SANS Cyber Guardian Program

I have decided to pursue the SANS Cyber Guardian Program. My goal is Red team focused right now, but it might switch after I complete my 4 core classes.

My goal is the complete the program in 2 years.

I was rather hesitant to pay the price for the SANS classes, but considering what I have spent on college its not terrible....and the skills I will gain will be well worth the initial investment.

Check it out:
SANS Cyber Guardian Program

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Bl8ckr0uter

ibcritn wrote: »

I have decided to pursue the SANS Cyber Guardian Program. My goal is Red team focused right now, but it might switch after I complete my 4 core classes.

My goal is the complete the program in 2 years.

I was rather hesitant to pay the price for the SANS classes, but considering what I have spent on college its not terrible....and the skills I will gain will be well worth the initial investment.

Check it out:
SANS Cyber Guardian Program

WOW!!! +Rep. I was literally just thinking about this today.

Awesome. I really want to do blue team but getting all of that done without a sponsor seems a bit difficult. How long have you been working in Infosec? They say you have to have a CISSP, but I was considering calling them and seeing if SSCP would be ok (when I get it of course).

Kasor

Let us what you find out if CISSP is a MUST.

ibcritn

Bl8ckr0uter wrote: »

WOW!!! +Rep. I was literally just thinking about this today.

Awesome. I really want to do blue team but getting all of that done without a sponsor seems a bit difficult. How long have you been working in Infosec? They say you have to have a CISSP, but I was considering calling them and seeing if SSCP would be ok (when I get it of course).

I haven't been working directly in Infosec for long, but I have plenty of security related experience. I suppose I will worry about all that when I complete the four core certifications

I think technically they require GSEC (score 80% and up), but you can qualify with CISSP.

I plan to try to self-study for as many of the certifications as possible, but I think a few I would enjoy taking the course....your GCIA self-study plan will help a lot.

Bl8ckr0uter

ibcritn wrote: »

I haven't been working directly in Infosec for long, but I have plenty of security related experience. I suppose I will worry about all that when I complete the four core certifications

I think they say CISSP, or you can do GSEC in its place. I think technically they require GSEC (score 80% and up), but you can qualify with CISSP.

I plan to try to self-study for as many as the certifications as possible, but I think a few I would enjoy taking the course....your GCIA self-study plan will help a lot.

GCIH looks fun. GPEN looks fun. GCFA doesn't lol. Trying to fit in to challenges this year is going to be very hard. More than likely I won't be able to crank off a few challenges until I am done with school. When I talked to SANS, they seemed pretty flexible about the requirements. I wonder if that is because many people aren't joining in (because of the cost) or they really want more "cyber guardians". I plan to do the GCIA in September, if they "let" me in, I will probably start then. Good luck!

ibcritn

Bl8ckr0uter wrote: »

GCIH looks fun. GPEN looks fun. GCFA doesn't lol. Trying to fit in to challenges this year is going to be very hard. More than likely I won't be able to crank off a few challenges until I am done with school. When I talked to SANS, they seemed pretty flexible about the requirements. I wonder if that is because many people aren't joining in (because of the cost) or they really want more "cyber guardians". I plan to do the GCIA in September, if they "let" me in, I will probably start then. Good luck!

Same to you. Among the core courses the GCFA does seem to be the least "fun", but I enjoy forensics and I also don't have an issue with the laws....I suppose its the paper work that would get to me.

Chris:/*

I am also going for the SANS Cyber Guardian program but a large part of my studies will have to wait till I get back to the states. I was planning on taking most of the courses anyway so the designation is just the cherry on top.

ibcritn

Chris:/* wrote: »

I am also going for the SANS Cyber Guardian program but a large part of my studies will have to wait till I get back to the states. I was planning on taking most of the courses anyway so the designation is just the cherry on top.

Awesome! Good to see another going for the challenge. I had the same logic as I was planning on doing most of the courses before I knew about the program.

Bl8ckr0uter

ibcritn wrote: »

Awesome! Good to see another going for the challenge. I had the same logic as I was planning on doing most of the courses before I knew about the program.

Were you planning Blue Team or Red Team? I started thinking about it more and I think I would rather do red team although I want to do the firewall analyst cert, the GCUX and GCWN are less appealing than I thought they were going to be. Actually its mostly the GCWN. If I could get out of doing that one and instead do something like GCED I would be golden. Well maybe not, it doesn't look as bad as I thought.

Also how much experience do you have?

rogue2shadow

This program has always looked awesome to me. If I were to do it, I'd probably go Blue Team. I've always felt that if you know what you're up against and can learn to tweak the attacker's model, then you'll be that much more deadly as a Red team member.

Well that and my web skills are weak as hell lol.

Chris:/*

You can do both you are not limited to one that is the direction I am going.

ibcritn

Bl8ckr0uter wrote: »

Also how much experience do you have?

3 years doing help desk stuff... and 4 years in an IT consulting role, 1 year in a hybrid sysadmin/security role and now ive been at my current job as a security auditor for 6 months.

I am not 100% sure as to which path ill go down....I figure ill make my choice fully after the four core classes....I like the idea of both

I also want to do the firewall class/cert as I find firewall design/analysis very fun.

Bl8ckr0uter

I talked to a recruiter about the program today and it would seem that the program is designed for folks who with a company backing them. They say it requires 5 years experience but I don't know if that is 5 years security experience or 5 years general experience. Only CISSP and GSEC can be used to meet the prereqs. That means SSCP, Sec+ and all others do not apply which is interesting. It does require your boss to "approve" or recommend you. If you want to do RED and BLUE team you can. You get %10 off of courses if you are in the program.

I am kind of getting pissed off about the whole thing now, basically the "program" is just doing a bunch of certs in a 2 year time frame? So the cheapest this "program" will run you is 8 grand, and it could run about 30k? This is crazy. I was talking to my wife about it, do you know what I could do with 30k or even 8k? I don't know about this anymore.

I might still go for the GCIA but I just don't know if I can afford it to pay for this.