Security certifictions

WHERE CAN STUDENTS LEARN SECURITY? 

Students always ask me about various certifications in the IT world. And for a good reason, because industry pays $12 per hour to employees without certifications, and $25 per hour to employees with certifications. Also, even for simple “experimentation” it is good to have some basic certification.

In the security field, the most basic certification is CompTIA Security+ certification. This certification is the de-facto expected certification of a new person in IT. http://certification.comptia.org/getCertified/certifications/security.aspx

CompTIA Security+ at a glance:

·         The basic security certification

·         Required by most entry-level security jobs

·         Requires retesting every 3 years, OR taking qualifying continuing education credits.

More experienced IT professionals will pursue CISSP certification. https://www.isc2.org  It is considered a high achievement and is expected for all higher-level jobs.  CSSP requires 5 years of industrial experience and a sponsor who is also CISSP certified, so it is not available to beginners. However, CISSP does have Associate version of the certification which is a “beginners” version of CSSP and will eventually count towards CISSP.

For people who do not plan to be security professionals but would like to learn a little bit “and have fun” and perhaps apply for less formal and less rigorous jobs than a typical IT professional would, there are many choices.

There are many certifications, such as Certified Ethical Hacker (CEH) by the International Council of Electronic Commerce Consultants (EC-Council). http://eccouncil.org 

CEH does not have a great reputation in the industry, however, it is a great start for an interested student. Requires  knowing:

·         ethics and legal issues

·         footprinting

·         scanning

·         enumeration

·         system hacking

·         Trojan programs and backdoors

·         sniffers

·         denial of service

·         social engineering

·         session hijacking

·         hacking web servers

·         web application vulnerabilities

·         web-based password cracking techniques

·         SQL injection

·         hacking wireless networks

·         viruses and worms

·         hacking novell

·         hacking Linux

·         intrusion detection systems, firewalls, honeypots

·         buffer overflows

·         cryptography

Students LOVE the idea of hacking but they forget that it has many consequences. For example, most students have electronic accounts, such as email, and have signed that they will not be using any school computers for hacking purposes. Being caught can expel you from school…. Also, there are state and federal laws. Federal laws exist for hacking into government and financial institutions. Hacking into government sites can carry serious monetary and jail penalties.