Are you thinking of getting into Cybersecurity? If yes, then you are reading the right article!
Cybersecurity as a specialized field, and a career choice has gained serious momentum in the last few years. All thanks to the increasing number of people realizing the need, and importance of Cybersecurity, in this tech-driven society.
Moreover, the increasing number of cyber attacks, and organizations shifting to cyberspaces has also fuelled the demand for Cybersecurity experts worldwide, and has created a large number of jobs for professionals in the field.
If you have an interest in the field of Cybersecurity, and above all, the required skills, it is an interesting, and a great career choice. However, with all the resources out there, and the large number of options to choose from, it can be overwhelming, just starting out, and choosing the right Cybersecurity course.
In this post, we discuss about the best Cybersecurity courses, and trainings to help you pick the best course for you to take your first step forward, towards a career as a cyber expert or for just polishing your already existing skills.
Suggested Reading: Types of Cybersecurity: know in absolute detail and avoid being traumatized!
Why learn Cybersecurity?
Cybersecurity is all about safeguarding, and protecting yourself from hackers, and malicious attacks online.
Cybersecurity can be defined as the sum of all the activities that help you defend, and safeguard yourselves, and your networks, devices, and important data, and files while you use the internet or your electronic devices like mobile phones, laptops, personal computers, etc.
It is also known as information technology or IT security, however, Cybersecurity is a much more popular term.
With the number of cyber attacks increasing by the day, the need for Cybersecurity experts is also increasing.
Cybersecurity experts are the ones who are able to fight cyber criminals, and prevent them from accessing important information, and thus keep you, your devices, and organizations safe, and secure from any breaches or attacks.
However, there are simply not enough, as there is a dearth of Cybersecurity experts to fill all of the available jobs out there, and more, that are coming up in the field of Cybersecurity. This calls for more Cybersecurity experts. Cybersecurity as a career is blooming, and has great upsides.
It is undoubtedly a fast-growing field. Thus, for people with an interest in the field of Tech, IT, and Cybersecurity, it is indeed a lucrative field, and a rewarding career choice.
According to cyberdegrees.org, “As more businesses move their operations online, and with cyber attacks on the rise, the need for skilled Cybersecurity professionals is projected to grow, particularly for healthcare, and financial organizations.
For example, the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) projects a 32% job growth rate for information security analysts between 2018-2028.”
The first step of your journey towards becoming a Cybersecurity expert is gaining the required education, and training. Most of the renowned, and prestigious institutions from around the world offer fabulous certificate courses, diplomas, degrees, and special trainings to help you prepare, and become a Cybersecurity expert.
This field also presents diverse career opportunities. With a Cybersecurity degree or any other specialization in this field, you can apply for a wide range of jobs. These jobs are, but not limited to, information security analyst, security architect, security engineer, chief information security officer, and more.
You can get employed in various companies, and work with computer systems design, management of companies, and enterprises, credit intermediation, and much more.
A couple of popular entry-level jobs in Cybersecurity include systems engineer, and administrator, network engineer, web developer, security specialist, and IT technician.
Security technician, incident responder, Cybersecurity consultant, and penetration tester are some great mid-level roles.
And, some of the best advanced-level roles in the field are Cybersecurity manager, Cybersecurity engineer, and more…
Best Cybersecurity Courses and Trainings
There are a variety of courses offered that revolve around cyber safety, and its various aspects. Here’s our list of the Top Training Courses for Cybersecurity that you need to check out!
Entry-level Cybersecurity Courses
Introduction to IT and Cybersecurity by Cybrary
The first course on our list is ideal for beginners. If you want to gain valuable insights in the field of IT, and Cybersecurity, then this course is a great choice for you, to kick start your Cybersecurity journey.
This course titled “Introduction to IT and Cybersecurity” is offered by Cybrary – a free-of-cost crowd-sourced learning platform for IT, and Cyber safety.
Cybrary is a leading Cybersecurity Professional Development Platform used by 3 million Cybersecurity professionals from around the world, and helps people build their careers in the field.
With the help of Cybrary, you can have Industry certification courses, dedicated mentors, and IT professionals, role-based learning, and hands-on experience, and gain real-world skills, and much more. You can check out their website here.
“Introduction to IT and Cybersecurity” is designed to help people understand different IT, and Cybersecurity careers like Network Administrator, System Administrator (SysAdmin), Cloud Engineer, Privacy Analyst, and Cybersecurity Manager.
You also learn more about their roles, and responsibilities, understand the skills required for each of these roles, and identify certifications for each of these discussed roles.
It is an entry-level IT, and Cybersecurity training course. This course is specially designed for people to help them decide the right career path for them in the field of IT, and Cybersecurity, and also understand which IT field is the best for them as a career.
The duration of this course is 4 hours, and 21 minutes, and upon the completion of the training, you also get a Certificate of Completion.
This course is taught, and overseen by industry experts like Ken Underhill (Master Instructor at Cybrary), and Joe Perry (Senior Technical Instructor at FireEye). Click here to learn more about this course.
