Phase 1 — Foundations (3–6 months)
Linux, OS basics, programming fundamentals, networking concepts. Build the ground floor every security expert stands on.
Phase 2 — Networking & Protocols (2–4 months)
TCP/IP, OSI model, DNS, HTTP, firewalls, VPNs. You can't secure what you don't understand.
Phase 3 — Security Core (3–5 months)
CIA triad, cryptography, authentication, risk management, OWASP Top 10, incident basics.
Phase 4 — Offensive Security / Red Team (4–8 months)
Ethical hacking, penetration testing, exploitation, web app attacks, post-exploitation.
Phase 5 — Defensive Security / Blue Team (3–6 months)
SIEM, SOC operations, threat hunting, IDS/IPS, forensics, malware analysis.
Phase 6 — Specialization & Advanced (Ongoing)
Cloud security, malware reverse engineering, exploit dev, threat intel, GRC, AI/ML security.
Phase 1: IT Foundations
Master the fundamentals that underpin all cybersecurity knowledge. No shortcuts here — these skills are used every single day.
- File system navigation (ls, cd, mkdir, rm, chmod)
- Process management (ps, kill, top, htop)
- User & permission management
- Shell scripting (bash basics)
- Package management (apt, yum, pacman)
- SSH, SCP, rsync remote access
- Log reading (/var/log/, journalctl)
- Cron jobs and automation
- Windows Registry, Event Viewer, Task Manager
- Active Directory basics
- Windows Defender, Group Policy
- macOS security features & SIP
- Virtualization (VirtualBox, VMware)
- Containerization basics (Docker)
- Boot process & kernel concepts
- Python: variables, loops, functions, files
- Python: requests, socket, subprocess libraries
- Bash scripting for automation
- PowerShell for Windows administration
- Regular expressions (regex)
- Basic HTML/CSS/JavaScript (for web security)
- Reading/writing JSON, XML, CSV
- Git version control basics
- SQL queries: SELECT, INSERT, UPDATE, DELETE
- Database schemas and relationships
- SQL injection concepts (attacker perspective)
- MySQL, PostgreSQL, SQLite basics
- NoSQL: MongoDB basics
- Database authentication & access control
Phase 2: Networking & Protocols
Deep dive into how networks work — from physical cables to application-layer protocols. Security runs on networks.
- 7 OSI layers & what happens at each
- TCP/IP 4-layer model (Internet model)
- Encapsulation & decapsulation
- IP addressing: IPv4 / IPv6 subnetting
- MAC addresses & ARP
- CIDR notation & subnet masks
- VLSM (Variable Length Subnet Masking)
- HTTP/HTTPS — how web traffic works
- DNS — name resolution, zone records
- DHCP — IP address assignment
- FTP / SFTP / FTPS differences
- SMTP, POP3, IMAP — email protocols
- SSH vs Telnet security comparison
- SNMP, NTP, ICMP
- TLS/SSL handshake process
- Stateful vs stateless firewalls
- Next-Generation Firewalls (NGFW)
- VPN types: IPSec, SSL/TLS, WireGuard
- Network Address Translation (NAT)
- Port forwarding & DMZ configuration
- Network segmentation & VLANs
- Proxy servers (forward & reverse)
- Load balancers & WAF basics
- Wireshark: capture filters & display filters
- Reading TCP handshakes & teardowns
- Identifying malicious traffic patterns
- tcpdump command-line packet capture
- TLS decryption with pre-master keys
- Traffic baselining & anomaly detection
- Zeek (formerly Bro) network analysis
Phase 3: Security Fundamentals
CIA triad, cryptography, access control, risk management, and the security frameworks that govern the industry.
- Symmetric encryption: AES, DES, 3DES
- Asymmetric encryption: RSA, ECC, Diffie-Hellman
- Hashing: MD5, SHA-1, SHA-256, bcrypt
- Digital signatures & certificates
- PKI (Public Key Infrastructure)
- Certificate Authorities (CA)
- TLS/SSL certificate chain of trust
- Steganography basics
- A01: Broken Access Control
- A02: Cryptographic Failures
- A03: Injection (SQLi, XSS, etc.)
- A04: Insecure Design
- A05: Security Misconfiguration
- A06: Vulnerable Components
- A07: Auth & Session Failures
- A08–A10: SSRF, Logging failures
- CIA Triad: Confidentiality, Integrity, Availability
- Risk assessment methodologies
- NIST Cybersecurity Framework
- ISO 27001/27002 overview
- GDPR, HIPAA, PCI-DSS basics
- Security policies & procedures
- Business continuity & disaster recovery
- Security awareness training
- IR phases: Prepare → Identify → Contain → Eradicate → Recover → Lessons
- Creating incident response plans
- Evidence collection & chain of custody
- Triage and severity classification
- Communication during incidents
- Tabletop exercises
Phase 4: Offensive Security / Red Team
Think like an attacker to defend better. Ethical hacking, penetration testing, exploitation techniques, and post-exploitation.
