2018-10-12 -  I recently dipped my toe into the world of SQL for the first time and got my head around the basic operators and statements. Here’s a summary of how to construct basic queries. I’d had brushes with SQL before. Even when I was a journalist, I would do the occasional...

2018-10-05 -  I had a week off recently, so for a bit of fun I embarked on my most ambitious and most complex Python project yet: to scientifically (kind of) predict the outcome of the 2018/19 Premier League season based on the results so far. Those who are particularly fond of buzzwords...

2018-09-22 -  This week I was at SANS London learning about forensics. I’ll post a proper writeup on the the course a bit later (it didn’t actually finish until this afternoon), but I thought I’d attend one of the SANS evening talks to learn something new and flex my rarely-used journalistic muscle....

2018-09-14 -  The bulk of cyber security incidents are fairly simple, but sometimes you end up working with a whole network of hosts that are connected to each other in different ways. With this scenario in mind, I recently set out to explore the possibility of creating a Python script to automatically...

2018-09-07 -  A colleague recently asked me for my advice for new cyber security consultants joining our company, which got me thinking about what I’ve learnt over my first year in the industry. Here are my seven top tips for those just entering the world of security consulting. 1. Get involved with...

2018-08-24 -  A little while ago I wrote about grouping data by multiple fields in Splunk, which is a very useful function that produces hideous export files. I took some time to write a Python script to fix that and make the data a lot more useful for further analysis. For reference,...

2018-08-10 -  It only took me half a year since its UK release, but I’ve finally finished reading InfoSec Rock Star, a book written by one of my old SANS instructors that touches on everything from dress codes to negotiation tactics for cyber security professionals. Disclaimer: Just so you’re aware before you read...

2018-07-22 -  Splunk is a powerful tool, but with so many available functions and hit-and-miss coverage on forums it can sometimes take some trial and error to get queries right. Here’s what I pieced together to perform a count on a subset of events and group the data by two fields… As...

2018-07-13 -  I had big expectations for Muse: Drones World Tour after 2013’s excellent Live at Rome Olympic Stadium. I wasn’t expecting a Hullabaloo beater, but I would have been happy with a solid rendition of the album’s tracks and older singles against the unique backdrop of the arena tour’s “in the round” setup and 360-degree Drones-themed experience....

2018-06-23 -  We all use passwords every day, but how exactly do they work? It would be easy to assume that the services we use all hold huge databases with our usernames and passwords side by side, but the reality is much more interesting – and, of course, much more secure. It’s...