Introduction to Cybersecurity for Business by The University of Colorado via edX
“Introduction to Cybersecurity” is another introductory or entry-level Cybersecurity training course designed to help you gain a practical perspective on computer security from a business point of view.
Offered by the University of Colorado, this course is perfect to learn more about practical computer security in an easy, and simple language.
It is offered via Coursera.org, a leading provider of online courses, certifications, and degrees. It is a well-known platform, and is used by thousands of students, and professionals from around the world.
This course is taught by Greg Williams, who is a Lecturer at the Department of Computer Science, at the University of Colorado.
The course focuses on some important skills like Cybersecurity, Information Security (INFOSEC), Risk Assessment, and Attack Surfaces, and covers all the fundamentals of enterprise Cybersecurity in a corporate environment very well.
This course runs for 5 weeks, with each week focusing on a new topic. Week one focuses on Practical Computer Security, and understanding the basics of computer security for business, while week two focuses on The CIA (Confidentiality, Integrity, and Availability ) Triad.
Week three is all about how you assess risks in a business daily, week four talks about Practical Application of Data Security, and week 5 focuses on Attack Surfaces which sums up what the students have learned, and worked on throughout the duration of this course. Apply for it by clicking here.
Introduction to Cybersecurity by University of Washington
The Introduction to Cybersecurity certification course by the University of Washington is another introductory yet insightful course in the field of network safety.
This course lays emphasis on the need, and prevalence of internet-based apparatuses, and administrations, and internet security, and acts as a great introduction to the field of Cybersecurity.
Though the program length is of six weeks, this online course only needs an effort of 2 to 5 hours out of every week. It is a great choice for beginners who wish to become Cybersecurity experts, and even for Cybersecurity experts, and IT professionals who want to gain more knowledge, and insight in the field.
The students will learn about important terms, and concepts related to Cybersecurity, identify, and differentiate between various cyber threats, understand the concept of network safety, learn about various international Cybersecurity agencies, and the difference between them, and much more.
Click here to learn more about this course and apply.
Higher-level Cybersecurity Courses
Google IT Support Professional Certificate
Even though this course isn’t completely related to Cyber safety, however, you cannot just begin to learn about Cybersecurity without establishing a strong foundation in the concepts of IT, and IT support.
The following course will help you learn all the basics about IT Support, which can further help you facilitate your training, and learning in cyber safety.
Google IT Support Professional Certificate offered by Google is a great certification course that claims to “have you job-ready in less than 6 months”. This program is designed with an aim to help you prepare for the role of IT Support Specialist.
This integrated course will help you kick start your journey into a career, in the high-growth field of IT, without any degree or experience requirements.
Launched in 2018, this course has been a top choice for a professional certification for students, from around the world. This course will help you acquire all the necessary IT skills required, for an IT job.
You will learn a variety of IT support operations such as providing basic end-to-end customer service, system assembly, installing various types of programs, networking, and much more. You will also learn how to use Binary Code, Domain Name Systems, and Command-Line Interface.
Other important skills this course focuses on, and that top employers are hiring for right now are Debugging, Encryption Algorithms, and Techniques, Cloud Computing, Linux, Troubleshooting, Ipv4, and Network Model. Thus, you learn all the basic foundational skills, as well as more expert skills required for an IT job.
The Google IT Support Professional Certificate has 5 courses. You can complete the certificate course in less than 6 months by devoting 10 hours a week for the same. After the successful completion of this course, you are eligible to apply for various IT jobs.
You also earn up to 12 college credits as the Google IT Support Professional Certificate is ACE® approved. And, not just jobs, this course also guides you through CompTIA A+ exams, and helps you prepare for the same.
(If you want to build, and strengthen your IT foundations, you can also have a look at the Google IT Automation with Python Professional Certificate.)
This program lays a strong emphasis on practical learning as well. The study resources are a mix of pre-recorded lectures or videos, assessments, and IT support scenarios, as well as hands-on labs that help you get a taste of real-life experiences of working in the field.
The learning material for this course includes more than 100 hours of practice based assignments, and other highly interactive study resources, curated by IT experts at Google that help you apply your knowledge by stimulating real-world, and IT support scenarios.
Let us take a look at the 5 Courses in this Professional Certificate. All these courses will not only help you understand basic computer, and IT fundamentals but will also act as a catalyst for your cyber safety training.
COURSE 1: Technical Support Fundamentals
The first course in this series is Technical Support Fundamentals which focuses on the different aspects of IT, and Tech support such as computer hardware, and software, customer support services, networking services, etc.
These topics not only give you a strong background of all the integral Technical Support Fundamentals but also help you prepare for what the other courses in this series have to offer.
The content explores various topics related to the working of the binary systems, how to assemble a computer system, install various types of software, and work with computer hardware, learn how different types of apps are created, the functioning, and role of the internet, and other important soft skills.
