I first heard about the training, from someone who is well-known in the security community, and also whom I have a close friendship lasting for years. He told me about a wide-ranged training program that has never been seen or done before, lasting for 10 weeks and containing cyber-struggle, the pen test, psychological operations, reverse engineering and more… I applied for it the moment I heard, because, like the most people who started these jobs, in the past, I have also attended the pen test training in the market and entered an intensive training program in one week. However, here there was a well-disciplined, 10-week-long training that covers all the topics in its field. Actually, there was not much to think about. After my registry was completed, those who registered before me have already started program manager’s homework, formed a communication network between themselves and started information exchange.

I adapted the team in a little while and begin the studies. I will not talk about the training week by week. Generally, I will talk about the factors that influenced me the most and contributed me. During the training, what program manager has emphasized the most was to be a team. Because we have to work as a team within all domains of the sector. The success of the work, sharing tasks that have to be done, information Exchange, they all depend on the team spirit. If we become a team, we will succeed together; if not, we will go down together. If we leave one person behind, the whole team would fall behind. With this in our minds, we tried to get through 10 weeks. It is open to discussion whether we succeeded or not, but we have done what we could.

Working in the sector, we have to show tolerance towards a lot of people, both our co-workers and those who we give service to. In this training, we gained this important experience, that perhaps could have been acquired through years, with retired special forces. We faced a lot of adversities as well as our taboos and phobias. Sometimes we succeeded, at other times we failed but we have endeavored to succeed. Mentioning the training given by the retired special forces, it would be lacking just to talk about tolerance against challenges; at the same time we struggled through all kinds of friction, lived the spirit of being a team, helped each other, pushed the limits and, the best one according to me, got to know and worked with soldiers who have accomplished so much. Living the frictions which you might make encounter within the unconventional flow of the process of cybersecurity that is an indirect attitude to our works with retired special forces was another extraordinary experience.

I would like to make a comparison if I had to mention the technical parts of the training. Like I have mentioned on top, there are multiple cybersecurity courses and almost all of them are ongoing for  1 weekday on an average. At these courses, main methods of attacking and fundamental tools being used on the market are being told and rest is completely up to your willingness to self improve and your researches. However, we have learned all of the attack techniques, every tool and every program that we had seen in this training program profoundly. Program Manager is a guy who loves to lay the foundation steady as I know him and during the training he gave his best to as always, these assignments that we have done as a team, helping each other did contribute a lot.

All of these assignments were not technical, some of them were to increase our character development, some of them were to help us learn to organize our plans, and some were the kind of assignments increasing your attention. We have seen the benefits of these all and I believe we will be benefiting them again. During our studies, we did study entirely applicable practices. Without being buried under theories, we have directly seen the application of every theoretical information that we treated. Without further ado, let’s get down to hell week… Sleeplessness, a lot of smoking and hours passing by without standing up… but The sat application that passed at my home with my friends, during which we supported each other and in the end an experience that we won’t ever forget. It was hard but beautiful. I think within these 10 weeks, I have gained years of worth experience. I am certain that things I learned here will not only affect my professional life but it will affect my social life positively too… There are a lot of people that have question marks in their minds in the security sector.

Things that I mentioned above had probably indicated how original and necessary the training is. In these days which the cybersecurity and national security are intertwined, it is absolutely necessary that training like this reach their needed positions. Cybersecurity is not just about engineering, software or hardware domains but it is also in touch with social sciences. That is why it grew into a field that affects national security. The last thing I am going to say regarding the training is,  there are a limited amount of countries giving that kind of training, and when we look at it, those are the countries that dominate the sector of information technologies and cybersecurity. Being one of the first countries conceiving the cybersecurity strategy in the world, the necessity of training like this is a crystal clear fact.