Video You Don't Need to Start as a Teen to be an Ethical Hacker (Video) 56
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Meet Justin Whitehead. While a lot of his contemporaries were going to college, he became an Airborne soldier. After that he went to college, became an IT technian, got some experience as a Computer Forensic Analyst, and met people who looked like they were having a good time as penetration testers. So he took some recommended classes,got hired by One World Labs, and last week at B-Sides Austin, he and coworker Antonio Herraiz gave a talk titled 'Spanking the monkey/How pen testers can do it better.
Justin is 40, an age where a lot of people in the IT game worry about being over the hill and unemployable. But Justin's little video talk should give you hope -- whether you're a mature college student, have a stalled IT career or are thinking about a career change but want to keep working with computers and IT in general. It seems that there are decent IT-related jobs out there even if you're not a youngster; and even if you didn't start working with computers until you were in your 20s or 30s.
Justin is 40, an age where a lot of people in the IT game worry about being over the hill and unemployable. But Justin's little video talk should give you hope -- whether you're a mature college student, have a stalled IT career or are thinking about a career change but want to keep working with computers and IT in general. It seems that there are decent IT-related jobs out there even if you're not a youngster; and even if you didn't start working with computers until you were in your 20s or 30s.
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The smart hackers know how to and when not to.
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Possibly my 25 year old body, but not the mind that went with it. I know more, understand more, can learn more, and think better than I could then.
Re: can't find a job at 40? (Score:2)
Youth has the edge on age when it comes to body fitness. However, age has the edge on youth when it comes to experience. By the time you get to 40, you've made a ton of mistakes and have (hopefully) learned from them. You know what works and what doesn't. Youth likes rolling its eyes at Age and running headlong down a path that Age says won't work. Sometimes Youth succeeds, but more than likely Age is proven right.
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I was in good shape in my 20s too and it would be a lie to say I "feel" better now than I did then. Personally I wouldn't mind having my 25 year old body back but even at 50 I've still got more speed and stamina that a lot of twenty somethings. And frankly, learning ha
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Key is continuous learning (Score:2)
I'm well over forty and I'd say none of those things apply (well, perhaps a little balder). I'm not as strong as I was at 25 but I'm not weak either, and I can go up many flights of stairs without winding... basically all of those things are a warning that you should stay active.
But that's beside the point, the biggest problem you list, the inability to learn new things, is what happens when you stop learning long enough. The longer you go without doing new things, the harder it is to get back into it...
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I'm turning 35 and while I can't deny the effects of aging I'm more fit than I was in my 20s. God I had a horrible way of life and was actually left panting for going up a flight of stairs.
Aging is a multifactorial process. I envy the mindlessness I had back then. By around 30~35 people usually realize they too are truly going to die someday and I already had my share of dying around.
Not that I did not know then but realizing it is a whole different matter.
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How's he encouraging more women to join the field?
By giving talks about Spanking The Monkey of course, how could that possibly fail?
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Re: Just what infosec needs: washouts (Score:1)
Most all of the twenty-somethings I have met want nothing to do with tech aside from kik, snapchat, and twitter.
Daughter: "I have this horrible error on my laptop and I cant do anything."
Me: "Ok. What does the error say?"
Daughter: "I dont know. I didnt read it."
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My favorite is when they say they want to be "game developers".
It's like "professional athlete" for people who want to smoke pot and not exercise. At least aspiring MLG are honest about their fantasy.
My software development hobby has turned towards games by accident. I don't like video games but they're a good way to test/learn AI.
Mostly this (Score:5, Insightful)
But I have to add that all of the hype is plain old wrong if you want to be a career IT security specialist. Hacking, or actually performing a penetration test, is a very small portion of the job. Seems like all of the hype around coding currently to try and flood the market with people thinking they can "hack" to reduce wages may be happening here. I don't know if that's true or not, but seems reasonable given the treatment of "coders" lately.
I was also confused at the "people over 40 can't find jobs" stuff, because after I hit 40 my desirability went way up. Maturity, especially in IT security, is a well sought after trait.
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The Wunderkind gets all the "sexy" jobs of performing audits, vulnerability assessments and penetration tests.
Well no, this is not really true. Younger IT Security people are doing a lot of other things. Trying to sneak in doors behind people, drop flash drives to see who plugs them in, copy/paste HTML code to make fake phishing campaigns too. To the horror of many, they find that they have to write reports on their findings and actually communicate with people. They have to make recommendations, and be absolutely sure of their facts with documentation, documentation, and even more documentation.
The media is fo
Worst First Comments... (Score:2)
Seriously? (Score:2)
The title could be reworded to "Masturbation/How pen testers can do it better."
I think I'll skip that video. Thanks.
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Workers are not hackers (Score:1)
People who get into security for a paycheck are not hackers, they're security professionals. Hackers are people who do it on their own time, for its own sake. It's not tinkering if you're getting paid for it. Just a semantic nuisance that annoys me, as a non-hacker, and a security professional, but also as someone who has been around REAL hackers for 20 years. If I was independently wealthy, I would not spend my time "hacking," because I am not a hacker. Security is a job to me.
Calling security professional
Headline is technically correct (Score:2)
You Don't Need to Start as a Teen to be an Ethical Hacker
You don't need to start as a teen to be anything. You have to start as a baby like everyone else.
Sounds awesome to me... (Score:2)
"stand up,hook-up,shuffle to the door" (Score:1)
Transcript (Score:2)
Where is it? Let's not further exclude the deaf from the internet, daily life is marginalization enough.
Sure it can be too late! (Score:2)
Or at least this is my impression. If I'm wrong, then it might help if elect