COURSE 2: The Bits and Bytes of Computer Networking
The next course in this series titled “The Bits and Bytes of Computer Networking” covers the concepts of Computer Networking, practical applications, and network troubleshooting in great detail.
By the end of this course, you will have a sound knowledge of the fundamentals of modern networking technologies, and protocols.
The course content easily helps its students learn about various forms of computer networks, explore standard protocols involved with TCP/IP communications, understand cloud computing, and storage, services like DNS, and DHCP, and also learn about the various network troubleshooting techniques, and tools.
COURSE 3: Operating Systems and You: Becoming a Power User
“Operating Systems and You: Becoming a Power User” combines video lectures, and hands-on-practice.
This course guides you through the main elements of an operating system, how it works, and some basic operations related to operating systems like user management, software installation, and management, installation of hardware, etc.
By the end of this course, you will be able to successfully work with a command-line interpreter, and graphical user interface to manage file systems on different operating systems like Windows, and Linux. You will also learn how to set up an account on an OS, and manage various permissions for account access.
This course also helps you build other important skills like installing, removing, and configuring various types of softwares on Linux, and Windows, manage system logs, work with remote connection logs, manage system processes, file systems, disk partitions, and more.
COURSE 4: System Administration and IT Infrastructure Services
The fourth course in this series is all about System Administration, and IT Infrastructure Services. System Administration is different from other computer systems as it deals with managing a large number of computer systems, and works in a multi-user environment.
Thus, this course will help you learn how to work at a broader scale, and not just on a single computer. This course will help you explore, and deploy infrastructure services, and their role in the proper functioning of an organization.
The course content also contains topics like cloud computing, utilizing systems administration, common infrastructure services, how to manage and system configure servers, how to use industry tools to manage System Administration, and IT Infrastructure Services, managing cloud resources, and more.
This course also covers how to recover IT infrastructure, work with directory services, Active Directory, and OpenLDAP, and more.
COURSE 5: IT Security: Defense against the digital dark arts
The last course in this series covers a wide variety of IT security concepts, tools, and best practices. It introduces threats, and attacks, and the many ways they can show up. This course gives you background of encryption algorithms, and how they’re used to safeguard data.
Then, you will learn the three As of information security: authentication, authorization, and accounting. You will also learn network security solutions, ranging from firewalls to Wifi encryption options.
This course is rounded off by putting all these elements together into a multi-layered, in-depth security architecture, followed by recommendations on how to integrate a culture of security into your organization or team.
IBM Cybersecurity Analyst by IBM
IBM Cybersecurity Analyst is a great professional Cybersecurity certificate course from American multinational tech giant IBM.
Professional Certificate courses are different from regular courses as they focus more on helping you become job-ready, and build a portfolio showcasing that you are job-ready, to the employers in your field.
Offered via Coursera, the content of this course is designed specially to help students launch a career in Cybersecurity, and gain job-ready skills for an in-demand role in the field of cyber safety. One does not need to have any degree or any prior experience in the field to take up this course.
This course lays strong emphasis on important elements, and skills such as information security, IT security, IBM New Collar, Malware, Cyber Attacks, database vulnerabilities, Network Security, SQL Injection, and more. Basically, almost everything that you need to build your technical skills, and become a Cybersecurity Analyst.
This course focuses on applied learning by making use of instructional content, virtual labs (SecurityLearningAcademy.com), internet sites, various tools like Wireshark, IBM Guardium, IBM Resilient, IBM QRadar, IBM MaaS360, and libraries like Python.
IBM Cybersecurity Analyst by IBM is an 8-course Professional Certificate. These courses are:
COURSE 1: Introduction to Cybersecurity Tools & Cyber Attacks
The first course of this professional certificate program is titled “Introduction to Cybersecurity Tools & Cyber Attacks”. As is obvious by the name, this course is aimed at helping its students, learn about the basic concepts about Cybersecurity, and the background needed to understand the same.
Topics range from the history of Cybersecurity, basic system concepts, and various types of cyber attacks to the skills required to pursue a career in Cybersecurity. Upon the completion of this course, you also get an “Introduction to Cybersecurity Tools & Cyber Attacks IBM digital badge”.
COURSE 2: Cybersecurity Roles, Processes & Operating System Security
The second course titled “Cybersecurity Roles, Processes & Operating System Security” focuses on basic knowledge, and concepts of Cybersecurity around people, processes, and technology.
In this course, you will learn about the various types of Cybersecurity roles within an organization, key Cybersecurity processes with examples, basics of Virtualization, and important concepts about various operating systems such as architecture, file systems, and basic commands.
Furthermore, upon the completion of this course, you are eligible for the “Cybersecurity Roles, Processes & Operating System Security IBM digital badge”.
COURSE 3: Cybersecurity Compliance Framework & System Administration
“Cybersecurity Compliance Framework & System Administration” as the third course in this series provides you with all the basic information that you need to comprehend, and learn about the various integral Cybersecurity compliance frameworks, and their industry standards.
