“I’m passionate about cybersecurity analysis and network security engineering. I learn new things every day.
Hilda Colon
Security Specialist, Accenture Federal Services
Kissimmee, FL, United States
Meet Hilda, CompTIA Security+ certified and certified in the National Security Agency’s (NSA’s) Information Security Assurance and Digital Forensics.
What motivated you to start a career in network security?
This changes because I’m not the type of person who wants to work on one thing for the rest of my life. I love that every minute of every day, somebody discovers a zero day attack or creates a new tool to facilitate the lives of people.
What was your path to your current position?
I remember during my college years one of my programming professors talking to me about changing my field of study from Electrical Engineer to Computer Engineer because he saw this amazing capacity in me to handle computers, programming, etc. I told him that I didn’t see myself in front of a computer all day. After I graduated one of my cousins saw my potential in the field and offered me an analyst position at his company. That is where my love for this amazing field began.
“This profession is so interesting to me because I’m not the type of person that wants to work on one thing for the rest of my life.
Why is network security important?
This field is very important since everything is evolving towards computers, cloud and people’s digital information (medical, government, corporate and financial records). Because of that, this field helps to protect organizations’ data assets from digital attacks that could damage the organization or individuals if placed in the wrong hands. In addition, this field is in high demand and the pay is very good.
What is a typical day as a network security engineer?
Monitoring logs, working with the clients troubleshooting internal issues, evaluating the tools based on the best practice procedures, performing configuration at the firewall, intrusion detection system (IDS), intrusion prevention system (IPS), anti-virus (AV), identity access management (IAM) etc.
What advice do you have for someone starting out in this field?
Work on getting as many certificates as you can, get your degrees and keep reading to keep up to date in this field because it changes from day to day.
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