Cyber security encompasses a wide range of disciplines, but its relative youth means it lacks the coherence you find in the more mature STEM fields.
What are we doing about this? A project called the Cyber Security Body of Knowledge has been set up with the long-term aim of contributing to the development of the cyber security profession. The project’s purpose is to codify the cyber security knowledge which underpins the profession. Apart from giving structure to the core knowledge, topics and reference texts, the project – which is scheduled to run to July 2019 – will enable the UK to focus learning pathways, professional development and careers information.
In February we appointed an excellent academic consortium* to start work on compiling a comprehensive Cyber Security Body of Knowledge, or CyBOK as we’ve come to call it. The CyBOK is at the scoping phase and the consortium is undertaking a broad community engagement within the UK and internationally. Workshops have been arranged across the country. There is also an online consultation which is now open.
This really is an exciting opportunity to get involved in an important initiative for the cyber security profession, so please take the time to contribute. The closing date for the survey is 31 July 2017.
The scoping work will result in the identification of Knowledge Areas (KAs) which will be successively developed and refined over the remainder of the project. Each KA is likely to be assigned an author from the international community, and as the KAs are developed they will be available for public review and comment on the project’s website. We expect the first KA descriptions to appear around the beginning of next year.
Once this scoping phase is completed we will have more to tell you, but in the meantime keep an eye on the CyBOK project website for the latest updates.
* The consortium team is Prof Awais Rashid (Principal Investigator, Lancaster), Prof George Danezis (UCL), Prof Andrew Martin (Oxford), Dr Howard Chivers (York), Prof Emil Lupu (Imperial) and Yvonne Rigby (Project Manager, Lancaster).
Chris Ensor
Deputy Director Cyber Skills & Growth
Source: National Cyber Security Centre