The knowledge of Cybersecurity compliance, and understanding the industry standards is important for anyone pursuing a career in this field. Thus, its importance cannot be underestimated.
The content is specially curated to help you easily learn the basic commands for user, and server administration. The curriculum also revolves around endpoint security, cryptography, and encryption, and patch management.
All these concepts are closely linked to Cybersecurity, figuring out vulnerabilities within operating systems, and preventing cyber attacks.
COURSE 4: Network Security & Database Vulnerabilities
The fourth course in this series titled “Network Security & Database Vulnerabilities” is about network security. From basics such as Local Area Networks, and TCP/IP to OSI Framework, and routing basics, this course covers all the important elements of networking security.
It is important for you as a Cybersecurity expert to have a sound knowledge about how networking affects the security of an organization, and steps you can take to safeguard an organization from cyber attacks. This course does exactly that, and helps you build sufficient knowledge about the same.
Moreover, you can find information on database vulnerabilities, resources needed to conduct database vulnerability research, types of security breaches, and other concepts that are important, to acquire the skills in order to become a network security expert.
COURSE 5: Penetration Testing, Incident Response, and Forensics
“Penetration Testing, Incident Response and Forensics” revolves around important Cybersecurity concepts, and skills every Cybersecurity Security Analyst must have.
The objective of this course is to help students learn about the different phases of penetration testing, process for gathering data for penetration tests, and learning about the widely used tools for penetration testing.
Moreover, this course will guide you through incident response, and related concepts like the various stages of incident response, constituents of an incident response team, and important documentation related to it.
Other important concepts discussed in this course are the forensic process, the power of scripting, digital forensics, and digital evidence, and the need for a system analyst. Also, upon the completion of this course, you are eligible for the “Penetration Testing, Incident Response, and Forensics IBM digital badge.”
COURSE 6: Cyber Threat Intelligence
The next course in this series is “Cyber Threat Intelligence”, which deals with a variety of Cybersecurity concepts, and skills.
You will learn about the important ways to deal with cyber threats such as network defensive techniques, using tools to monitor networks, scanning technologies, threat intelligence platforms, recognizing application security vulnerabilities, and more.
You will also learn about network access control, data protection risks, mobile endpoint protection, data loss prevention tools, important concepts around threat intelligence, SIEM product, and classifying data in a database environment.
Finally, you become eligible to earn the “Cyber Threat Intelligence IBM digital badge” after you complete this course.
COURSE 7: Cybersecurity Capstone: Breach Response Case Studies
“Cybersecurity Capstone: Breach Response Case Studies” gives you important details, and insights on incident response techniques, and various security models.
This course helps you in recognizing, and categorizing the main types of vulnerabilities, and cyber-attacks, comprehend, and describe ransomware threats, phishing attacks, and point of sale attacks, and more.
The course contains detailed, and informative case studies related to some well-known breaches, how they were detected, and the plan of action to minimize these threats.
As a part of this course, you are also required to perform a case study, and analyze a recent Cybersecurity breach or cyber attack based on your previous knowledge of Cybersecurity, and apply everything that you have learned thus far from this certificate program, and also investigate prevention recommendations.
Your project will be graded by others taking the same course. Furthermore, the completion of this course grants you the “Cybersecurity Capstone: Breach Response Case Studies IBM digital badge”.
COURSE 8: IBM Cybersecurity Analyst Assessment
The last course titled “IBM Cybersecurity Analyst Assessment” is actually not a course, but an assessment that is designed to test your acquired knowledge, and skills. After passing the final assessment quiz, you will successfully acquire the IBM Cybersecurity Analyst Professional Certificate!
Google Cloud Certification: Cloud Security Engineer Professional Certificate by Google Cloud Training
Cloud Security Engineer Professional Certificate by Google Cloud is a professional training course aimed at advancing your career as a Cloud Security Engineer by supporting your preparation for the Google Cloud’s Professional Cloud Security Engineer certification exam.
With a focus on cloud computing, this course will guide you through all the necessary skills needed to become a cloud security expert, and provides the training to help you prepare for the well renowned “Google Cloud’s Professional Cloud Security Engineer certification”.
The content of this course is specially designed keeping in mind all the important concepts like network security, managing access, logs analysis, organizational policies, Google VPC networks, subnets, and more.
You will also acquire a lot of important skills like Google Compute Engine, Google App Engine (GAE), Google Cloud Platform, Cloud Computing, Creating, and understanding custom IAM roles, Securing a Kubernetes environment, and Creating, and configuring network peering.
This Professional Certificate contains seven courses. Let us briefly talk about each one of them.
COURSE 1: Google Cloud Platform Fundamentals: Core Infrastructure
The first course titled “Google Cloud Platform Fundamentals: Core Infrastructure” covers the basics of Google Cloud Platform (GCP), and related concepts.
This course focuses on the various types of storage, and computing devices – Google Cloud Platform, resource, and policy management tools like the Google Cloud Resource Manager, and more.
