Cyber Security Certificate Tier List – UPDATED (2023)
Summary
TLDRThe video offers an insightful evaluation of various cybersecurity certifications, highlighting their usefulness in landing jobs and the importance of practical knowledge over theoretical memorization. It emphasizes the value of CompTIA Security Plus and SANS training, the practicality of ethical hacking certifications like OSCP, and the limitations of vendor-specific and GRC-focused certificates. The speaker shares personal experiences and industry insights to guide viewers on their cybersecurity career path.
Takeaways
- 📚 The speaker's personal journey with cybersecurity certifications highlights the struggle of finding relevant and practical training early in their career.
- 🚀 CompTIA certificates are popular for beginners, offering vendor-neutral, foundational knowledge, but may involve memorization over practical skill development.
- 🔒 CompTIA Security Plus is considered a good introduction to cybersecurity, providing a broad understanding of the field.
- 📈 CompTIA Cybersecurity Analyst (SECA+) is more challenging and covers useful concepts for cybersecurity analysts, despite being theoretical.
- 🤔 The speaker questions the value of CompTIA PenTest+, comparing it to learning to drive by reading a book, and suggests it may not be worthwhile.
- 🌟 SANS Institute training is highly regarded in the cybersecurity industry, offering practical, up-to-date training from experienced professionals.
- 💡 ISAO certificates focus on governance, risk, and compliance (GRC), but may not provide practical training, and require significant experience.
- 🔥 Ethical hacking certificates like OSCP are favored for their practical approach, testing real-world ethical hacking skills rather than theoretical knowledge.
- 🛠️ Vendor-specific cybersecurity analyst certificates from Google, IBM, Microsoft, and Splunk aim to introduce cybersecurity basics to those without IT experience.
- ☁️ Cloud security certifications are in high demand, with specialized vendor certificates from AWS, Azure, and Google Cloud being particularly valuable.
- 🔑 The effectiveness of a single certification in securing a job depends on experience and the job market, but certifications can serve as a starting point for a learning journey in cybersecurity.
Q & A
What is the speaker's main goal in creating this video?
-The speaker's main goal is to provide an honest, no-nonsense rating of cybersecurity certifications and help viewers understand which certifications are useful for both learning and landing a job in the cybersecurity industry.
What was the speaker's experience with CompTIA A+ and CCNA certifications?
-The speaker found the process of learning for CompTIA A+ and CCNA certifications extremely boring and felt that the knowledge gained was irrelevant to ethical hacking and web application servers.
What does the speaker think about the CompTIA Security Plus certification?
-The speaker believes that CompTIA Security Plus is a good introductory certificate that teaches the general foundations of cybersecurity, making it a valuable starting point for beginners.
Why does the speaker criticize multiple-choice exams for cybersecurity certifications?
-The speaker criticizes multiple-choice exams because they believe that they encourage memorization and cramming of concepts rather than a deep understanding and practical application of cybersecurity topics.
What is the speaker's opinion on the CompTIA PenTest+ certification?
-The speaker does not believe that the CompTIA PenTest+ certification serves any practical purpose, as it is based on theoretical knowledge from a multiple-choice exam, which is insufficient for learning ethical hacking skills.
What are the advantages of SANS Institute training and certifications?
-The advantages of SANS Institute training and certifications include high-quality, up-to-date material, experienced instructors, practical components, and broad coverage of cybersecurity topics. They are also well-respected within the cybersecurity industry.
What is the main disadvantage of SANS training?
-The main disadvantage of SANS training is its high cost, which is typically around eight thousand dollars, targeting companies to pay for their employees' training.
What does the speaker think about the OSCP certification?
-The speaker highly regards the OSCP certification as it is fully practical and tests the candidate's ability to perform ethical hacking, rather than just passing multiple-choice exams.
Why does the speaker rate CISSP certification as a B?
-The speaker rates CISSP as a B because, while it is a well-known certification, it is more suited for cybersecurity managers and does not deeply cover specific domains. It also requires memorization of concepts, which may not reflect practical cybersecurity skills.
What is the speaker's view on vendor-specific cybersecurity analyst certificates like Google, IBM, Microsoft, and Splunk?
-The speaker views these vendor-specific certificates positively, especially for beginners with no IT experience. They provide a good introduction to cybersecurity and come with hands-on labs, which are beneficial for learning and confidence building.
