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Editorial
Hacks create high-paying jobs in cybersecurity
Wednesday, July 29, 2015
One major car company is distributing a software patch for its new cars after Wired magazine published a video about two hackers taking control -- through the radio, nonetheless -- of a coworker's car while he was driving it. The video shows the steering wheel spinning on its own, him pleading with the hackers to give him back control of the accelerator pedal so he isn't struck by a semi, and ends with the vehicle, left without brakes, swerving over a bank into the ditch.
Most of us aren't in danger of having our car hacked -- the Wired case involved some pretty specialized knowledge of firmware and the like -- but the stuff of yesterday's science fiction is today's reality.
We're a long way from the days of the first car computers, some of which supposedly caused vehicles to stall when they ventured too near high-powered radio transmitters.
But with electronics playing more and more of a role in our lives, it's of definite concern.
Consider the claim of another hacker, who said he hacked into the controls of an airliner, influencing the power output of an engine for a time.
For every problem, however, there's a solution, as well as a way to profit from providing it.
If you have a tech bent and are looking to get into a growing industry, consider cybersecurity.
According to the 451 Research study, of 1,000 IT professionals, about a third reported they were not able to implement security projects because of staff expertise and shortages. Only about a quarter of the enterprises had full-time monitoring in place with internal resources.
Michael Brown, CEO of Symantec said there will be a demand for 6 million cybersecurity workers by 2019, but only about 4.5 of them available.
The laws of supply and demand are already in effect. An analysis of the cybersecurity job marked showed the top paying cybersecurity job is a security software engineer with an average salary of $233,333.
It's no wonder that U.S. News and World Report ranked information security analysis as eighth on its list of the 100 best jobs for 2015, growing at a rate of 36.5 percent through 2022.