Plus, with the help of hands-on labs, you can easily build your foundations, and acquire the basic skills needed to work with GCP.
COURSE 2: Networking in Google Cloud: Defining and Implementing Networks
The second course in this series – “Networking in Google Cloud: Defining and Implementing Networks” introduces you to the types of networking options in the Google Cloud Platform. You will also learn about the widely used network design patterns, and their automated deployment.
This course also guides you through the various other Google Cloud networking technologies which are Virtual Private Cloud (VPC) networks, subnets, and firewalls; interconnection among networks; load balancing; Cloud DNS; Cloud CDN, and Cloud NAT.
Also, different types of study material, and learning resources are available such as lectures, demos, and hands-on labs to make the whole learning process easier.
COURSE 3: Networking in Google Cloud: Hybrid Connectivity and Network Management
This course gives students information, and training about the networking options in Google Cloud. “Networking in Google Cloud: Hybrid Connectivity, and Network Management” helps you explore, and deploy Google Cloud networking technologies, Hybrid Connectivity, and Network Management.
COURSE 4: Managing Security in Google Cloud Platform
The next course in this series is titled “Managing Security in Google Cloud Platform”, and introduces you to security controls, and techniques in the Google Cloud platform.
This course helps you explore, and learn about achieving security in the Google Cloud Platform, secure Google Cloud solution, Cloud Interconnect, Google Cloud Load Balancing, Cloud Peering, Cloud IAM, and more.
COURSE 5: Security Best Practices in Google Cloud
Just as the name suggests, this course explores Security Best Practices in Google Cloud, and various security controls, and techniques in Google Cloud.
Also available is a wide range of study material in the form of pre-recorded lectures, demonstrations, and hands-on labs. The content is specially curated to help the students learn in detail about the components of a secure Google Cloud solution.
This course also covers key concepts like securing Kubernetes environments, security Keys, API access controls, scoping, signed URLs, and more.
COURSE 6: Mitigating Security Vulnerabilities on Google Cloud Platform
In this course, the participants learn about how to mitigate security vulnerabilities on the Google Cloud Platform. It helps you discover important concepts like Security Command Center, cloud logging, and audit logging.
This course focuses on preparing its students to mitigate attacks, and other similar security vulnerabilities on a Google Cloud-based infrastructure.
Moreover, this course also covers how to deal with various other types of cyber threats in a Cloud-based infrastructure such as DDOS attacks, phishing attacks, and many other types of cyber attacks.
COURSE 7: Hands-On Labs in Google Cloud for Security Engineers
The last course in this series is titled “Hands-On Labs in Google Cloud for Security Engineers” focuses on hands-on practice of various tools meant for ensuring safety, and identifying them in Google Cloud.
You also learn how to secure resources using various Google Cloud services such as Google Kubernetes Engine (GKE). This hands-on practice exercise is offered by Qwiklabs, and helps you practice in real Google Cloud.
Fundamentals of Computer Network Security Specialization by University of Colorado
“Fundamentals of Computer Network Security Specialization” by the University of Colorado is an integrated network security course designed to help you launch your career in Cybersecurity.
The content of this course is specially curated to help its students learn about the various network security principles, master the tools used to secure networks, system, and data security, and more.
This specialization is designed keeping in mind Cybersecurity experts, IT Security Analysts, IT security professionals, programmers, and others who want to improve their qualifications, and understanding in the field of cyber safety, and network system security.
This Specialization consists of four courses covering important aspects of Computer Network Security including designing, and Analysis of Secure Networked Systems, and Developing safe, and secure Programs with Basic Cryptography, and Crypto API.
The content of this course also covers hacking, and Patching Web Applications, and Securing Network Systems with Firewall, and IDS. This course is taught by Edward Chow, Professor of Computer Science at the University of Colorado.
By the end of this specialization, the students will be able to build public/private keys, hack web applications with vulnerabilities, and patch them, configure firewall, and IDS for secure network systems, write secure web apps with Crypto API, create certificate requests, secure emails, and more.
The students can also crack passwords given the hashes in password file using AWS P2 GPU, code signing, apply penetration testing tool to exploit vulnerable systems, and specify effective security policies, implement efficient enforcement procedures, and more.
Just like other courses on our list, this specialization also focuses on various Applied Learning Projects.
The first project aims at helping the participants apply the security principles, and knowledge that they have gained so far in real-world tasks. This project promotes the use of various integrated tools, which are (but not limited to):
- Gpg for signing, and verifying documents/open-source software packages.
- Misc/CA scripts for performing CA certificate signing tasks, generate server/client certificates, and set up an apache web server for secure web access with mutual authentication.
The second project titled “Project2a-b” focuses on the practical learning of OpenSSL for encrypting/decrypting data, and Diffi-Hellman key exchange. The third applied learning project called “Projects 3a-b” covers hacking, and patching with command injections, and SQL injections.
Project 3c explores, and helps the students deploy, and also covers cracking Linux passwords. Lastly, Project 4a-b contains applied learning related to the DMZ firewall system with IP tables to provide DNAT, masquerade services, and more.
