Without A Castle

By Daniel Miessler on April 4th, 2006: Tagged as Information Security | Musings

As a consultant, the one thing I really miss is the feeling of owning a network and defending it. In training I’ve attended over the last couple of months I’ve noticed the other students processing all input in reference to that which they are responsible for.

I miss that.

All I have is a home network to defend, and if it goes down (or gets 0wn3d) nobody cares. It’s not even close to being the same as having a live, production network that depends on you.

See, I enjoy the art and science of attacking because I love defense — and it’s because of this fact that I fill somewhat empty without a castle that needs me.

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Viewing 3 Comments

    • ^
    • v
    I do agree with you, and I think this is the feeling of most of IT consultants... not to have to defend or promote a real and long-term project, but constantly being subjected to a business to another.

    "There was a lonesome cowboy..."
    • ^
    • v
    Hi Daniel,

    I feel just the opposite, ironically enough.

    I wear multiple hats (systems admin, network guy, security monkey) during my 8-5 at an educational institution. I consider the systems and networks there as "mine". If something happens to them, I take it personally -- I'm sure many others in similar positions feel the same way.

    Outside of the school, however, I also do consulting on the side. At least 50% of this work is strictly security work and most of these jobs are not short, quick projects. Most of them are ongoing projects with no "end date" set, which may be why I feel differently than you do. In these cases, I am the security guy for these companies. Anything security related comes through me, which once again makes me feel as if the networks in question are "mine". Obviously, they're not, but I feel that way, and I take great pride in protecting these networks and the confidential data belonging to my customers.
    • ^
    • v
    I think the key difference is the time spent with the client. I get to spend very little and have a relatively small interaction with them after each encounter. You, on the other hand, seem to be, as you said, their very own security expert.

    Ideally I'd be doing that more, but it's all dependent on the type of engagements we get as a company. For the time being I'm going to be in the "touch and go" boat, as that's the type of gigs we're getting.

    Anyway, thanks for the comment.
 

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    This site is an avatar for my own self-assigned life purpose--an attempt to model the world in the most accurate way possible, and to do so without bias or fear of unpleasant truth. I desire to develop, articulate, and perpetually improve models of how things work, and then to use that understanding to increase happiness and reduce suffering. I seek those on similar paths and thrive on sharing an appreciation of the interesting and beautiful with others.



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