How does the speaker feel about cloud security certificates?
-The speaker sees cloud security certificates, particularly those from major cloud providers like AWS, Azure, and Google Cloud, as highly valuable due to the increasing demand for cybersecurity professionals with cloud security knowledge.
Outlines
🔍 Introduction to Cybersecurity Certifications
The speaker shares their personal journey and experiences in the cybersecurity industry, highlighting the importance of understanding the value of different cybersecurity certifications. They discuss their initial steps with CompTIA A+ and CCNA, and their realization that these certifications were not as relevant to their desired ethical hacking path. The speaker also notes the surprising fact that some friends secured cybersecurity jobs without any certifications, prompting a reevaluation of the certification process.
📚 CompTIA Certifications: Pros and Cons
The speaker delves into the advantages and disadvantages of CompTIA certifications, emphasizing their vendor-neutral approach and the foundational knowledge they provide, especially for beginners. They appreciate CompTIA Security+ for its introductory nature but criticize the memorization-based learning style of multiple-choice exams. The speaker also discusses other CompTIA certifications like Cybersecurity Analyst (SECA+), CASB+, and PenTest+, with a critical view on the latter's theoretical approach.
🎓 SANS Institute and ISACA Certifications
The speaker highly recommends SANS Institute training and certifications, noting their industry recognition and the practical, up-to-date content provided by experienced instructors. They mention the extensive range of topics covered by SANS and the respect it commands in the cybersecurity field. However, the high cost of training is a significant drawback. ISACA certifications, focusing on governance, risk, and compliance, are also discussed, with the speaker appreciating their community events but criticizing the experience requirement and lack of practical teaching.
💻 Ethical Hacking and Vendor-Specific Certificates
The speaker expresses a strong preference for ethical hacking certificates, particularly the OSCP, for their practical approach to testing real-world ethical hacking skills. They also mention other entry-level ethical hacking certifications like EJPT and PJPT, praising their focus on practical training. The speaker is less enthusiastic about the CISSP, viewing it as more suitable for cybersecurity management roles and criticizing it for its focus on memorization rather than practical skills. They also touch on the value of vendor-specific cybersecurity analyst certificates from companies like Google, IBM, Microsoft, and Splunk.
☁️ Cloud Security and the Role of Certifications
The speaker discusses the growing importance of cloud security certifications, particularly from major cloud providers like AWS, Azure, and Google Cloud. They highlight the AWS Security Specialty and Microsoft Azure Cloud Engineer Associate as highly valuable certifications, while noting the lesser demand for Google Cloud certifications. The speaker also critiques vendor-neutral cloud security certifications like CCSP and CCSK for their theoretical nature and lack of practical application, suggesting they do not fully prepare individuals for cloud security roles.
🚀 Beyond Certifications: Practical Experience and Projects
The speaker acknowledges that while certifications can be a starting point, they are not a guarantee for landing a job in cybersecurity. They emphasize the importance of practical experience and suggest a list of progressive projects that can help build confidence and skills. The speaker offers a roadmap for those who have completed some cybersecurity certificates and are seeking the next steps in their learning journey, promising more details in the video to come.
Mindmap
Keywords
💡Cyber Security
💡Certifications
💡CompTIA
💡Vendor Neutral
💡Penetration Testing
💡SANS Institute
💡Experience
💡Cloud Security
💡Vendor Specific Certificates
💡Practical Projects
Highlights
The speaker shares their personal journey in the cybersecurity industry and offers an honest rating of cybersecurity certifications.
CompTIA A+ and CCNA were found to be boring and irrelevant for ethical hacking by the speaker.
Some individuals managed to land cybersecurity jobs without any certifications, questioning the necessity of these certificates.
CompTIA Security Plus is considered a good introduction to cybersecurity, delivering foundational concepts.
CompTIA Cybersecurity Analyst (SECA+) is appreciated for its harder content and practical concepts for cybersecurity analysts.
CompTIA PenTest+ is criticized for being theoretical and not effectively teaching ethical hacking skills.
SANS Institute is recognized for its high-quality, up-to-date, and practical cybersecurity training.
SANS training courses cover a vast range of topics and are well-respected in the cybersecurity industry.
ISAO focuses on governance, risk, and compliance (GRC) with limited practical teaching, requiring five years of experience.
Ethical hacking certificates, such as OSCP, are favored for their practical approach to testing cybersecurity skills.
