CyberWire Daily - Michael Bishop Jr.: Good, bad or indifferent. [Security] [Career Notes]

Episode Date: January 11, 2025

Please enjoy this encore episode, where we are joined by Senior Security Officer at Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services Michael Bishop Jr. as he shares his journey from Army infantryman deployed to Iraq to working in cybersecurity. After 12 years in the U.S. Army, Mike found himself in a rough spot. Looking for work and having some personal challenges, Mike's mentor, an Army officer he met while enlisted, recognized Mike's struggles and helped to nudge him toward cybersecurity. Mike credits his mentor with helping him transition to where he is today. Undergoing training for cybersecurity, he was tested in many areas and found the route he wanted to go. We thank Michael for sharing his story with us. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

You're listening to the Cyber Wire Network, powered by N2K. and VPNs, yet breaches continue to rise by an 18% year-over-year increase in ransomware attacks and a $75 million record payout in 2024. These traditional security tools expand your attack surface with public-facing IPs that are exploited by bad actors more easily than ever with AI tools. It's time to rethink your security. Thank you. Learn more at zscaler.com slash security. My name is Mike Bishop, and I am a senior security officer at Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services in the high glass accounting sector. I am a army brat. You know, growing up watching my dad, I always wanted to be in the army. And then of course, my granddad was an army veteran as well. That's what I became when I graduated high school. I was in the Army for 12 years. Joined right out of high school. I literally graduated on a Friday.

And then that Monday, I was in basic training. I was an infantryman for at least 10 of the 12 years in which I deployed to Iraq in 2005 for a year. So that was an interesting time in my life. It kind of made me the person I am today, though. I don't fear as much as I might have when I was younger. I don't know. The people that I did get to meet, the younger kids, or even though we didn't always talk the same language,

we had an interpreter. You still got to meet other people in the villages. I'd buy Cokes or candy bars from the young kids. It was rough when I first got back. It was a rough time. I resorted to drinking a little bit and then eventually kind of sought help on it, so it kind of helped me out.

It's hard to explain you know I just it was rough for me when I initially came back and of course I went through a divorce too shortly after I came back so that didn't help you know that was a man that was a long time ago so I've grown because of all that experience. Though it was hard going through deploying and transitioning back, I've grown more of an appreciation for the world and the things that I do. So I try to make the best out of everything now. It took me over a year before I finally got a job. But in between that, I had a very good mentor that I had met in the military. He was an officer and I was one of his enlisted guys.

And we had a good relationship. I actually taught Army ROTC at Johns Hopkins with him. And he knew that I was kind of struggling after I got out. So he said, you need to look into doing cybersecurity. I was like, computers are cool, but I don't know. So through him being my mentor and just being a great guy, he pretty much got me into this cybersecurity training, or at least forced me to at least apply. So that kind of helped me to transition to where I am today. It was a challenge, but I saw it as a challenge that I wanted to take on and I wanted to be the best that I could at it.

So when I went to UMBC Training Center, they actually, since it was an intense program, they had us take like 11 different tests to judge us on if we're able to actually succeed in this course or have the ability to. And after I took it, I was like, man, I think I did horrible at these. I didn't even know what I was doing. And then, of course, they talked to me later and said, you actually did pretty well. The ones that you didn't do well on is kind of expected because you had no IT knowledge or any idea.

But the stuff that you really did do well on were impressed. So they accepted me into the course my advice is to figure out which route you want to go because you can get all the certifications you want if you don't know which route that really you want to go in so you got your security you got your help desk you got networking you got to figure out what you want to go in. So you got your security, you got your help desk, you got networking, you got to figure out what you want to do and then go for those certifications or in that route. CompTIA has a list if you want to go security,

which security plus, CYSA plus, you got to figure out which route you want to go. It's sometimes hard for me to describe it because I normally just tell them, hey, I create counts, reset passwords, and I make sure that people aren't supposed to get into the system that should get into it. The things that I've gone through, good, bad, or indifferent, have made me or gotten to me to where I am today. So I don't think I would change anything.

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