Which Security Certs Are People Interested In Taking?

We’re going to be starting up study groups for security certifications in the future. What certs would you like to see covered?

  • Security+
  • Network+
  • Certified Ethical Hacker (CEH)
  • CISSP
  • SANS Institute Courses
  • OSCP
  • Other (Please comment with which)

0 voters

I’d love to join in for any course. My preference is CSSLP, which is a software focused version of the CISSP since I’m already working on it.

I heard OSCP is pretty tough, so would prefer to steer clear of that one at this stage.

It’s not a certificate but this stuff is also a great resource. Dense and informative. Going through it as well, but alas slower than I’d wish to. Having people to chat with would be brilliant.
https://www.cl.cam.ac.uk/~rja14/book.html

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Oooh thanks for this; I’ll defo have a read through and chat about it with you!

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Pentest+ From compTIA would be nice!

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Hi all - I saw the post on slack and thought I’d jump in and see if we(NICyber Cluster) can help in any way? I’d have to check but if it would be useful to you maybe we could ask our members which certifications they have found useful and also what they look for from a career perspective. Could be a nice way of joining hands between NICyber & InfosecNI?

With best wishes

Simon

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What’s the plan for kicking this off? Is it just people self-organising or do you have a structure in mind?

Sec+ is a pretty solid foundation to a lot of other stuff, and often a requirement for government jobs.
https://pauljerimy.com/security-certification-roadmap/ (read from the bottom up)

After that, it’s worth thinking about what type of security you enjoy working with, and building up experience and certs mainly in that domain. But Sec+ (and other basics) give you a chance to think about a variety of domains, which I think is useful if you haven’t worked out yet what your preferences are. It took me ages to work out how much I preferred Blue Team/Forensics stuff, and only after I’d dabbled in a whole bunch of other things.
I’d like to do GCFE later, myself, but I don’t think there’s any appetite for that locally. I’d also find CEH interesting/useful - understanding Red Team strategy is useful for Blue Team work.

Would definitely be useful to know what local employers are looking for @szlwzl !
I think it’s also worthwhile googling a bit to find out what certs might increase your pay the most, to make sure you’re doing something worth the time.

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Hey Simon,

I’m so sorry, I’m only seeing this now! That’d be great if you guys want to be involved! IT would be really useful to see which certs your members have found useful and take that as a basis for which certs we focus on. Thank you so much :grin: - we’d love to collaborate! Also, if any of your team wants to help me run any of the study groups, I’d be happy to have you! I’m starting with Sec+ because I’m studying for it, but I’m not as familiar with some of the other certs we’re likely to cover!

We’ve decided on our first Cert! Signups and discussion here: CompTIA Security+ Certification Study Group 22nd July 2020!

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I recently completed/attained the OSCP and found the whole course very informative.

I had spent about a year prepping for this, through other methods like hackthebox & tryhackme etc before I signed up.

I received a notification that OffSec have recently updated their OSWE syllabus so I am tempted for that next. I need to get my Azure Admin cert out of the way first.

What’s the appeal of CEH for the users here?

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It’s one of the “recommended to start with” certifications as far as I’m seeing. An acquaintance of mine tried to go for OSCP as a first and also recommended that it’s better to start with CEH which they pivoted to.

I personally found that the OWASP materials were best for getting started in a professional context, rather than any certifications.