CISSP is seen as less valuable among cybersecurity professionals, often being a target for those outside the field.
Vendor-specific cybersecurity analyst certificates from Google, IBM, Microsoft, and Splunk aim to introduce cybersecurity basics to beginners.
Amazon AWS, Microsoft Azure, and Google Cloud platform certificates are in high demand for securing respective cloud environments.
Vendor-neutral cloud security certificates like CCSP and CCSK are considered less practical and less valuable in the job market.
The speaker provides a tiered list for different cybersecurity certifications, with 'S' being the best and 'F' being the worst.
Practical projects and intermediate cybersecurity certificates are recommended for those starting their learning journey.
The video aims to save time and money for individuals looking to enter the cybersecurity field by providing an informed perspective on certifications.
Transcripts
this video might be controversial but my
goal is to help you understand the cyber
security industry better so in this
video I will give you my honest no BS
rating of cyber security certifications
in terms of which ones are useful for
you so you can man a subject but also
land the job this is from my own Journey
when I was trying to break into cyber
security 20 years ago but also from what
I see in the market both as a hiring
manager but also as a cyber security
consultant where I help organizations
run the cyber security division when I
was trying to land my first cyber
security role I thought I had it all
figured out people gave me the advice
that I needed to do CompTIA a plus and
CCNA to build that Foundation before I
can begin to learn how to do some
ethical hacking activities but as I was
going through these certificates I
noticed that I was getting extremely
bored learning both the a plus and the
Cisco CCNA but not only that I noticed
that the things that I was learning were
completely irrelevant I didn't know how
learning The Cisco command line will
help me out in doing ethical hacking for
web application servers it just made no
sense but then things got worse I
started noticing that some of my friends
got their first cyber security job
without even doing any of those
certificates in fact I've even met fresh
University graduate who got their first
cyber security role without having any
certifications or experience whatsoever
so I started questioning the part that I
was on which turned out to be a blessing
in disguise because it led me to a
journey of doing so many cyber security
trainings and certifications which gave
me exposure to so many cyber security
certification programs and if this video
manages to save time and money for one
person then I consider my goal
accomplished let's get into it CompTIA
certificates are extremely popular among
people who don't work in cyber security
and among people who are extremely
Junior and early in their cyber security
Journey the main advantage of the
CompTIA certificates is that it's vendor
neutral which means instead of teaching
you how to configure Palo Alto firewalls
they teach you in general what firewalls
are and what they do but they don't
teach you how to configure a specific
vendor firewall which can be useful for
someone who's new to the field so you
get to learn the generic concepts of how
things are supposed to work the other
big advantage that I personally like
about CompTIA is the CompTIA Security
Plus is a beginner introductory
certificate that will teach you the
general foundations of what cyber
security is this was quite revolutionary
because in the past we didn't have many
cyber security certifications that will
introduce you to the field so Security
Plus was and still is a good
introduction to cyber security now there
are many problems with CompTIA
certificates the biggest disadvantage of
CompTIA certificates is that the exams
are multiple choice exams which means
when people study for these certificates
they end up memorizing and cramming a
bunch of Concepts so they can pass the
exam which is not the best way to learn
a topic in my opinion we will use this
popular tiering system so the S tier is
the super tier and then comes the a b c
d and then the f is the worst tier in
the list so the company certificates
that I will look at is Security Plus I
think it does a good job introducing
people to the field of cyber security it
delivers on the promise that it will
teach you the foundational concepts of
cyber security it's not going to make
you an expert it's not going to make you
an all knowledgeable hacker man but it's
definitely a good introduction to cyber
security then we have the seza plus
which is the CompTIA cyber security
analyst certificate I actually really
like this one because it's a lot harder
than the Security Plus and it introduces
you to an extremely useful Concepts that
you will use if you work as a cyber
analyst it will teach you about security
operations incident response
vulnerability management and even
reporting unfortunately the same
disadvantage that apply to all companies
certificates apply here it's extremely
theoretical so you will end up
memorizing and cramming a bunch of
Concepts to pass a multiple choice exam
but nonetheless I still think the
information in there is valuable the
next one is the cast B plus this is
meant to be a tier above the sizzle plus
it's a little bit harder it touches on
Concepts such as architecture and
operations again GRC engineering and
cryptography and then we have the
CompTIA pen test plus this is the
