should Know About Driving Down MTTD and MTTR

cybersecurity, Network Security

Effectively connect people, process and technology to minimize MTTD and MTTR

There’s a reason it’s said that what gets measured gets managed. In order to successfully achieve a goal, you have to be able to measure progress. It’s the only way to know if you’re heading in the right direction.

That’s why any security operations team worth their salt will be paying close attention to both their mean time to detect (MTTD) and mean time to respond (MTTR) metrics when it comes to resolving incidents.

The average dwell time for attackers still sits somewhere within the ranges of 100 – 140 days and frankly, we can do better. Security operations teams need to be fanatical when it comes to lowering these metrics within their organizations.

Significantly reducing dwell time, MTTD and MTTR starts with an understanding of attacks. From there, you need multiple groups working together in harmony enabled by technology to automate and orchestrate incident response processes.

Am I Already Using the Cloud and is it Safe?

Cloud Computing, Network Security

Often when speaking to people about the cloud, their first reaction is that it isn’t safe and they won’t use it. Odds are that they, and most everyone else who owns an Internet connected device, is already using the cloud.

Let’s take a step back and define the cloud. In essence, it’s just a network of servers — which are large, super-powerful computers. Anything that’s referred to as “cloud-based” or “in the cloud” means it primarily lives online, instead of on something physical in your possession like a CD or your computer’s hard drive.

A good rule of thumb for determining whether something is “cloud-based” is asking yourself the following question: Can I easily log into this service from another device, like my phone or a different computer? If the answer is yes, then the service is probably based in the cloud.

Vulnerability assessment

Vulnerability Assessment versus Penetration Assessment

cybersecurity, Network Security

We get asked this question frequently, “What the difference between a vulnerability assessment and penetration assessment?”. It’s a great question and one we’d like to shed a bit more light on throughout this blog. Both engagements are aimed towards shedding light on areas within your cybersecurity posture that need improvement. We regularly perform vulnerability assessments and penetration tests for our clients tasked by regulatory compliance to adhere to a particular standard or to increase their security posture. Both of these tests play an important role within your organization by enlightening you on areas of weakness and decreasing risk from adversaries.