Hello, world! Today, I’ll be reviewing my ISC2 Certified in Cybersecurity Certification Training experience (I did not take exam) which is free!
TLDR: Solid self-paced free training course with an optional exam (The exam is optional if you want the certification saying you completed the exam but the course/training itself is free) attempt that can and should be taken by anyone that is aspiring to start their cybersecurity journey. Link included to learn more!
Link:
https://www.isc2.org/certifications/cc
Yes free so it wont hurt to go out there and enroll in this training because who doesn’t love free.
Let’s get started!
If you’re new (which I was) on their website ISC2 does a phenomenal job informing you how to navigate through their platform. Those are always helpful because there are sometimes us as humans just don’t even want to begin working on something because we are unable to navigate a site. Which then makes it seem overwhelming, which eventually leads to us not wanting to do what we came to do. They also have a 24/7 ‘Help & Live Chat’ section right next to the ‘FAQs’ on the main page in case you need a hand!
After our brief intro we can scroll down to click on the ‘My Courses’ tab. If you are enrolled in other courses will see those as well but for us that our new here and just have this waiting for us.
Prerequisites
You don’t need to know a single thing about networking, security, GRC, or anything related to cyber security before beginning this training. This is a complete level 0 beginner start from scratch course that will teach/inform you of all the fundamentals of cyber from the business side all the way to the technical side. What you thought there was more? That you needed to know how to write malware? How to take down a network from within? No way dude, they made this training so smooth that you could go from any other career to start this training and find it manageable.
Domains:
Now, we’re accessing our course and we see ahead what we’ll be getting ourselves into in order:
Course Introduction
Security Principles
Incident Response, Business Continuity and Disaster Recovery Concepts
Access Control Concepts
Network Security
Security Operations
Course Conclusion
I’m pretty sure you can get a sense of what each domain will be about based off the title haha. I also want to say that I believe even if you are a tier 1 SOC/Junior Analyst this free course is a good refresher since I can see it being a little bit similar to what you would learn on CompTIA Security+. Mostly if not all topics covered on here are on the Sec+.
Activities on Exam:
This feature I’m fond of in the curriculum:
I say this because there are other courses on different platforms that don’t have the variety this includes. There are people out there such as myself that find that video after each topic extremely useful because sometimes reading it just isn’t enough to make it click. Furthermore, the small knowledge checks every now and then throughout the modules further support this learning diversity. Applied Scenarios are nice little interlude’s spread across these chapters as well relating to real world concepts. Podcasts are also insightful by getting into the mind of the security professionals. Lastly, the end of chapter summary paired with a quiz is a great glue to cement these topics together one last time before moving onto the next chapter. To reiterate, the layout of this training is top-tier.
I do wish
I do wish they add a technical portion in certain chapters such as: Access Control Concepts, Network Security, Security Operations. Possibly just a mini virtual lab with 2/3 questions based off a scenario, just to get a feel of what it would be like in practice.
Comparison to Security+
Now I'm not the biggest fan of comparing in the sense of which is better or worse. I'm more of a context comparer... if that's even a thing? Basically I'll be comparing this to CompTIA's Security+ as you can tell, but not to say which is better and why you should only do what I say. If you already have taken and passed your Security+ that’s great! Most of these concepts you will have already seen, but there are differences on how you may have learned from CompTIA or yourself if you’re self-taught. This is good practice for aspiring and current entry-level cyber security enthusiasts. In my opinion I believe this would actually be a good prerequisite for Security+.
Conclusion
The Certified in Cybersecurity (CC) certification training will demonstrate to employers that you have foundational theoretical knowledge of industry terminology, network security, security operations and policies and procedures that are necessary for an entry- or junior-level cybersecurity role. If you ever have any questions please don’t hesitate to reach out on my socials as I don’t mind lending a hand to my peers in our community.
What's next?
Now that I finished studying this and my semester ended. I'll be starting my journey with HTB CDSA. See you all soon!