cybersecurity is hard.

⏰ Timestamps
0:00 - Introduction
0:45 - Short Answer
1:12 - Learners Perspective
3:56 - My Thoughts on CyberFast Track
5:33 - Industry Perspective
8:15 - The reality
8:55 - Conclusion

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[jpiercelt]

The fact that you're humble enough to admit 'I have no idea what I'm looking at' makes me think you're gonna make it my guy! The most times I've seen people fail, is when they relax on their laurels thinking that they know it all. This is an ever-changing field, just like most of IT is, hell most of life for that matter! As long as you keep the passion alive and the desire to learn, and KNOW that you don't know it all...you'll be just fine !

[bryanb]

cybersecurity is easy... you buy expensive tools that never get implemented properly, provide cool looking presentations for executives and completely ignore things like accounts for people that have left the company still being enabled and all of the mundane stuff that actually matters quite a lot. The greatest threat should always be the one you just learned about at your last conference, and it should be of utmost importance to buy yet another tool to combat it.

[TheChiggerBug]

I graduate from cyber security in November, it is nice to see someone else who doesn't really know what they are actually studying.

[elevatecyber]

Great points. As someone that's been in this field for over 5 years, let me just say... that feeling never really goes away. The more you know, the more you realize how much you still don't know. To me, that's part of what makes the field awesome though. There's always more cool stuff to learn!

[spencerwilson-softwaredeve]

The foundational knowledge required to begin in network security is a massive hurdle, it's true. I am completing my bachelor's specializing in network security applications development and you essentially need to understand all of the protocols at each layer in the OSI model (With emphasis on TCP and IP). Then you must also understand the basic networking administration tasks such as mainting a network, setting up servers, changing hostnames, setting up different networking services. How to set up and configure firewalls, how to set up and configure IDSs, etc. You have to understand network design, which is how to design a network that is scalable, efficient, and secure, while maintaining costs. Once you understand these you can start to get into the offensive side of things where you start to learn how to penetrate all of the defenses you set up previously. You obviously need to understand how to design low-level network applications, etc. Once you have all of that stuff figured out, you can get into network forensics and analysis which is the fun part (tracking down hackers, monitoring networks for attacks, etc).

[blackwhitegrey]

I am strong believer of never giving up. If you have the curiosity and diligence to learn. You can succeed.

[felixmorin]

Canadian here, been in Cyber for almost a year in a half now. I would say that you raised so many valid points. In addition of having a full IT skills you also need communications skills as well. Governance and office politics are as important as your knowledge in IT.

It is hard. You have to fight alone against the whole internet AND change inertia in your own company. Been lucky enough to spot and stop 2 attacks quite fast so they're listening more now.

[Judicial]

Cyber security aspirant here.. you made me laugh from the get go because it is so ridiculous how much crap we have to jam into our heads. Whenever I feel overwhelmed I just remember that I will be on a TEAM of experts, and thus it will be our collective knowledge that gets the job done.

[CHRISTIVN.OFFICIAL]

I started off learning Hacking and offensive security...and trust me I can relate. CTFs are the best way to get hands on experience to learn offensive security...Hackthebox and all those platforms...really good platforms to learn. DEDICATION AND PASSION IS KEY. I feel like giving up everyday... but videos like this are a major encouragement. Lets carry on the journey people. Thanks Grant!

[Dtomper]

This video motivated me so much because the difficulty of cybersecurity made me start to lose hope in myself thinking that it is not my type. But apparently it's hard for everyone so there is hope for everyone!

[austinlambdin]

The foundation must be super solid.

Every avenue has a different focal point, though they all intermingle and you really gotta know your stuff if you want to do better in interviews. Just think about the OSI model, for example. If you can fully understand how systems operate at every layer and what exactly is happening at each layer, that will really help you out in the long run. If you can effectively communicate that you know how things work, how to protect systems or applications, and how to verify that the protection works, then you’ve got a pretty solid answer for a lot of problems any company could be facing.

[Apexchaos]

If you are in university or educating yourself in IT fundamentals, get a technical support position. It will pay dividends to have on your resume to say you got paid to work in IT.

[near]

Just got out of college and I got a job a few months ago as "Jr. Security Engineer" or so they said. On my first 5 months I've struggled trying to keep up with all the things they ask me to do, one day is Azure, the other day networking problems, vulnerability patching, and a bunch of things. On top of that, seniors seem to have no idea of what they're doing. I love cybersec but man it sure is tough! Thank god it is my passion and I love learning, that'll keep me on the road :) Good luck to you man!!

[vivverz]

I've been working in IT for almost 14 years and decided to go back to school in order to obtain my degree in cybersecurity, and I feel like I have no idea what I'm doing, especially being a remote student, no live lectures, really no support. So when I get stuck or have questions, it will take 48 hours to 4 weeks before I get a response back. Thank you for doing this video, it's greatly appreciated. I've actually been able to use online tools and online learning platforms, which, made it really easy to understand what I'm doing.

[ComeHereGreatness]

It's only hard if you don't understand it and some things just take longer to understand. It's not just cybersecurity it's any job.

[abdulrehmanmalik]

Nothing is hard. Its just needs focus dedication, Passion, Love, Consistency, Patience

[supermax]

Yeah, there's a lot to cybersecurity than meets the eye. I just finished 1st year of college doing the major, and I can tell you, that I have got a long way to go

[Smallz]

You do need to know a decent amount of all IT to do cyber security but DONT be afraid be cause you don't know a lot about everything. I currently work as I Cyber Security Analyst but my current job duties are managing several Palo Alto firewalls and running phishing campaigns to train users. Ask me about application gateway firewalls and I have no idea. The bottom line is just specialize in something in cyber security. It has way too many facets to know everything. I also know very little in Malware analysis and offensive penetration testing. I am more defensive Security. I hope what I say encourages more to get started. The best piece of advice I could give is: Know how something works vs memorizing how something works if that makes sense.

[David_]

So I went the traditional route of going to school and obtained industry certs. Did my fair share of CTFs and self learning platforms like HTB and THM. I currently in incident response and I must say that I feel incredibly overwhelmed at times with what I don’t know. I take it day by day learning my new role but cybersecurity is no joke with what you have to KNOW to do your job well.

[blanco]

The thing is, the industry is growing and it needs to change the way it thinks, you need to grow and groom talent, if all the companies want 10 yr experienced masters in everything, good luck. There’s people wanting to go into it, of course you need to study, it’s a lot of information, but there’s a lot of professions like that. A lot of gatekeeping and old ways of thinking are going to make it easy for criminals in the long run.