Dark Reading is part of the Informa Tech Division of Informa PLC

This site is operated by a business or businesses owned by Informa PLC and all copyright resides with them.Informa PLC's registered office is 5 Howick Place, London SW1P 1WG. Registered in England and Wales. Number 8860726.

Database Security
Authentication
Mobile
Privacy
Compliance
Careers and People
Identity & Access Management
Security Monitoring
Advanced Threats
Insider Threats
Vulnerability Management
Comments
Closing The Skills Gap Between Hackers & Defenders: 4 Steps
Newest First  |  Oldest First  |  Threaded View
Page 1 / 2   >   >>
Robert McDougal
50%
50%
Robert McDougal,
 User Rank: Ninja
8/16/2014 | 10:05:02 AM
Re: there's another lesson
Unfortunately, I see this all too often.  One of the non-profits I volunteer with falls into this category.  They believe they have nothing to lose and will not spend the money to properly secure their data.  I address this issue with them about once a quarter but I get the same response, "Nobody cares about us, we are just a little operation".
Robert McDougal
50%
50%
Robert McDougal,
 User Rank: Ninja
8/16/2014 | 10:02:27 AM
Re: Skills Shortage
I think you have hit the nail on the head here.  The important thing is not education into current practices, for they are all imperfect, but rather focusing on innovation.
Robert McDougal
50%
50%
Robert McDougal,
 User Rank: Ninja
8/16/2014 | 10:01:03 AM
Re: Think security
Although I agree the good guys sometimes become complacent, I don't believe we will ever see a 100% secure application.  The reason being that if you make an application 100% secure the usability of that application drops to near 0%.  

I concede that I may be proven wrong by future technologies but currently I don't see a path to 100% security.
Marilyn Cohodas
50%
50%
Marilyn Cohodas,
 User Rank: Strategist
8/15/2014 | 9:08:09 AM
Re: Skills Shortage
Creativity is definitely under-rated, Dr. T. Did you see Lysa Meyers recent blog -- Time To Broaden CompSci Curriculum Beyond STEM? She makes a very strong case for that skill set. 
Dr.T
50%
50%
Dr.T,
 User Rank: Ninja
8/13/2014 | 4:03:16 PM
Re: there's another lesson
Good point. Some companies think they do not have anything lose, when they review the requirements around the regulations they would realize it. If they do business they have data they need to protect.
Dr.T
50%
50%
Dr.T,
 User Rank: Ninja
8/13/2014 | 3:59:39 PM
Re: Skills Shortage
Education is one thing, experience something else, they are all needed I would say, however what is most important is the creativity, in my view. Innovating new ways to protect ourselves from potential threats. 
Dr.T
50%
50%
Dr.T,
 User Rank: Ninja
8/13/2014 | 3:56:25 PM
Think security
 

I agree with the article. Good guys have enough opportunities to outpace bad guys by developing more secure applications, networks and systems. The main reason all these system being attached and attacks are successful just simply because they all have vulnerabilities. When we embed security considerations early enough in a project not only those vulnerabilities would be minimized and but also the impact of attack would be minimized.
GonzSTL
50%
50%
GonzSTL,
 User Rank: Ninja
8/12/2014 | 1:12:30 PM
Re: Skills Shortage
As with most other BS degrees, you can only gain so much knowledge through education, and the rest really depends on hands-on experience. That does not detract from the importance of education because it is that education that provides the foundation upon which experience is built. You have to look at the entire picture to really understand the different aspects of IT and security. I received a BSCS and what that really did for me was help me understand how electronic computing worked, both from a hardware and a software perspective. As far as security is concerned, for me it was a combination of continuing education, mostly from reading manuals, technical papers, attending technology specific classes, hands on experience, and everyday common sense. The title of "Security Analyst" is so broad that it can encompass many different roles, such as the one you had. You mentioned that you helped everyone else with their projects to ensure that they met security/compliance objectives. Did it occur to you that it was in fact a critical and appropriate role in IT security? Educating fellow employees was also critical - if there was a need for it, then you also served that need, to increase the overall security posture of the organization. Sure, that sounds a lot like deskwork or paper pushing, or whatever, and it isn't quite as sexy as hacking, or tracking hacker activities in real time as depicted in the movies, but in reality, IT security is all of that combined. In a large organization, that is way too much for a single individual, and must be split off into several roles among several personnel. I have also worked for small companies where I wore many hats, and it was both exciting and fulfilling. I suppose that is really where I started to see the big picture, saw how everything worked and how they all come together. I admit it was more exciting that being pigeon-holed into some mundane role. However, one must look at security from an overall point of view, culling information from all the different mundane roles, to provide an overall assessment of the existing security posture in the context of existing business processes. From there, you determine where the gaps are, and provide an analysis and actionable data to produce a secure environment in which the organization can deploy technology in support of the organization's goals. IT security isn't merely a technical discipline; it is in fact a combination of technology know how and business savvy, and is an integral part of an organization that wants to poise itself for success.
dewser
50%
50%
dewser,
 User Rank: Apprentice
8/12/2014 | 12:08:06 PM
Skills Shortage
There is only so much to teach at the college level.  Your standard BS holder is going to come out with some base knowledge in either MIS or CS.  That knowledge is most likely going to be out-of-date when they hit the workforce.  To be an effective defender you need to have some pretty strong bases in a number of IT disciplines.  You need to know how the infrastructure works.  The best way to learn this is to do it.  I've spent the last 15 years of my life in the IT space.  A majority of that was building servers, deploying firewalls, and troubleshooting everything from the simple app crash to the more complicated network performance issues.  Only in the last 3 years have I've focused on security.  But guess what, everything I tell a company now is everything I told them years ago when I was a Sys Admin.

