Giulia Traverso

PhD- Senior Consultant Cybersecurity, EY

How do you become a “cybersecurity expert”? The journey that would lead me into working in this field started more than fifteen years ago, when nobody was taking about cybersecurity. I wasn’t aware of it either. I stumbled upon cybersecurity by chance.

My journey began fifteen years ago when, after middle school, I had to choose what type of high school to attend. A school with a strong scientific or technical background, you might think. Well, no. Unbelievable as it may sound, I opted for the so-called “Classic Lyceum”. In Italy, where I was raised, a Classic Lyceum is a high school with a strong focus on literature, ancient Greek, Latin, philosophy and history, and only five hours per week of mathematics, physics and science. After completing my five year stint at the school I knew that “cryptography” came from the Greek root “crypt-”, which means to hide, and that “cybersecurity” came from the Greek root “cyber-“, which means to govern, to pilot. At age nineteen, that was all I knew about cybersecurity.

My journey towards my current field of expertise started slowly and unconsciously when I decided to enrol for a bachelor’s degree in mathematics at the university. At least I was in the STEM field and one of the (supposedly) few women in STEM. In fact, half the students in the mathematics faculty were women. My interest started to shift to cybersecurity when I decided to study for a master’s degree in mathematics for cryptography.

Studying for my bachelor’s degree I had found subjects like number theory, finite fields, and algebra very interesting. Those are the mathematical foundations of cryptography, the core (and the best part!) of cybersecurity, the technology that protects our secrets and communications in our daily life.

By becoming a cryptographer I (finally) officially became part of the cybersecurity workforce. However, this took a few more years. After my master’s degree, I did not feel ready for a job in the industry. I wanted to explore cryptography more deeply, and contribute to it. So I decided to do a PhD in cryptography.

Armed with a PhD I had two main options to become part of the cybersecurity workforce: pursue a career in academia and become a professor or move into the industry. Those who decide to stay in academia are at the forefront of innovation. They are the folks inventing new primitives, proving the security of these, and equipping them with more and more desirable and sophisticated features. Those who move into the industry implement cryptography in to protect real data and processes.

I belong to the latter group. After my PhD, I joined a cybersecurity startup to manage its R&D projects, adding security to embedded technologies, such as IoT and AI. At the time of writing, I am about to join a Big Four consulting firm where I will be dealing with compliance to cybersecurity standards and regulations for major banks and insurance companies.

My career path shows there are many ways to becoming a cybersecurity expert. So I hope I’ve shown you there is much more to working in cybersecurity than hacking and programming all day long. There are theoretical and strategic roles.

Cybersecurity is a discipline where knowledge and competence count for more than degrees and certificates, and where career progression is not closely tied to specific study paths. Therefore, if you’re passionate about cybersecurity or simply interested in it, please just go for it! Study on your own, take online classes, read books, ask people on LinkedIn. A career in cybersecurity is closer than you can imagine.

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