Let us now briefly discuss the 4 Courses in this Specialization.
COURSE 1: Design and Analyse Secure Networked Systems
The first course titled “Design, and Analyse Secure Networked Systems” helps the students learn, and explore secure networked systems, and basic Cybersecurity concepts. You will also learn – how to identify cyber vulnerabilities, and threats in different types of network systems.
Throughout the duration of this course, the students will:
- Learn to explore, and deploy CIA basic security services in recent cyber attack incidents.
- Learn how to analyze the risks in various network systems using risk management frameworks.
- Protect different forms of data, and safeguard computer systems by applying basic security design principles.
- Analyze the reliability of data, and programs in your systems, and explore the best way to examine, and verify that they are integral, and authentic.
- Control shared access given to different people, and system processes by applying principles of least privileges.
- Use GnuPG software on Amazon Cloud instances to create public keys, and private keys. This will help the students to sign, and verify various documents based on open source software, and encrypt them.
- Learn the process of software publishing, how to publish signature, and release key on a web server, and public key to PGP key server so that others can retrieve, and make use of it.
- Explore what Public Key Infrastructure (PKI), and Linux utility are, and how they can act as a CA for any organization.
- Explore the process of how certificate requests are signed in secure web applications, and emails.
COURSE 2: Basic Cryptography and Programming with Crypto API
The second course in this series is aimed at helping students explore the concepts, and principles of cryptography in detail. You will also learn how to apply basic crypto analysis, and how it is used to decrypt messages encrypted with a mono-alphabetic substitution cipher.
The content of this course also discusses quantum key distribution systems, and strong encryption techniques.
Following are some of the basic elements of Cryptography, and Programming with Crypto API discussed in this course: (Source: Coursera)
- Efficient symmetric key cryptography algorithms for encrypting data.
- DES, and AES standards, and the criteria for selecting AES standard.
- Block cipher operating modes, and their role in preventing, and detecting block swapping attacks.
- Protection against replay attacks.
- Diffie-Hellman Symmetric Key Exchange Protocol to generate a symmetric key to facilitate communication over an insecure channel.
- The modular arithmetic, and the Euler Totient Theorem to appreciate the RSA Asymmetric Crypto Algorithm.
- OpenSSL utility to learn more about the basic operations of the RSA Crypto Algorithm.
- PHP Crypto API, and its role in writing secure programs for encryption, and decryption of documents.
COURSE 3: Hacking and Patching
“Hacking and Patching” deals with hacking web applications by using command injection vulnerabilities present in a website.
Following are some of the basic elements of Hacking, and Patching discussed in this course:
- Finding important, and valuable information in Linux systems with the help of LAMP services.
- Patch various web applications by validating input with the help of regular expressions.
- Pattern for security design to prevent injection vulnerabilities with the help of specific function calls, and input validation.
- Hacking web applications using SQL injection vulnerabilities.
- Retrieve user profile data, and passwords from web applications.
- Patch the user profile information, and passwords with SQL parameter binding, and input validation.
- Learn how to scan vulnerabilities, and penetration testing using Kali Linux.
- Gain access to vulnerable Windows Systems using Metasploit Framework.
- Remote VNC server injection.
- The process of cloning a Kali instance using AWS P2 GPU support.
COURSE 4: Secure Networked System with Firewall and IDS
The last course in this series includes understanding Secure Networked Systems with Firewall, and IDS. You will learn how to secure various network systems using IDS, and firewall.
This course also explores the basic concepts surrounding network security, Network IDS, Snort, Host IDS, and dual-firewall DMZ. Moreover, this course also includes an in-depth study, and learning of the Linux firewall.
Introduction to Cyber Security Specialization by New York University
Introduction to Cyber Security Specialization is a great course for students who wish to learn, and develop a deeper understanding of the modern information techniques, and learn about Cybersecurity, and the various cyber safety technologies, and methods, offered by New York University.
This specialization acts as a great start to your cyber safety journey by summarizing the basic meaning, and aim of Cybersecurity, and the advantages, and the disadvantages of security through obscurity. It also helps you plan for potential careers in Cybersecurity.
Other integral skills you will gain from this specialization are Cryptography, Risk Assessment, Cyber Attacks, Information Security (INFOSEC), Denial-Of-Service Attack (DOS), and Public-Key Cryptography, all of which are important elements of Cybersecurity.
From Students, and developers to engineers, and IT professionals, the content of this specialization is designed to benefit everyone willing to learn. The learning experience also incorporates multimedia study material including Special interviews, and Insights from IT professionals, and industry partners.
The Instructor of this course is Dr. Edward G. Amoroso, who is a Research Professor at NYU, and CEO of TAG Cyber LLC.
To help the students understand, and retain the topics in a better way, this course also includes various Quizzes, and projects. This course focuses more on a deeper understanding of the concepts, and not just memorizing facts.
