Syllabus

• Week 1

  Foundations of Cybersecurity

  • Lesson 1: Course Introduction

    This introduction outlines course goals, key topics, and the importance of cybersecurity today. It prepares you with a roadmap for building essential skills in cybersecurity operations.

  • Lesson 2: Introduction to Cybersecurity

    This lesson introduces cybersecurity basics - its definition, importance, and core principles. It highlights how organisations use these practices to protect assets, build trust, and ensure business continuity.

  • Lesson 3: Cybersecurity Landscape and Domains

    This lesson explains cybersecurity’s organisational structure, key domains, and attack surfaces. You’ll also explore critical assets and frameworks like NIST and MITRE that guide security decisions.

  • Lesson 4: The Human Element and Operations

    This lesson explores the human side of cybersecurity, covering key roles and teams, the importance of awareness, and how AI helps address the global skills gap in protecting digital assets.

• Week 2

  Securing Identities and Access

  • Lesson 5: Identity and Access Management Fundamentals

    This lesson introduces Identity and Access Management (IAM) fundamentals, covering the Four A’s, access control models, and the principle of least privilege to reduce risks and secure user access.

  • Lesson 6: Modern Authentication and Trust Models

    This lesson explores modern authentication, comparing single vs. multi-factor, introducing passwordless FIDO passkeys, and explaining Zero Trust principles to strengthen identity security.

  • Lesson 7: Managing Privileged Access and Secrets

    This lesson introduces Privileged Access Management (PAM), explains the importance of securing IT secrets like passwords and keys, and explores best practices for secrets management to ensure compliance.

• Week 3

  Understanding and Mitigating Threats

  • Lesson 8: Attacker Landscape and Motivations

    This lesson explores cyber threats, hacker types and motives, the Cyber Kill Chain, and common tactics. It builds a foundation to help you anticipate, recognise, and defend against attacks.

  • Lesson 9: Human-Centric Threats

    This lesson examines social engineering, phishing, and deepfakes. You’ll learn how attackers exploit human psychology and AI tools to create convincing scams that bypass traditional defences.

  • Lesson 10: Software and Web-Based Threats

    This lesson introduces malware types and analysis basics, common web vulnerabilities like XSS and SQLi, and core cryptographic principles including encryption and digital certificates for secure communication.

• Week 4

  Security Operations Center (SOC) & Practical Aspects

  • Lesson 11: Introduction to Security Operations Centers (SOCs)

    This lesson introduces Security Operations Centres (SOCs) as the hub for monitoring, detection, and response, highlighting key roles like analysts, responders, and managers in defending organisations.

  • Lesson 12: SOC Technologies and Capabilities

    This lesson covers SOC technologies including SIEM, XDR, SOAR, and AI. Learn how these tools integrate to improve detection, speed response, and reduce manual workload through automation.

  • Lesson 13: SOC Operations: Practical Point of View

    This lesson explains SOC incident response phases from detection to recovery. Learn best practices for coordination, tools, communication, and readiness to reduce breach impact.

  • Lesson 14: Course Conclusion

    This lesson wraps up the course by summarising key learnings and reinforcing core concepts. It highlights how to apply cybersecurity principles and prepares you to continue growing in the field.

Who will you learn with?