CyberSeek Paints Picture of Cybersecurity Skills Gap

Cool news and equally cool visuals (including the one below) are being generated by the folks at CyberSeek.org. This public partnership brings together three organizations: IT industry association CompTIA, labor and anlytics firm Burning Glass Technologies, and NICE, the National Initiative for Cybersecurity Education (which itself is sponsored by NIST, the National Institutes for Standards and Technology).

 

The aim of this unique coalition moving forward is to track the cybersecurity skills gap continuously. Thus, the graphic you see below partially reflects where things stand in the USA for November 2017, where supply and demand for cybersecurity workers is concerned.

 

Ed T 11 10 17 Figure 1

Source: CyberSeek.org Heat Map snapshot Nov. 9, 2017

 

CyberSeek has put together what it calls a "heat map," which compiles statistics on cybersecurity workers. Among other things on that page you'll find the following:

 

1. A color-coded map of the United State (including Alaska and Hawaii, but which does not account for any U.S. territories, which is kind of a shame) that shows levels of open positions by state.

 

The darker the color, the more cybersec jobs are open. Currently, eight states have more than 10,000 open positions in cybersecurity: New York, Maryland, Virginia, Georgia, Florida, Illinois, Texas, and California.

 

2. The stats that make up the graphic for this blog post show how many cybersec jobs are currently open versus those that are filled (left-hand side) and the ratio of filled to open (right-hand side). The overall ratio is just under 3 jobs filled for every job open, but I expect that ratio to keep shrinking as demand for skilled cybersec workers continues to grow.

 

3. There's also information regarding the top cybersecurity job titles, which include Cyber Security Engineer, Cyber Security Analyst, Network Engineer/Architect, Cyber Security Manager/Administrator, and Software Developer/Engineer as the Top 5.

 

4. The top "workforce framework category" openings include operate and maintain (183,482 openings); securely provision (172,732); protect and defend (112,552); analyze (110,073); oversee and govern (80,938); and collect and operate (45,129).

 

5. There's also some interesting certification data in there, too. CyberSeek lists Security+, CIPP (Certified Information Privacy Professional), GIAC (which covers a lot of ground), CISA, and CISM as its Top 5 credentials.

 

This information can provide readers interested in occupying or upgrading cybersecurity jobs with all kinds of guidance on what kinds of positions, certifications, and locales will offer them the biggest opportunities (and by extension, the best pay). Be sure to check it out if this means you!

 

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About the Author

Ed Tittel is a 30-plus-year computer industry veteran who's worked as a software developer, technical marketer, consultant, author, and researcher. Author of many books and articles, Ed also writes on certification topics for Tech Target, ComputerWorld and Win10.Guru. Check out his website at www.edtittel.com, where he also blogs daily on Windows 10 and 11 topics.