penetration testing certificate I
honestly don't think this certificates
serve any purpose because trying to
learn ethical hacking from a theoretical
multiple choice based exam is like
channeling to drive a car by reading a
book yes you can learn all about the
traffic Rules by reading a book but you
still have to actually try and drive the
car to learn driving so in my opinion
pen Test Plus doesn't serve any purpose
to put them in our tiering list I will
put all of the company certificates as
tier B because they have good
theoretical information but
unfortunately they have the practicality
that we need in cyber security except
the pen test plus I think it's rated as
F because in my opinion it doesn't serve
any purpose it will just waste your time
and money now before we move on to the
next section I didn't forget the popular
CompTIA a plus and network plus and even
things like CCNA in my opinion these are
not cyber security certificates these
are General it certificates and for
cyber Security Professionals I don't
think it's a great idea to do them now
if you've already done them that's great
but if you haven't done them then there
are so many options that are cheaper and
faster that will teach you the same
Concepts and I talked about all of them
in this video so please check it out the
next one is the GX certificates the DX
certificates have an Associated Sands
training the sense training institute is
the most popular cyber security training
institute in the cyber security industry
sure your it manager or network admin or
even your Hotshot Junior cyber analyst
may not have heard about the Sans
Institute but those of us who work in
cyber security are extremely familiar
with the Sans Institute they are not
only a training provider but they've
actually set some industry standards
that we use in our day-to-day cyber
security jobs the way it works is you do
a sense training that is four to six
days of training depends on the course
and then you study and pass the
associated Jac exam the Sans Institute
has world-class cyber security training
for a number of reasons they are
extremely selective on who the
instructors are so a stand instructor is
usually someone who have a lot of
experience in cyber security they are
actively working in cyber security so
they are not a full-time instructor and
they are not an academic so they have
the hands-on experience and to become a
sense instructor it's a very very
demanding process so they maintained
this high quality of instructors
throughout their use now compare that to
your PhD University Professor who have
never worked a day in their life and
they're trying to teach you how to
become a cyber security professional
there is a huge difference the other
good Advantage about Sans is the
material is so high quality it's always
up to date their courses reflect
problems that we face today in cyber
security other great thing about sense
training is usually most of their
courses have a practical component that
you will do in the training the other
underrated advantage of sense training
is that they cover every topic Under the
Sun they've got a training course for
every topic you can imagine even obscure
things like they'll have a course
dedicated to operational technology they
have courses dedicated to mobile device
forensics they have courses for cloud
forensics so whichever topic you want to
learn chances are there is a sense
training and you know know that the
quality is super high and the final
advantage of sense training is that it's
well respected within the cyber security
industry when people see that you've
done a sense training or a GX
certification they know that you know
something that goes beyond memorizing
and cramming and passing a multiple
choice exam now the biggest disadvantage
of sense training is the price the cost
of the training is about eight thousand
dollars and the reason behind that is
the sense training usually Target
companies so they want your company to
pay for the trading so the employees can
attend the training now bonus tip if you
want to do sales training cheaper go to
the work study program within sense
apply there and you might get a chance
to be an assistant in a sense training
program or you get to do the training
for much much cheaper I've done a few of
those myself I highly recommend it now
there are so many Jax certificates so
it's nearly impossible to rate all of
them but if I was to group them all
together and rate GI can even the sense
training institute all at the same time
they will definitely in the istio anyone
who works in the industry knows that and
they've maintained their quality
throughout the years the next one is
isaka isaka certificates focuses on the
area of governance risk and compliance
or GRC the main advantage of isaka is
that kind of the only GRC certificate
providers so if you want to do an I.T
audit certificate then isaka is pretty
much all you have at the moment the
other thing that I like about iseka is
they earn a lot of free events for the
community so if you go to Google and you
type isaka chapter in your own City then
chances are you'll find a really nice
Meetup that you can attend and you can
network with other cyber Security
Professionals I highly recommend
attending those now unfortunately there
are many disadvantages with isaka
certificates the first one is that to do
isaka certificates you need five years
of experience and I'm talking here about
the popular one Caesar series can see
ISM in my opinion this experience
