RSA 2018: In the Golden Age of Cyber Crime we have a People Problem
Reading the title above your first thought might be a cyber-attack resulting from a deliberate insider or an unintentional, well-meaning employee. After all, people are the problem, right? However, our people issue today in the cyber industry is simple: lack of qualified human capital. It is estimated by Ponemon Institute that by 2020, we will have 1.8 million cyber jobs left unfilled. It is bad enough we are living in the Golden Age of Cyber Crime, where deterrence is lacking, the threat surface is expanding exponentially, and the technical talent to hire is way too limited. Unfortunately, this confluence of events is a cyber criminal’s perfect storm.
Our industry has to change how it hires, and what it expects from an employee prospect pool that is diversified in age, experience, race, religion and gender. Speaking of gender, at RSA 2018 McAfee presented a session titled, Building the Cybersecurity Innovation Pipeline, where Chief Human Resources Officer, Chatelle Lynch, pointed out a shocking statistic: “In 1990 32% of the IT workforce was women, and in 2017 is was 25%! This during a time when the industry growth exceeded 338%. The Good Old Boys Club is alive and well in technology circles.