Eric Haupt

Welcome to another Sunday Musing Friends! I’m glad you’re here.

I’m excited to share a quick dose of what I’m exploring and thinking about. Please feel free to forward this along to friends.

Don’t Buy the Hype, Trust yourself, Do Your Research

I had a great opportunity this week to converse with an aspiring cyber officer. A colleague of mine referred him to me to get the “real” opinion on the profession, which branch was better, and whether to go offensive or defensive cyber.

I remember having the same questions, I remember my friends having the same questions, and now here I am, answering these questions. My advice to anyone in this field is: Don’t buy the hype (good and bad), trust your self and your passions, and do your research.

Don’t Buy the Hype

Electronic Warfare is hard, On Net Cyber is hard, Defensive Cyber is hard, Offensive Cyber is hard, DevOps is hard, AI is hard, so is ML, GANS, you get the point. They’re also fun, boring, exhausting, exhilarating, and rewarding. Anything we do in this field is going to be all of these things, especially crazy. The key is finding the crazy that benefits both you and your area of focus. Yes, both. Don’t be a parasite, don’t suffer a parasite. How will you know? Test the waters, don’t be afraid to F.A.I.L., and seek mentorship from those that you trust.

Really, Don’t buy the hype, Trust Yourself.

Many love to humble-brag about how hard and stressful their job is, how busy they are. Even more so in a new domain like cyber. This creates anxiety amongst applicants, students, and newly minted professionals. Trust that you’re good enough as long as you keep going forward and approach the new chapter of your life with the “I can do this” mindset instead of “Can I do this?” (It’s a simple word shuffle).

Do Your Research

Never in history has so much knowledge been as accessible as it is today. Degrees are becoming less important than abilities and skills. With resources like Udemy, Cybrary, Offensive Security, Hack the Box, Capture the Packet, YouTube and so many more, try out a skill you’re interested in, find your passion, and pursue it relentlessly. Try your skills out at a CTF event or just go to the event to learn and meet people.

Your leaders will see your passion and drive and find ways to underwrite your honest mistakes while resourcing your innovation and productivity. If you’re the leader; encourage these things, do these things. Be astounded at your people’s creativity and innovation.

Have an amazing week!

-e

What I’m Reading / Doing This Week - DNS Sinkhole

FBI Warning Us About Imposter Ads

The agency advises people to take action on online ads to prevent malign askers poisoning your search results. They’re advising, 1) Check your URLs before clicking (mouse over and look at the bottom of your browser) 2) Go to sites directly instead of clicking the link (type the address in your address bar) and 3) Us an ad blocker.

As I’m building out my new setup anyway, I’m going to reinvigorate one of my Rasberry Pi’s to implement a DNS Sinkhole. It’s pretty easy using things like AdGuard now a days and there are a ton of ways to do it. At the risk of sounding simplistic, it’s a better browser ad blocker because you just don’t see the ads… like… any of them. By being a “DNS” in between you and your DNS, it returns nonsense back to kill those pesky ads.

Why is it even better? You also can also throw in parental control and safe search settings. I’m not going to put a hard service recommendation out on the newsletter, but if you want one, just shoot me a message; knowledge is free.

If you implement it, I’d love to hear about your results!

Quote I’m Musing

“Waste no more time arguing what a good man should be. Be one.”

-Marcus Aurelius

I listen to the news on occasion to just hear about what’s going on; I’m not so much interested in the opinions behind the events. As I’ve removed myself more and more from the commentators and opinions of the news and only the actual events, this quote becomes louder and louder.

Whether it’s a President with classified documents, a congressperson fabricating their C.V. or members of a clergy abusing those in their trust. Don’t just focus on your own deeds over words, it implores us to be observant of our influences.

We don’t just have two ears, but two eyes to our one mouth. Observe people’s actions, their behavior as well as their spoken word. Just like earlier in this publication, trust yourself, do your research, and come up with your own thoughts and opinions based on what you value.

Recently, Robert Green said:

“Don’t listen at what people say. Don’t look at people’s appearances. Look at people’s actions, and the patterns of their behavior. For instance, I talk about Howard Hughes in [The Laws of Human Nature] as somebody who's got a very weak character, who was a horrific businessman. People were lured in by his image of this sort of maverick aviator, a great Hollywood person, et cetera. But if you looked at the patterns of his behavior, you would have seen that he was actually quite toxic. So stop looking at what people say about themselves. Look at their actions.”

Which musing is your favorite? What else do you want to see or what should I eliminate? Any other suggestions? Just send a tweet to @erichaupt on Twitter and put #SundayMusings at the end so I can find it. Or, eric@erichaupt.com for long form email.

Have a wonderful week, I’ll see you Sunday.
-e