The primary role of a Cyber Security Technologist is to apply an understanding of cyber threats, hazards, risks, controls, measures and mitigations to protect organisations systems and people.
Those focused on the technical side work on areas such as security design & architecture, security testing, investigations & response.
Those focused on the risk analysis side focus on areas such as operations, risk, governance & compliance.
Whether focused on the technical or risk analysis side, all people in this occupation work to achieve required security outcomes in a legal and regulatory context in all parts of the economy. They develop and apply practical knowledge of information security to deliver solutions that fulfil an organisation’s requirements.
- Security Architect, Penetration Tester
- Cyber Security Specialist
- Information Security Analyst
- Governance & Compliance Analyst
- Information Security Assurance & Threat Analyst
- Forensics & Incident Response Analyst
- Information Security Auditor
- Information Security Officer.
Individual employers will set the selection criteria, but this is likely to include A’ Levels, a relevant Level 3 apprenticeship, or other relevant qualifications, relevant experience and/or an aptitude test with a focus on functional maths.
| Technical Competencies |
Technical Knowledge and Understanding |
Threats, hazards, risks and intelligence
- Discover (through a mix of research and practical exploration) vulnerabilities in a system
- Analyse and evaluate security threats and hazards to a system or service or processes. Be aware of and demonstrate use of relevant external sources of threat intelligence or advice (e.g. CERT UK). Combine different sources to create an enriched view.
- Research and investigate some common attack techniques and recommend how to defend against them. Be aware of and demonstrate use of relevant external sources of vulnerabilities (e.g. OWASP)
- Undertake a security risk assessment for a simple system without direct supervision and propose basic remediation advice in the context of the employer.
Developing and using a security case
- Source and analyse a security case (e.g. a Common Criteria Protection Profile for a security component) and describe what threats, vulnerability or risks are mitigated and identify any residual areas of concern.
- Develop a simple security case without supervision. (A security case should describe the security objectives, threats, and for every identified attack technique identify mitigation or security controls that could include technical, implementation, policy or process).
Organisational context
- Identify and follow organisational policies and standards for information and cyber security.
- Operate according to service level agreements or employer defined performance targets. Future Trends
- Investigate different views of the future (using more than one external source) and trends in a relevant technology area and describe what this might mean for your business, with supporting reasoning.
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Understands the basics of cyber security including:
- Why cyber security matters – the importance to business and society
- -Basic theory – concepts such as security, identity, confidentiality, integrity, availability, threat, vulnerability, risk and hazard. Also how these relate to each other and lead to risk and harm
- Security assurance – concepts (can explain what assurance is for in security, and ‘trustworthy’ versus ‘trusted’) and how assurance may be achieved in practice (can explain what penetration testing is and how it contributes to assurance; and extrinsic assurance methods)
- How to build a security case – deriving security objectives with reasoned justification in a representative business scenario
- Cyber security concepts applied to ICT infrastructure – can describe the fundamental building blocks and typical architectures and identify some common vulnerabilities in networks and systems.
- Attack techniques and sources of threat – can describe the main types of common attack techniques; also the role of human behaviour. Explain how attack techniques combine with motive and opportunity to become a threat.
- Cyber defence – describe ways to defend against attack techniques
- Relevant laws and ethics – describe security standards, regulations and their consequences across at least two sectors; the role of criminal and other law; key relevant features of UK and international law
- The existing threat landscape – can describe and know how to apply relevant techniques for horizon scanning including use of recognised sources of threat intelligence
- Threat trends – can describe the significance of identified trends in cyber security and understand the value and risk of this analysis
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