requirement is not warranted the topics
in season even C risk and cism to a
certain extent are not exactly Advanced
so any Junior IT Auditor should be able
to do and pass this at least the Caesar
certificate so to me they created an
unnecessary hurdle but the main biggest
disadvantage that I personally don't
like about isaka is that the training
itself doesn't teach you anything so
think of Isaac as after you get GRC
experience then you do isaka
certificates to kind of validate your
experience but if you do the isaka
certificate they're not going to teach
you how to do GRC which is a huge
problem in my opinion and because of all
of that my tearing is C I still think
they hold some value but unfortunately
they don't teach you anything the next
ones are ethical hacking certificates
those are my absolute favorite
certificates I wish that the rest of the
cyber security domains have good
training materials similar to ethical
hacking the most popular ethical hacking
certificate is the oscp and it's fully
practical and it's popular for a reason
because it will test that you can
actually perform ethical hacking as
opposed to testing you on how you're
gonna pass a bunch of multiple choice
exams but fortunately we have other
ethical hacking certificates so we have
the ejpt and the pjpt both are
entry-level ethical hacking certificates
that are meant to introduce you to the
field of ethical hacking using fully
practical training and practical exams
which I'm a huge fan of even if you
don't want to be an ethical hacker in my
opinion doing these certificates is
extremely helpful for you as a cyber
security professional so if I was to
tier the ejpt and the pjpt they are
definitely tra now we talked about oscp
but there is ecppt and there is tntp all
are extremely valuable practical ethical
hacking certificates in my opinion they
are tier s because if you do them you
will learn so so much but doing the exam
you will also prove that you have the
skill of ethical hacking I personally
know so many cyber security
professionals who started studying for
the oscp but they never managed to
finish it because it's just hard and
finishing it also communicate to me that
you are passionate about cyber security
as a hiring manager I see so many
candidates who tell me I'm very
passionate about cyber security but to
me this is meaningless instead of
telling me you're passionate about cyber
security show me what work you've done
in the field show me the difficult
projects that you've done because this
will prove that you're passionate it's
really really hard to pass the oscp
without being passionate about cyber
security now there is easy Council and
the certified ethical hacker certificate
this is a multiple choice exam based
certificate in my opinion it's not the
best way to learn ethical hacking it's
extremely similar to the pen Test Plus
so in my opinion I would personally rate
it as F because doing it will not make
you an ethical hacker so it doesn't
deliver on the promise and for these
Reasons I'm tearing it as if the next
one is the ifc2 certificates the cissp
is definitely the most popular
certificate for people who have no idea
how cyber security works so for example
I'll get network Engineers who come and
ask me or should I do cisp to become a
cyber security professional or I will
meet someone who is a university student
who would like to work in cyber security
and the first thing they ask me is oh
should I do cissp the truth is among
people who actually work in cyber
security we don't care about cissp and
there are so many reasons for this the
first thing is the cissp is actually
intended to make you a cyber security
manager this is the goal of the system
ticket so it's meant to be a mile wide
and an inch deep so it touches on so
many domains but it doesn't go deep in
any of those domains so an isc2 came up
with this certificates they thought this
is what cyber security managers need now
the other reason that we don't really
care about cissp is because the vast
majority of server security managers do
not have CI SSP and they don't even care
about it because to be a really good
cyber security manager you need to have
a lot of depth in so many topics but you
also need management skills which the
CIS SP definitely don't teach you other
huge disadvantage of cissp is that if
you can't see issp I know for sure that
you've just crammed a bunch of Concepts
it's all about memorizing the whole heap
of junk in my opinion trust me
memorizing the types of fire alarms have
nothing to do with cyber security no one
cares now is the CIS SP all that bad no
there are few things going on for the
cissp they actually have a group of
cyber security professionals who
contribute to the exams so the multiple
choice questions that you get in the
exam have actually come from some really
good cyber security profession so they
try to emulate real world as much as
possible in a multiple choice exam in
fact one of my close friends sit in that
committee the other good slash bad thing
about the cisp is that people who don't
work in cyber security seem to somehow
know about it so when they do a job
search cyber security they see the ciss
be thrown here and therefore jobs that
Frankly Speaking have nothing to do with
cicssp I have no idea why a security
analyst would ever need a cissp
nonetheless people still copy paste the
CI SSP and they put it there more often
than not this is just a wish list so
they'll put the issb and they'll put a
bunch of certificates that doesn't mean
they absolutely want you to have it it
