BBC

Meet the apprentice fighting Cybercrime at the BBC


The BBC and its 120-strong IT workforce has, for the first time, enrolled new recruits like Abraham Gordon, Cyber Security Analyst, onto Firebrand Apprenticeship programmes to ensure they are protecting themselves against cyber-crime fast.

Hired in September 2017 within the BBC’s growing Cyber Security team, Abraham is currently enrolled on a Cyber Intrusion Analyst Apprenticeship with Firebrand. We caught up with Abraham and found out how the first four months of his Apprenticeship — and life, working for the world’s largest broadcaster — are going.

“I’ve been able to develop at a very proud rate here at the BBC through several reasons, the main one being the care and consideration of my personal and professional development shown by colleagues and senior managers. For example, my colleagues within SOC often ask me if I have done “X” task before or if I’m interested in learning about it. They then take their time in educating me, ensuring I understand in full and then often assign a task to prove I understand in full: very impressive commitment by the team. Managers also present opportunities for me to get involved within Information Security and within the wider organisation.

“For example, I have been able to get involved in Information Security by working on dedicated projects that will provide intelligence for the SOC and reviewing automated alerts, improving them in the process. In the wider organisation, I have got involved in a project that will improve BBC Bitesize in the near future; I have also got involved in outreach community projects that are not necessary Cyber-Security-based.

“Since being here at the BBC, I've become a certified power user in our [Security Information and Event Management] tool, certified Wireshark user, learned the basics of Dev, Pascal, Python, and HTML, and also completed some basic Forensics Investigations. Colleagues have also taken time to do 1-to-1 teaching of modules such as Cryptography, DNS, and Network Administration. All the mentioned has been completed within three months of working at the BBC and mainly been taught by either independent learning or via colleagues!

“I’ve also been granted a lot more responsibilities due to learning and proving my ability at a very proud rate, therefore gaining trust from other members of staff. I have been tasked with projects to help improve our proficiency and recently completed my first that is now being used as a tool internally. The next task is in process and aim to be completed by February 2018.”

Abraham is also an active STEM ambassador for the BBC, travelling to schools and colleges across the UK to promote STEM as a subject and Apprenticeships as a career choice. He completed his apprenticeship in December 2018.

During his 16-month Level 4 Cyber Intrusion Analyst Apprenticeship, Abraham took several Firebrand accelerated courses, including:


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