Current State of and The Future of Cybersecurity Positions

 According to this article it seems that there is a large slowdown in the hiring efforts of many companies as it pertains to filling their cybersecurity teams. As someone who is currently a student for that very field and is looking at being in the job market in just a couple more years, this is certainly concerning. Stories of understaffing, low-moral, long hours, and potential burnout seem to be the reality of many professionals in the field at the moment as well. However, there might be a silver lining here.

It likely comes as no surprise that the use of AI is being cited as one avenue to improving the lives of many security professionals. Per the article, 45% of teams were currently using AI in their tools already and here is what was cited as the primary use-cases:

"Augmenting common operational tasks (56%)

Speeding up report writing and incident reporting (49%)

Simplifying threat intelligence (47%)

Accelerating threat hunting (43%)

Improving policy simulations (41%)"

Hopefully this means that a reprieve is coming over the next couple of years for those of you who are currently working in the field, though I also hope this doesn't create more challenges for those of us that are trying to break into the field too. The potential for automation is always concerning when looking at the skillset of many "entry-level" types of employees as it could be possible to all but eliminate some of those positions if the tools available can already do it well enough.

With that being said though, the article closed with one last note that left me with some hope for the future of the job market that I'll eventually be going into. The uncertain future of AI in the cybersecurity landscape is causing employers who are still hiring to focus more on transferable skills and not specialized skills, things such as strong problem-solving skills being one thing that was noted. 

Maybe the lessened focus on specific skills will bode well for fresh grads in the future, who knows?

Source Article: Cybersecurity Job Market Stagnates, Dissatisfaction Abounds

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