There are 4 Courses in this Specialization. These are Introduction to Cyber Attacks, Cyber Attack Countermeasures, Real-Time Cyber Threat Detection, and Mitigation, and Enterprise, and Infrastructure Security.
COURSE 1: Introduction to Cyber Attacks
Introduction to Cyber Attacks provides students with a baseline understanding of one of the most important elements of Cybersecurity – cyber attacks.
Cyber attacks is one of the major reasons as to why Cybersecurity exists, so it is important for a Cybersecurity expert to know everything about common Cybersecurity threats, and risks. And, this course will help you do just that!!
The structure of this course will guide you through how cyber attacks originate, and how they affect your computer systems, and networks, and also introduce you to basic Cybersecurity risk analysis. Information about Unix kernel hacks, Internet worms, Trojan horses, and other cyber attacks is also included.
Moreover, this course also describes other network attacks like distributed denial of service (DDOS), and botnet-attacks. Furthermore, this course also explains how all these cyber attacks work by taking examples from real-life cyber attacks.
Other important aspects that is covered as a part of this course are confidentiality/integrity/availability (CIA) security threat framework, how threat-asset matrices can be used to prioritize risk decisions, and security engineering methodologies.
COURSE 2: Cyber Attack Countermeasures
After introducing you to the different types of cyber risks, and vulnerabilities, this series then shifts its focus to the various Cyber Attack Countermeasures.
This second course in the specialization, elaborates the countermeasures that you can take against the different cyber threats, and malwares while also giving you information about the different types of cyber defense techniques, and mechanism.
This course also covers Information flow framework, and various foundational models such as Bell-LaPadula.
The functional protections, different authentication solutions, and protocols, basics of cryptography, conventional block ciphers, public-key cryptography, cipher block chaining, triple-DES, and Secure Sockets Layer (SSL) schemes are also included in this course.
COURSE 3: Real-Time Cyber Threat Detection and Mitigation
The next course in this series titled “Real-Time Cyber Threat Detection, and Mitigation” deals with the various techniques, and methods that can be used to detect, and mitigate real-time cyber threats. This course helps you learn TCP/IP security hacks, how to design, and configure firewall solutions, and much more.
COURSE 4: Enterprise and Infrastructure Security
The last course in this series is about Enterprise, and Infrastructure Security, and introduces its students to advanced, and current topics in Cybersecurity, especially in the context of modern enterprise, and infrastructure settings.
This course also discusses the various concepts surrounding enterprise compliance frameworks such as NIST, and PCI, and Hybrid cloud architectures. You will also learn about hyper-resilience approaches related to mobile security, and cloud security.
This course also covers new emerging security issues related to the Internet of Things (IoT), and vulnerabilities in blockchain, critical infrastructure protection, and more.
The Complete Cyber Security Course: Hackers Exposed! By Nathan House
One of the bestselling Cybersecurity courses on Udemy.com, “The Complete Cyber Security Course: Hackers Exposed!” is an amazing course created by Nathan House that will help you become a Cyber Security Specialist.
Nathan House is a Cybersecurity expert who has over 24 years of experience in Cybersecurity. He is also the recipient of the AI “Cyber Security Educator of the Year 2020” award. Currently, he is the CEO of a Cybersecurity consultancy known as Station X.
Apart from working as an advisor for some of the largest corporations in the world, he has also worked as the lead security consultant on various UK-based mobile banking, and payment solutions.
This complete course contains 4 volumes, and to complete the full course, you are required to complete these four volumes.
And, upon the completion of this course “you will know more – than 80% of the security professionals, governments, and law enforcement agents, and even expert hackers about maintaining security, privacy, and anonymity” (as per their claim).
The four volumes are:
- Volume 1: Become a Cyber Security Specialist, Learn How to Stop Hackers, Prevent Hacking, Learn IT Security & INFOSEC.
- Volume 2: Network Security, WiFi Security, WiFi Hackers, Firewalls, Wireshark, Secure Networking. + Password Managers.
- Volume 3: Become a Cyber Security Specialist, Anonymous Browsing, Hide my IP, Tor, Privacy, Proxy Servers, and Best VPNs.
- Volume 4 : Become a Cyber Security Specialist, Antivirus & Malware, Disk Encryption, Finding & Removing Hackers & Malware.
Let us briefly discuss each of these four volumes.
Volume 1: Become a Cyber Security Specialist, Learn How to Stop Hackers, Prevent Hacking, Learn IT Security & INFOSEC
This course is designed to help its students learn how to Stop Hackers, Learn IT Security & INFOSEC, and prevent Hacking among many other things.
To take this course, the student or the participant must have a basic understanding of how the operating systems work, what computer networks are, and how they operate, and how the internet works. You also need to have a basic understanding of how to download, and install softwares on an OS.
If you wish to become a Cybersecurity expert or learn everything that you need to know to become a privacy or an anonymity expert, then this course is right for you! The content in this course will provide you with enough knowledge to kick start your journey to becoming a Cybersecurity expert.
