This is my sixth year openly posting about my learning and training goals, though it feels like I skipped a year. Last year was not a productive year on the personal training front, so most of my items here are not really new. And I’m already about a half year late making a post like this, which means a few of these items might already be done or in flight.

So, what do I have in play this year? I’ve sort of skewed things a bit towards the blue team side of things last year, and that’s still the plan this year. I pride myself with having deep knowledge of red, blue, and forensics skills and I possess a strong belief that each plays and improves upon the others, whether in a team situation or as a long wolf.

Formal Training/Certifications

AWS Solutions Architect Associate certification renewal. I’ve done this once, so should be good to do again, but I’ll be consuming courses on Udemy and ACloudGuru in this pursuit. I truly thought about doing the Professional version of this, but I’d like more consistent hands-on AWS work before it.

AWS Security Specialty certification renewal. I’ve also done this once, and am not too worried about this one, but I do distinctly recall these questions were dense and tricky. As with SolArch, I’ll be using Udemy and ACloudGuru to prepare.

CISSP renewal. This is really about paying the fee, yet again. With all the other stuff I do, the CPE tanks are always full.

GIAC GCFA (FOR508) forensics certification renewal. This is also just paying the fee. But, I then need to carve some time out to go over the updated course materials and labs.

Antisyphon training courses. I’ve really liked the format of the BHIS/Antisyphon courses, and the cost as well. I plan to continue to take courses here as long as they have interesting topics offered. I’ve so far taken three, and while I’d just take them all if I could, here are some leading choices: Applied Purple Teaming (Ickler/Drysdale), Enterprise Attacker Emulation and C2 Implant Development (Thyer), Hacker Ops (May), and various others that tend to lean into Red Team stuff.

OffSec. A stretch goal. Since getting my OSCP some 5 years ago, I’ve wanted to get back and do some more of the advanced courses, labs, and subsequent certs that Offensive Security offers. I just haven’t done it yet. I likely won’t get to this in 2022, but I think in 2023 I want to look very hard at the annual subscription which opens up materials for all of OffSec’s certs.

Informal Training

BlueTeamLabs.online. BTLO is a sort of blue team themed lab and gamified ladder, much like HTB is for red team skills. The company behind this also offers courses for blue teamers, but I’m more interested in the labs to practice skills, learn new tools, and improve what I know through hands-on trial and error in a safe environment. This has exceeded my expectations so far, and I’ve even exceeded my own goals on the platform. I started out just wanting to learn some things and maybe make the top 100. Today, I’m trading off the global #1 spot with several others.

Practical Malware Analysis book and Reversing, debugging. Getting into and even successfully through the RE challenges on BTLO has whet my appetite for continuing down this path some more. I’ve long dabbled very lightly in reversing, debugging, and dissassembly, but never to a degree that makes me feel skilled at it. I’ve broken through some barriers while doing BTLO challenges, and I’m wanting to keep that ball rolling. I’d like to go through exercises in the Practical Malware Analysis and Malware Analysis Techniques books while also getting started in TryHackMe’s related areas. I also still have access to the Zero2Automated course set, but that seemed a bit beyond me when acquired a few years ago.

Microsoft Azure and M365 stuff. I namely want to just go through materials for AZ-900 & AZ-500, and then also MS-900 & MSSC-500 and other stuff in the SC-series. I don’t really plan to pursue any of the associated certifications, but I’m not entirely ruling it out, either. This is mostly to get more exposed and build foundations in Azure and M365 offerings as they become more and more ubiquitous in the enterprise. Very similar to picking up AWS skills a few years ago. Also plan to learn more about Azure Sentinel.

Splunk Learning. I use Splunk at work, and I’ve long put off the more formal courses. Splunk has recently re-organized their certification and learning offerings, and while I can’t say I think they’re good changes, I still want to plug through the material at some point. Much like MS stuff, I don’t necessarily plan to do the certifications. These courses are definitely only worth it if the business or Splunk credits pay for them. It’s otherwise better to just sign up for Boss of the SOC (BOTS) (free!) on a regular basis to gain some hands-on experience.

TryHackMe (THM). I’ve only briefly used this platform once, and just have not made the time or effort to get back here. I think now might be the time. I’ve almost fully completed BTLO, I don’t really want to go back to HTB yet, I’ve gotten up to where I want to be on PentesterLab. And THM is just a blank spot for me that I shouldn’t have let go so long.

PentesterLab. I still have a sub to this lab site, and while I’m mostly caught up on what I want, they still push out content enough to keep me coming back, particularly on the Code Review badge lately.

C2 & Attacker Emulation. Last year I took a course in using various C2 platforms, but didn’t feel like I got quite enough out of it on the first run. I’d like to wield my home lab a bit further and try more C2 platforms out and just gain more familiarity. If I achieve other things before the end of the year, this could be a nice break before 2023 activities.

Gentle Career Aspirations

I don’t normally do this, as I don’t want to suggest to potential employers that these are the only things I want to do, but it’s good to at least tell myself these things in case career opportunities land in my lap. But, in a way, doing these for work in the next few years would probably make me a happy employee (not that I’m not happy now, but it’d be exciting to look forward to and then learn and do):

• pentesting, red teaming, purple teaming…even just testing new exploit POCs
• C2 and attacker emulation to test and improve controls, both technical and response
• web app testing and other application/development security
• architect-level planning and design and advisement, configuration hardening
• ever-increasing hands-on in AWS and Azure/M365