just means if you have it yep nice to
have whatever what you really need is
the skill of being a cyber security
professional the other advantage of cisp
is that it's a little bit harder than
Security Plus it's not a lot harder I
personally know people who passed it in
two weeks those are professionals who
work in the field who have the
experience so all they did was they just
read the book quickly and went and took
the exam so yes it is harder than
Security Plus but it's not that hard in
fact it's a lot easier than something
like the oscp so don't be fooled by
shiny objects just because I see issb
show up on a job search doesn't mean
it's as valuable as some beginners on
the Internet seem to think in the real
world no one cares so my personal rating
of it is B and that's mainly from what I
see in the industry most people who have
CIS SP usually don't have that much
experience I'm aware that the CI SSP
asks you for five years of experience
but usually what happens is a helpless
experience for example can qualify for
you to meet that experience requirement
even if your experience of help desk had
nothing to do with the security domains
it's it's good it's a level above the
Security Plus but I wouldn't exactly
call it an advanced certificate there
are also two popular certificates from
isc2 which is the sscp that was meant to
be a stepping stone for the cisp in my
opinion it absolutely serves no purpose
so I would rate it as F but then there
is a new one called certified cyber
security this is aimed at beginners who
have no cyber security experience or
skills in my opinion this is useful
because it introduces people to the
field of cyber security although I
personally think it's a little bit
watered down so I would rate it as C
just because there are other alternative
beginner cyber security certificates
that will teach you a little bit more
next up is cyber security analyst
certificates from vendors like Google
IBM Microsoft Splunk and Cisco these are
certificates from Big vendors like
Google and Microsoft they are aimed at
people who have no I.T experience no
technical knowledge and no degree and
they teach you the basics of cyber
security this is fantastic news because
even as far as two years ago we did not
have anything like this in the market so
kudos for these companies for creating a
good quality training that's aimed to
get more people to work in cyber
security now you may be wondering which
one is better the Google cyber security
certificate or the IBM or Microsoft or
Splunk or Cisco in my opinion I wouldn't
be splitting hairs on which one is
better I've explored all of them I think
they're all pretty good there are minor
differences and I will tier them a
little bit different but in my opinion
you can't go wrong with any of them and
they're all quite cheap to be honest so
if you do one or two or even all of them
it's not going to take you a lot of time
but it will also not cost you a lot of
money now some of the advantages of
these certificates is that a few of them
come with Hands-On Labs like the Google
certificate and even the IBM and
Microsoft certificates they definitely
have Hands-On lab where you get to
practice what you learn which is a huge
thing especially for someone who's
completely new to it or cyber security
it gives you a chance to practice but it
also improves your confidence and it
helps you retain the information you
learned so you're not just cramming a
bunch of Concepts to pass a multiple
choice exam now if I look at the
differences between them I think the
Google is a great option because it
teaches you MySQL Linux and python which
are extremely popular tools that you
will use as a cyber security
professional the Microsoft certificates
it teaches you a little bit about Office
365 and Microsoft Azure Cloud platforms
which are extremely useful the IBM
certificate will show you how to use
things like GitHub and snake and the IBM
x4s which are popular tools in the
industry then we have the Splunk
certificate I think is the odd one out
because this certificate will not
introduce you to cyber security as a
field but more so it will introduce you
into how to use Splunk as a tool but
Splunk is an extremely popular tool so
it's definitely useful and then we have
the Cisco certified support technician
again it gives you an introduction to
cyber security as a field which is
extremely useful so in my opinion if I
was to tier these certificates they
definitely deliver on the promise that
they will introduce you to cyber
security as a field so to me that's
definitely a tier a and this goes for
the Google certificate IBM certificate
the Microsoft certificate and the Cisco
certificate Splunk unfortunately it does
not really introduce you to cyber
security it also introduces you to
Splunk as a tool so to me that's
definitely a tier C yes it's useful but
it doesn't deliver on the promise that's
an introduction to cyber security next
up is cloud certificates this is
definitely a hot area in the market
there is a huge demand for cyber
security professionals who understand
and know how to use that cloud the three
biggest cloud providers are Amazon AWS
Microsoft Azure and the Google Cloud
platform Amazon AWS is still the market
leader in Cloud so if you work in cyber
security or even if you work in it
chances are you will run into Amazon AWS
they are still by far the most widely
used and adopted Cloud platform in fact
as a consultant every time I go to help
a company with their cyber security