The content also covers important concepts related to the practical aspects of other important skillsets like mitigating the risk from malware, Trojans, hackers, trackers, cybercriminals, and all online threats.
And, even if you don’t want to become a Cybersecurity expert, you can still take this course if you are interested in security, safety, and privacy, and want to learn more about the same.
Volume 2: Network Security, WiFi Security, WiFi Hackers, Firewalls, Wireshark, Secure Networking. + Password Managers
Volume 2 of 4 of the complete course for Cybersecurity privacy, and anonymity is titled “Network Security, WiFi Security, WiFi Hackers, Firewalls, Wireshark, and Secure Networking. + Password Managers”.
As is very much clear from the title of this course, as to what one can expect from this course, this course focuses on imparting an advanced practical skill-set for network security, and takes a detailed look at the same.
With all the latest methods, and up-to-date study material, this course is designed to prepare you against major cyber threats like advanced hackers, exploit kits, trackers, Wi-Fi attacks, and much more. However, it is recommended to take up volume 1 of this course before starting this course, although it is not a necessity.
Moreover, to take this course you need to have a basic understanding of networking concepts, and how networking works.
Important aspects that this Volume covers are password managers and their use, how to crack passwords, how to mitigate, and avoid password attacks, and discovering security vulnerabilities across an entire network.
This course also covers how to configure firewalls on a variety of platforms including Windows, macOS, and Linux, configuring, and architecting a small network for ensuring great levels of physical, and wireless security, and the use network monitoring to discover, and identify potential hackers.
Moreover, you will also learn about tools like Wireshark, Tcpdump, and Syslog, learn how corporations, nation-states, ISPs, and others entities track you online, discuss search engine privacy, best methods of authentication including passwords, multi-factor authentication, and much much more.
Volume 3: Become a Cyber Security Specialist, Anonymous Browsing, Hide my IP, Tor, Privacy, Proxy Servers, and Best VPNs
Volume 3 of 4 of the complete course focuses on online anonymity, and other privacy, and anonymizing services, and methods. Before starting this course, it is recommended to read Volumes 1, and 2 for complete understanding, and for a much deeper learning experience, although it is not a necessity.
In this course, you will explore advanced practical skill-sets related to online anonymity, online privacy, and bypassing firewalls, and proxies.
After the completion of this course, you will become well versed with how to protect yourself against various types of adversaries online, and other vital Cybersecurity concepts like effective OPSEC or operational security, and live operating systems.
You will also learn about – how to use virtual private networks (or VPNs) for security, privacy, and to attempt anonymity, anonymizing service, and darknet known as Tor, proxies servers, and how they work, SSH protocol for optimal security, dynamic port forwarding, and i2p darknet.
Additionally, you also learn about other privacy, and anonymizing services such as JonDoNym, and botnets, nesting, and chaining anonymizing services, off-site connections such as Wi-Fi, the use of cellular networks for privacy, and anonymity, and more.
Everything is covered in great detail, both in theory, and through practical learning.
Volume 4: Become a Cyber Security Specialist, Antivirus & Malware, Disk Encryption, Finding & Removing Hackers & Malware
Volume 4 of the complete guide to Cybersecurity, privacy, and anonymity is titled “Become a Cyber Security Specialist, Antivirus & Malware, Disk Encryption, and Finding & Removing Hackers & Malware”.
This course lays emphasis on an advanced practical skill-set in securing personal devices like desktops, laptops, and mobile devices.
The content is specially designed to cover important concepts like mastering the selection, and implementation of solid disk encryption technology, and how to protect devices fully from disk decryption attacks.
Moreover, you will also learn about diverse technologies offered by end-point-protection software, and other methods like application control, execution prevention, machine learning, and AI.
This course will also teach you the process of detecting, and monitoring cyber threats such as malwares, and hackers, how to work with system resident malwares, and hackers, the process for operating system hardening, email, and messenger security.
You also learn about the best methods in anti-forensics to safely delete data, and meta-data to make it unrecoverable.
You are free to take this as a stand-alone course, but it is recommended to first go through, learn, and watch the previous three volumes of this complete guide.
Summing up Cybersecurity Courses and Trainings
Since cyber safety is now a matter of great concern for most individuals, and organizations all around the world, it is not a surprising fact that cyber safety as a career is also blooming. More, and more people are now being drawn towards and, learning Cybersecurity.
In this post, we gave you the very best choices, and the top rated Cybersecurity courses from around the world, to help you narrow down the options, and to help you choose the best cyber safety course for yourself!
We hope that this post helped you in learning more about Cybersecurity courses, and trainings. If you are not satisfied with these courses, and trainings included here in our list, you can also find more professional courses, trainings, certifications, and specializations through research, and online search.
If you know of better courses, and trainings that are even better than the ones in this post, don’t forget to comment down below, and add to our list, and also tell us what you think about these Cybersecurity courses in the comments section down below! For more posts on Cybersecurity, check out our blog here!