Do you Need to be Great at Math to Start a Career In Cybersecurity?

Do you really need to be great at Math to have a career in CyberSecurity? Find out more in this YouTube video from CyberSecurity Engineer - Grant Collins.

Watch the Video

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I7s5VB5VPxg&ab_channel=GrantCollins

Read the Video Transcript

00:00

all right so do you know how to solve

00:02

this complex equation right here because

00:04

i surely do not know

00:06

what the heck is in front of me and

00:09

that's the topic of today's video

00:13

[Music]

00:14

all right so do you need math in cyber

00:17

security no you don't need it i will be

00:19

talking about why you don't need it when

00:21

you may need it and

00:23

well my overall synopsis of if you need

00:26

math in cyber security

00:31

all right so from the industry

00:32

perspective math isn't necessarily

00:35

something you need to know the ins and

00:37

outs of

00:38

right it's more so hands-on practical

00:41

application of technologies and tools

00:43

and concepts and all were of these words

00:46

but you get what i'm saying you really

00:48

don't need math in industry all right so

00:51

i went on indeed and as you can see if

00:54

we take a look at the job

00:55

responsibilities

00:57

well the majority are not going to have

00:59

anything to do related or with math at

01:02

all in terms of getting into the field

01:05

of cyber you really don't need it you

01:07

know you can take a look at any of job

01:09

description

01:10

and a lot of them are not asking for

01:12

well cyber security math so there is at

01:15

times areas where actually you may need

01:17

to know math and let me go ahead and

01:19

elaborate just a little bit more on what

01:21

i mean there

01:24

when i was a freshman entering into

01:26

university and cyber security there were

01:29

a few classes i had to take before

01:32

entering into my cybersecurity major

01:34

classes and those included math classes

01:38

so in this case there are areas where

01:41

you may need to have

01:43

some level of understanding with math

01:46

and that includes if you're going to go

01:47

out and get a university degree

01:50

in cybersecurity typically a bachelor's

01:52

of science they're going to require you

01:54

to take

01:55

maybe two three four classes

01:58

of math in order to get into you know

02:00

the cybersecurity program it's all just

02:02

basically a filtering system in my

02:04

opinion trying to

02:06

weed out students because it really

02:08

isn't necessary once you enter into the

02:11

industry now there is one particular

02:13

area in cyber security where you would

02:16

need to have a strong foundation and

02:18

understanding

02:19

of math and that is mathematical

02:22

cryptography so cryptography ultimately

02:24

comes down to sending and receiving

02:27

messages securely to you know authorized

02:31

parties in a very basic sense but

02:33

mathematical cryptography has

02:36

well let's just say at a high level

02:38

a lot of

02:40

working components

02:41

that you have to be mindful of when

02:44

creating a secure messaging system there

02:46

is a lot of

02:48

complex math and probability that goes

02:51

into it if you want to be a

02:53

cryptographer maybe work for a

02:56

government agency such as the nsa in the

02:59

united states or you want to be some

03:01

sort of cyber security researcher who

03:03

either is trying to

03:05

crack the algorithms crypto analysis or

03:08

you're trying to develop more secure

03:10

algorithms

03:11

that's an area of math where you would

03:14

need to know and be familiar with

03:17

in cyber security but

03:19

ultimately if you don't want to do that

03:21

you really don't need to know the ins

03:23

and outs of cryptography you just need

03:25

to know the secure algorithms to use one

03:28

other level of math you may need to know

03:31

is if you're going to get into the

03:32

programming side of the security

03:34

industry whether that's creating cyber

03:36

security software or you're being a

03:40

secure software developer looking to

03:42

implement more secure code you may need

03:45

to know the foundations of building an

03:48

algorithm for an example which i don't

03:50

even know how to do myself so that is

03:53

something you may need to keep in mind

03:54

if you want to be

03:56

a programmer

03:57

that would be an area where you may need

03:59

to know

04:00

some level of math all right so it's

04:03

been a short video once again i wanted

04:06

to do an update on this video i created

04:08

this video three years ago and i just

04:10

thought i would go ahead and

04:12

provide a quick update on my thoughts

04:15

with cyber security and math you don't

04:17

need it

04:18

really but sorta hopefully this video

04:21

has been somewhat useful in your process

04:24

of getting into cyber security and yeah

04:27

until the next one have a good day