I tried my hand at working for a large enterprise.  My title was IT Security Analyst, but that was nothing more than a title.  I spent more time as a glorified project manager.  That consisted of helping everyone else where their projects to ensure they meet security/compliance objectives.  But honestly many of the regular IT staff had little knowledge of servers, operating systems, networking...  so I spent more time educating them on that.  So in my mind I was being severly underutilized.  Yes I think it was good I was able to help educate but very few of these people showed any desire to learn some things on their own.  Unfortunately this did not play into my long term goals and frankly I was bored out of my gourd.  Now I am doing exciting work in a small startup.  I have to wear many hats but it is very much worth it.

So the big enterprises and the government want skilled hackers, unfortunately I think many do not have the culture that can support these types of minds.  Also money is not always the best motivator.  I could probably be making much much more working for a larger entity as a "Cyber Security Analyst" but in my current role if I want to go to some type of special training or a hacker con, management is all for it.
Whoopty
50%
50%
Whoopty,
 User Rank: Ninja
8/12/2014 | 11:04:24 AM
Cyber Centurion
I was pretty pleased to hear that the UK is pushig for more digital security experts by opening up the Cyber Centurion competitiion to younger school children:

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/technology/internet-security/11025457/School-children-to-be-trained-in-cyber-warfare.html?placement=CB1

That said, I'm not sure I approve of one of the main prizes being to intern at an American defence contractor. Couldn't they do the same at a British company instead? 
Page 1 / 2   >   >>


News
US Formally Attributes SolarWinds Attack to Russian Intelligence Agency
Jai Vijayan, Contributing Writer,  4/15/2021
News
Dependency Problems Increase for Open Source Components
Robert Lemos, Contributing Writer,  4/14/2021
News
FBI Operation Remotely Removes Web Shells From Exchange Servers
Kelly Sheridan, Staff Editor, Dark Reading,  4/14/2021
Register for Dark Reading Newsletters
White Papers
Video
Cartoon
Current Issue
2021 Top Enterprise IT Trends
We've identified the key trends that are poised to impact the IT landscape in 2021. Find out why they're important and how they will affect you today!
Flash Poll
Twitter Feed
Dark Reading - Bug Report
Bug Report
Enterprise Vulnerabilities
From DHS/US-CERT's National Vulnerability Database
CVE-2021-1074
PUBLISHED: 2021-04-21
NVIDIA Windows GPU Display Driver for Windows, R390 driver branch, contains a vulnerability in its installer where an attacker with local system access may replace an application resource with malicious files. Such an attack may lead to code execution, escalation of privileges, denial of service, or...
CVE-2021-1075
PUBLISHED: 2021-04-21
NVIDIA Windows GPU Display Driver for Windows, all versions, contains a vulnerability in the kernel mode layer (nvlddmkm.sys) handler for DxgkDdiEscape where the program dereferences a pointer that contains a location for memory that is no longer valid, which may lead to code execution, denial of se...
CVE-2021-1076
PUBLISHED: 2021-04-21
NVIDIA GPU Display Driver for Windows and Linux, all versions, contains a vulnerability in the kernel mode layer (nvlddmkm.sys or nvidia.ko) where improper access control may lead to denial of service, information disclosure, or data corruption.
CVE-2021-1077
PUBLISHED: 2021-04-21
NVIDIA GPU Display Driver for Windows and Linux, R450 and R460 driver branch, contains a vulnerability where the software uses a reference count to manage a resource that is incorrectly updated, which may lead to denial of service.
CVE-2021-1078
PUBLISHED: 2021-04-21
NVIDIA Windows GPU Display Driver for Windows, all versions, contains a vulnerability in the kernel driver (nvlddmkm.sys) where a NULL pointer dereference may lead to system crash.