About Me

I’m an IT Support Engineer at a legal-tech AI company, where I’ve worked for 2+ years, and I hold a BSc in Computer Science from the University of Leeds (2:1) and CompTIA Security+.

But before any of that, I want to explain where my passion for cybersecurity came from, because it goes back a long way. It started with me being a script kiddie in my early teens, and grew into a real interest in securing things. First came my years of self-employment as an IT Technician, removing malware, advising customers on how to stay safe, and teaching family and friends to protect themselves online. These days it’s enterprise environments, where I’m involved in security and infrastructure projects. The more I did it, the more my interest grew.

How it started

It really began with The Code Book by Simon Singh. The codebreaking pulled me in, not just the secrets, but the idea that any system built to protect something can be picked apart by someone who looks closely enough. That same instinct turned into a lifelong love of problem-solving, the kind I still chase in games like Sudoku, The Witness, The Room. Then I picked up Ghost in the Wires by the legend Kevin Mitnick and watched Mr Robot and Snowden, and it clicked! That same pull, but aimed at real systems and real stakes. That was the moment I knew I wanted to build a career in cybersecurity. I set my goals, I knew exactly what I wanted, and I’ve been following that plan ever since.

University

I started with an access course in computing, finished it with a distinction, and went on to study Computer Science at university. Those years gave me a strong technical foundation. Solid programming skills and a deep understanding of how everything fits together, from operating systems and networks to distributed systems, robotics, and AI.

My favourite projects were the security-focused ones. I analysed a Java application for vulnerabilities and exploited them the way a real app pen tester would: I wrote a brute-force Python script that cracked the passwords, then fixed the flaw myself by adding lock-out mechanisms to the Java code. I also found SQL injection vulnerabilities and patched them using Java’s PreparedStatements.

Placement and dissertation

Before my final year, I spent an industrial placement year as an ICT Engineer at an aerospace engineering company. One of my projects was building a cybersecurity awareness training programme and running phishing simulations with Webroot. I also worked with NIST 800-171, reading through the company’s gap analysis and identifying ways to move closer to compliance, including rolling out a group policy that restricted USB access on work machines.

That passion carried into my dissertation, which I chose myself: a Django web application that teaches cybersecurity and online safety to children. It meant a lot of research into how children learn about security and how to design an interface that actually works for them.

Into IT

After university I went straight into IT, because I saw it as the key stepping stone into security. I wanted to be immersed in the systems companies actually run — there’s no better way to get hands-on with security baselines, endpoint hardening, and systems administration.

The job title “IT Support Engineer” is honestly a bit deceiving, because I do far more security work than people expect. My role covers a lot of ground: locking down SaaS apps and secure baselines, triaging Sophos EDR alerts, and implementing conditional access controls. It’s exposed me to so many areas of the business and turned out to be invaluable, and directly transferable to a SOC Analyst role, where a core part of the job is triaging alerts and classifying them as true or false positives.

Once I was doing all this security work day to day, I wanted to certify it, so I earned my CompTIA Security+. It filled in real gaps for me. I’d been doing a lot of the practical side without always understanding the why behind it, and Security+ brought that into focus. It helped everything make sense: why we rely on tools like SIEM, EDR, IPS/IDS, firewalls, and SASE, and how they fit together.

Now

These days I’m focused on homelabs, working through TryHackMe’s SOC Level 1 path, reading cybersecurity books, and writing up what I learn. I want to keep growing in this field and to share my work with the community along the way.