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Lina Deen
CST 300 Writing Lab
Industry analysis paper
January 16, 2019

Cyber Security and Ethical Hacking

The industry I am interested in pursuing a carrier in is cybersecurity specifically becoming

an Ethical Hacker or penetration tester, but to understand Cybersecurity, we have to understand a

brief history and follow the reason behind why computers and the internet were invented and

why Cybersecurity became crucial to everyone either on a personal or business level. Machines

were created as computation devices to do repetitive computation, then in the era of WWII when

“Charles Babbage an English mechanical engineer and polymath originated the concept of a

programmable computer Considered the Father of computers." Moreover, computers expanded,

and the use changed with time which led to the invention of the internet which was first known

as “ARPANET” that was invented to share data and information. Thus, evolved over time to the

internet we know now a day, and of course, with the internet cyber-attacks, such hacking was

born “The origin of Internet privacy issues date to before the Internet was even launched” and

cyber security was necessary to protect personal and vital information”.

Hacker is a powerful word highly misused and misunderstood that when we hear it, we

think shady business and trouble right away we also imagine an anti-social person sitting in a

dark room using his skills to no good. Nevertheless, that is how I use to think before I attended a

cybersecurity class. Moreover, and what many people don’t know that not all hackers are the

same and there are ethical hackers, and there are unethical hackers with the same level of
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knowledge and skills. However, and what makes them different is their morality and intention

behind their actions. Moreover, the idea of hacking goes back to “pre-1970” was born out of

curiosity of some people who used their intellect to think outside of the box not in the right way.

Thus, wanted to learn and test the boundaries of the new technology, how it can be uttered and

used in a deferent way to give different results not intended in the original design. Moreover, as

technology advanced the curiosity of those individuals grew to come up with more sophisticated

and different ways that were constantly changing and becoming smarter and more advanced

which resulted in the cybersecurity issues we deal with today.

From the government, financial institution, such as banks “and I work for one” to any

corporate and business big or small cybersecurity is essential and is a big part of their daily

process because “Cybersecurity is the protection of Internet-connected systems, including

hardware, software, and data, from cyber-attacks." Moreover, every company has a particular

department that deals with fraud and security issues and continually works on securing,

preventing, and fixing problems that can lead to a security breach or dealing with the offense

when it happens to avoid the minimum loss possible.

My interest in pursuing cybersecurity grew after taking a class. However, Cybersecurity is

a vast industry that is continuously growing “In 2018, the global cyber security market is

expected to reach 151.67 billion U.S. dollars. The figures from 2018 to 2022 represent an

estimate based on the source-provided compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of 10.2 percent, as

well as the market revenue figure for 2017 and 2022 provided by the source.” Cybersecurity is

an industry that is growing and will always be in demand, unlike other industries and business

that perished with time and technology evolving and got replaced with new ideas.
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I work for Wells Fargo one of the major leading financial institution in the United States a

company established in 1825 by Henry Wells and William Fargo Wells Fargo is found almost in

every State in the US where their main business being in customer service and sales. However,

Wells Fargo was not always a giant financial institution we know today, and the company went

through a life changing transformation earned a great reputation starting in the 1970s when the

company’s CEO at the time Dick Cooley “foresaw that the banking industry would eventually

undergo wrenching change.” Therefore, he went out preparing to which later on became one to

the best team of executives in history that helped the company thorough banks deregulation and

transforming it form a small lending business in to a major financial institution. Nevertheless,

and when in 1983 many “banking industry fell 59 percent behind the general stock market, Wells

Fargo outperformed the market by over three times” becoming one of the top companies at the

time according to the book “Good to Great, by Jim Collins.” The current top executives at Wells

Fargo are David Galasso Executive Vice President head of Human Recourses. Richard Levy

EVP controller, Mary Mack Senior EVP consumer Banking. Moreover, the company offers

services such as Banking, lending, investment, and mortgages Wells Fargo provides more than

80 services and products a company that is standing firm despite the many scandals and lawsuit

that shook the company’s reputation with the latest 2016 scandals of unethical practices.

However, Wells Fargo came out strong after every issue stood and took responsibility for any

issue. Moreover, the company has a great reputation as an employer because it provides its

employees with the best benefits from the pay, 401k, medical, tuition reimbursement and many

other great benefits. However, and since Wells Fargo bank is a financial institution that deals

with money and has a lot of customers sensitive information, they are always prone to security

out breach and face a lot of danger when it comes to secure their data and protect the customer's
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privacy that trusted them from being targeted by hackers. Therefore, aside from their finical

department Wells Fargo has a big department that deals with fraud and cybersecurity issues.

Nevertheless, and not until I took the cybersecurity plan that I understood the importance and

reason and importance behind having what it is called a program that is continuously updated

and easily accessible called “Business Continuity Plan."

Moreover, how important for every employee to have access to the plan no matter what

their position is and to follow specific procedures such as changing the password every 90 days

and have particular requirements for a secure password. Moreover, I understood more about our

fraud department and the “report to Phishing” that we use to report any suspicious emails or texts

that we see on a daily basis where many customers come to us concerned about an email, they

got that looks like it was sent from our financial institution. However, and in fact, it is coming

from a hacker that camouflaged the email to look like it was sent from Wells Fargo.