Journey they always complain about how
they have a huge Amazon AWS setup they
don't have many people who understand
how to secure the AWS Cloud so it's an
extremely useful skill so to explore
Cloud security certificates we have
vendor certificates so certificates from
Amazon Microsoft and Google we also have
vendor neutral certificates as well so
starting with the most popular and most
useful one in my opinion which is the
Amazon AWS security specialty you're
meant to do that after you do something
like the Amazon AWS Cloud practitioner
and the Amazon AWS architect and then
you can do the AWS security specialty
it's extremely useful the information
and knowledge in there will definitely
help you land the role securing the
Amazon AWS Cloud there is an equivalent
to this certificate and from Microsoft
soft which is the Microsoft Azure Cloud
engineer associate again extremely
useful yes in the market there is more
AWS than Azure but Azure is still widely
used chances are you will run into
companies earning at least something
like Office 365 and maybe SharePoint so
it's really useful to know about Azure
security Technologies and less known one
is from Google which is the Google Cloud
security engineer Google has a much
smaller market share however doing it is
still useful because believe it or not
all the cloud platforms are extremely
similar so once you learn and get good
at one of the cloud platforms the same
skills are transferable to other Cloud
platforms you will just find some
differences in the names of the tools
that's all so if I was to tear them in
my opinion both the AWS and the
Microsoft Azure certificates both are
too old because the skills are
definitely highly sought after the
Google Cloud security engineer I would
teach it as serious because it's not as
popular and you're less likely to be
dealing with Google Cloud security
issues at least in the present moment
now looking at vendor neutral Cloud
security certificate from ist2 we have
the ccsp this is meant to teach you
General Cloud security Concepts so the
claim that this certificate will enable
you to become a cloud security
professional unfortunately I haven't
seen this happen in the real world no
one will hire you just because you have
the ccsp as hiring manager we're looking
for someone who knows how to configure
security groups within Amazon AWS or how
to configure identity and access
management in the cloud we don't want
someone who knows generic concept about
how Cloud security should be so in my
opinion this certificate doesn't really
deliver on the promise of making you a
cloud security professional the same
thing goes for the cloud Alliance ccsk
again another theoretical certificate
that claims to make you a cloud security
professional by teaching you a bunch of
Concepts now the cloud security Alliance
have actually used for checklists that
I've seen in the industry where people
use the CSK checklist on how to secure
clouds this can be useful but just
because these spreadsheets and these
checklists are around doesn't mean that
the certificate itself is useful that
security is one of those extremely
practical things so I'd rather you know
how to configure security ability in
Office 365 as opposed to memorizing
concepts of how the cloud need to be
secured so if I was to tier them both
the ccsp and the ccsk are trf because I
would never recommend anyone doing them
now a common question I constantly get
asked is is the Google cyber certificate
enough for me to land the job as the
Security Plus enough for me to land the
job is the cissp enough for me to land
the job is this training sufficient is
this boot camp sufficient and to be
honest the answer is always it depends
on how much experience you have but
assuming you have zero experience and
zero knowledge and all you did was one
certificate or two certificates the
answer is maybe you might get lucky and
get hired with one certificate in fact
I've seen people get hired with zero
certificates it definitely happened but
chances are you will probably need more
the certificates are meant to be used as
a structured way for you to learn a
subject but especially those beginner
level certificates are meant to be the
beginning of your journey they are meant
to introduce you to the field and to get
you started in your Learning Journey but
what ends up happening is after you
finish one or two two certificates
you'll find that you have to memorize
and cram a bunch of Concepts and maybe
you start to forget this concept but
also you may not have so much confidence
in applying to jobs or in landing your
first job so to solve this I curated a
list of practical projects that you can
do progressively so you can go from one
project to the other you start from
beginner level projects all the way to
intermediate projects and then you do
practical intermediate cyber security
certificates I created this roadmap
specifically for people who've done some
cyber security certificates and are
looking for this next step on what to do
all of this is detailed in this video
and I'll see you then
Browse More Related Video
Underrated Cyber Security Certs that WILL get you HIRED
GRC Certification Roadmap v1.0: Recommended Training and Certs #cybersecurity #grc
How to Get into CyberSecurity | Step by Step Roadmap (2024)
Step-By-Step Cybersecurity Beginner Learner's Guide | Cyber Security Training for Beginners 2023
Kickstart Your Cybersecurity Career: Top 5 Certifications for Newbies
Creating a career roadmap for the cybersecurity beginner
5.0 / 5 (0 votes)