- Passive recon: WHOIS, Shodan, Censys
- Google dorks & advanced search operators
- LinkedIn OSINT, social engineering recon
- theHarvester: email & subdomain gathering
- Maltego: graphical link analysis
- Recon-ng automated framework
- Subdomain enumeration (subfinder, amass)
- DNS enumeration (dnsx, dnsenum)
- Nmap: port scanning, service detection, OS fingerprinting
- Nmap scripting engine (NSE scripts)
- Masscan for fast large-scale scanning
- Nikto: web server vulnerability scanner
- Gobuster / ffuf directory brute forcing
- SMB enumeration (enum4linux, smbclient)
- SNMP enumeration
- Banner grabbing & service fingerprinting
- Metasploit Framework: modules, payloads, sessions
- Manual exploit adaptation from PoCs
- SQLmap automated SQL injection
- Buffer overflow exploitation (x86/x64)
- Password attacks: Hydra, Medusa, John, Hashcat
- Exploit-DB / SearchSploit usage
- CVE understanding & CVSS scoring
- Zero-day research introduction
- Burp Suite: intercept, repeater, intruder, scanner
- SQL Injection: manual & blind techniques
- XSS: reflected, stored, DOM-based
- CSRF, SSRF, XXE attacks
- Authentication bypass techniques
- IDOR & access control testing
- File upload vulnerabilities
- JWT manipulation & attacks
- Privilege escalation: Linux & Windows
- Credential dumping (Mimikatz)
- Lateral movement techniques
- Persistence mechanisms
- Data exfiltration methods
- Covering tracks & log manipulation
- Active Directory attacks (Kerberoasting, Pass-the-Hash)
- BloodHound AD attack path analysis
- Executive summary writing
- Technical report structure
- Risk rating (CVSS, DREAD)
- Proof-of-concept screenshots & evidence
- Remediation recommendations
- Scope & rules of engagement
- PTES (Pen Test Execution Standard)
Phase 5: Defensive Security / Blue Team
Monitor threats, hunt attackers, analyze malware, and respond to incidents. The guardians of the enterprise.
- Splunk: SPL queries, dashboards, alerts
- Elastic Stack (ELK): Kibana, Logstash, Beats
- Microsoft Sentinel (cloud SIEM)
- Log types: Windows Event, Syslog, auth.log
- Correlation rules & detection logic
- Alert tuning & reducing false positives
- SIEM architecture & data sources
- Hypothesis-driven hunting methodology
- MITRE ATT&CK framework usage
- Hunting for LOLBins (Living off the Land)
- Detecting lateral movement in logs
- Behavioral analytics & UEBA
- Sigma rules for detection engineering
- YARA rules for malware hunting
- Threat intelligence integration
- Static analysis: strings, file headers, imports
- Dynamic analysis: sandbox execution
- ANY.RUN, Cuckoo Sandbox, VirusTotal
- IDA Pro / Ghidra for reverse engineering
- x64dbg / OllyDbg debugging
- PE file format analysis
- Obfuscation & packing detection
- Malware family identification
- Disk imaging (dd, FTK Imager)
- File system forensics (NTFS, ext4)
- Memory forensics (Volatility)
- Autopsy for case management
- Registry analysis (RegRipper)
- Browser & email artifact recovery
- Deleted file recovery
- Chain of custody documentation
Phase 6: Specialization & Advanced
Choose your domain. Cloud security, exploit development, threat intelligence, AI security, or leadership. This is where careers diverge.
- AWS IAM: roles, policies, least privilege
- S3 bucket security & encryption
- VPC, security groups, NACLs
- CloudTrail, GuardDuty, Security Hub
- Azure Active Directory & Conditional Access
- Cloud misconfigurations (ScoutSuite, Prowler)
- Container security (Kubernetes, Docker)
- Serverless & microservices security
- x86/x64 assembly language
- Stack-based buffer overflows
- Heap exploitation techniques
- ROP chains (Return-Oriented Programming)
- Format string vulnerabilities
- Bypassing ASLR, DEP, stack canaries
- Windows kernel exploitation
- Fuzzing with AFL++, libFuzzer
- Threat actor profiling & TTPs
- MITRE ATT&CK for CTI
- STIX/TAXII for sharing intel
- OpenCTI, MISP platforms
- Dark web monitoring
- Diamond Model of Intrusion Analysis
- Cyber Kill Chain methodology
- Intelligence production & dissemination
- Adversarial ML attacks
- Model poisoning & data poisoning
- Prompt injection in LLMs
- AI-powered threat detection
- Deepfake detection methods
- Securing ML pipelines
- AI governance & ethics in security
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