الثلاثاء، 12 يوليو 2016

A Look at the Cyber Security Apprenticeships

Guest Author: Annabelle Harris

UK Government and businesses are consistently at threat from cyber attack. It is now estimated that the UK has spent approximately £18-27 billion pounds in defending against these type of attacks. With an ever increasing threat, the number of skilled  IT security professionals required is not developing fast enough, creating a large and growing cyber-security ‘skills gap’.

In a bid to closed the gap, the Government has introduced new cyber security apprenticeship standards. Paired with significant financial backing, the aim is to increase the number of cyber experts as effective security aids to protect against a data breach’s far-reaching effects. 


The two new apprenticeships are titled - Cyber Intrusion Analyst and Cyber Security Technologist. In this post we will take a closer look at the two. The skills they teach and the funding available.


Cyber Intrusion Analyst:


An apprentice that has taken the role of Cyber Intrusion Analyst will learn how to detect breaches in network security for escalation to incident response or other determined function.

A Cyber Intrusion Analyst will benefit from a range of automated tools to monitor networks in real time. They’ll interpret and understand the alerts that are automatically generated by those tools, including integrating and correlating information from a variety of sources and in different forms and, where necessary, seek additional information to inform the Analyst’s judgement on whether or not the alert represents a security breach.

The apprentice will often be part of, or lead, a team when working. They will also be required to cooperate with external stakeholders

With a Cyber Intrusion Analyst apprenticeship you will develop the skills to work in a range of different job roles including:

Secure Operations Centre (SOC) Analyst, Intrusion Analyst, Network Intrusion Analyst, Incident Response Centre (IRC) Analyst and Network Operations Centre (NOC) Security Analyst.

This apprenticeship is ranked a Level 4 apprenticeship and its duration is typically 24 months.

For this apprenticeship, the maximum contribution of government is £18,000 , where the contribution of the said business is £9,000.

This particular apprenticeship is also eligible for additional incentive payments including:

  • 16 – 18 year olds: £5,400 
  • Businesses with less than 50 employees: £2,700 
  • Successful completion: £2,700 


Cyber Security Technologist:


An apprentice that has taken on the role of Cyber Security Technologist will learn how to apply an understanding of cyber threats, hazards, risks, controls, measures and also mitigations to be able to protect organisations systems and people.

The apprentice will work in a selection of areas as well as security design and architecture, operations, risk, governance and compliance, security testing, investigations & response. Their goal is to accomplish required security results in a legal and monitored framework in all areas of the economy. As well as that, they will develop and apply a practical understanding of information security to provide solutions that fulfil an organizations requirements.

A Cyber Security Technologist apprenticeship can open doors to many job roles such as: Cyber Operations Manager, Security Architect, Penetration Tester, Security Analyst, Risk Analyst, Intelligence Researcher, Security Sales Engineer, Cyber Security Specialist, Information Security Analyst, Governance & Compliance Analyst, Information Security Assurance & Threat Analyst, Forensics & Incident Response Analyst, Security Engineer, Information Security Auditor, Security Administrator, Information Security Office.


Just like the Cyber Intrusion Analysts apprenticeship, this apprenticeship is ranked a Level 4 apprenticeship and its duration is typically 24 months.

For this apprenticeship, the maximum contribution of government is £18,000 , where the contribution of the said business is £9,000.

This particular apprenticeship also attracts the following encouragement payments for the employers:

  • 16 – 18 year olds: £5,400 
  • Businesses with less than 50 employees: £2,700 
  • Successful completion: £2,700 


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