Wells Fargo’s present trend is a new technology in cyber security called “cyber range virtual

environments where real cyber-attacks are launched on replicas of their actual IT systems” the

industry is also getting the online banking evolving and becoming advanced

I always found computers interesting, and I decided to study computer programing when I

was 14 years old about to start high school. Therefore, I went to a technical institution and

studied computer programing. However, I never worked in the field, and the languages I studied

became old and outdated, since computer languages changes and evolved a lot in the past two

decades. Therefore, that is why I decided to go back and learn the new technology all over again,

and that is when I decided to take a cybersecurity class although my major is in software

engineer. However, I thought that it is essential to learn how to protect the software and I fell in

love with cybersecurity. Therefore, I decided to become a Certified Ethical Hacker.

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Moreover, in the course, I learned not only about the different steps of Ethical Hacking that starts

with mapping and checking to secure but also about how it was invented, different security

breaches history of famous hackers and their techniques in hacking, information about recent

company’s security breaches. Moreover, I learned about Target in 2104 the Hilton Hotels in

2015 an even the presidential election security breach. Every business and company have a

security plan, and a cybersecurity department with employees with specialized skills called white

hat hackers work as soldiers always alerted and on the lookout for attacks. I also learned that

hacking is not all bad and there are two types of hackers the white hat hacker, and the black hat

hacker and the difference is that they both have the same skills. However, the black hat hacker

uses their expertise to perform illegal activities while the white hat hacker uses their powers to

prevent and protect from the black hat hackers’ attacks. However, it doesn’t get more

comfortable with time attacks become more sophisticated and advanced “These attacks happen

daily and are constantly evolving. In the past 50 years, cyber-attacks have evolved from little

hacks created by high-school students to state-sponsored attacks compromising presidential

elections”. Therefore, the need to stay updated and learn about new and advanced ways to

protect against illegal attacks is vital.

Pursuing a career in cybersecurity, requires a lot of work and it is essential for me as a first

step towards a achieving my goal to obtain certification and become a Certified Ethical Hacker

at first to be able to work in the industry and will be working for the company I am working for

now at their fraud prevention department. However, I have to pursue more classes since the one

class I took “Cybersecurity Ethical Hacking CS/193” is not enough. Therefore, I am in the

process of doing that since I found a program online called “EC council on the Web.,” they offer

a one-year program fully online with live instructors, online labs, certificate of completion, and
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test prep towards the end to the program. Moreover, it is necessary to practice what I learned on

my own since I have software and books that can help me practice the skills, I learned from the

course. Moreover, an internship will be beneficial to me since learning is essential but putting to

practice what we have learned is like a glue that makes everything we learn comes together.

Also, attend seminars and convention, and one of the conventions I would like to attend is “DEF

CON” hacking conference where hackers from all over the United States attend to learn and

share new ideas and new techniques. I also would also like after I graduate as a software

engineer to incorporate my knowledge in coding and software developing with cybersecurity

and maybe help in improving cyber security issues by writing a new security software that can

help enhance cybersecurity especially issues that I see the banking industry and other business

struggling in dealing with including Wells Fargo the company I work for now. Moreover, stay

updated with the latest news, techniques, and attacks, listening to cybersecurity podcasts such as

“Braking Down Security” “Risky Business” “the Security Weekly Podcast” and many more to

help me stay informed and on track with the latest attacks, technology , and discoveries.

Becoming a Certified Ethical Hacker is not an easy process that requires a lot of

knowledge and comes with significant responsibilities and liabilities. Thus, to perform the job,

an ethical hacker needs to obtain a legal written consent from the company to conduct a

penetration test and analyze the strength of their security, the flaws that put them into a high risk

to fall a pray for an unethical hacker. Ethical Hacking is a fun job to do for a great cause that

help, protect and secure business and individuals privacy and assets from unprincipled attacks

and from falling into the wrong hands. Becoming an Ethical Hacker is a challenging career.

However, the rewards out way the difficulties, either for society or personal rewards.
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References

8 breakthrough events in the history of cyber security-Infographic Oct 16, 2018

https://bigdata-madesimple.com/8-breakthrough-events-in-the-history-of-cybersecurity

- Sean Philip Oriyano 2016 - CEHv9 Certified Ethical Hacker Version 9 Published

simultaneously in Canada.

Cybersecurity by Margret Rouse Walts

https://searchsecurity.techtarget.com/definition/cybersecurity

Jim Collins2001- Good to Great Why some Companies Make the Leap and Others Don’t

1st edition. HarperCollins Publishers 195 Broadway. New York.

History the invention of the internet

https://www.history.com/topics/inventions/invention-of-the-internet

Inside a Bank Rescue

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articles.latimes.com › Collections

Size of the cyber security market worldwide, from 2017 to 2023 (in billion U.S. dollars)

https://www.statista.com/statistics/595182/worldwide-security-as-a-service-market-size

The History of Cybersecurity — Everything you Ever Wanted to Know By Sentinel One

- March 10, 2018

sentinelone.com/blog/history-of-cyber-security