It’s not often that you hear about a ransomware attack that has caused data breaches or a devastating impact on companies and individuals from all industries. Cyberattacks are becoming more sophisticated and attack everything from credit card data to personal health records.
The job of a cybersecurity professional is to protect against these attacks by analyzing weaknesses and taking preventative measures. To accomplish this, they need certain capabilities, both non-technical and technical.
A cybersecurity expert must be familiar with different platforms and systems in order to stay current with most advanced hacking methods. This includes understanding of programming languages, forensic investigation, and specific tools (e.g., those used for penetration testing and digital forensics). A cybersecurity analyst, for instance is required to know how IoT devices are connected to the Internet and can be hacked.
It is essential that cybersecurity professionals can identify and assess the level of risk in their business. This is because the seemingly infinite ways hackers can cause trouble can make it impossible to protect against every threat. For example security professionals must be aware that passwords must be long, complicated and include an array of upper and lowercase letters, numbers, and symbols, and that passwords should not contain personal information like birthdays or a family member’s name.
To be a successful cyber professional, you must have empathy for both the perpetrators and victims of cyberattacks. This helps them understand how hackers think, which can assist them in creating more effective defenses.
