Need help advice in certification.

[Jazzmaster]

Hi, its been a long time since I last visited AntiOnline, but I hope I'll come here more often in the close future ;)

Anyway, I have this situation. I work as a techsupport in a local ISP. The work is pretty easy for me... but I would rather say TOO easy. Until recently the job suited me quite well... it allowed for a lot of free time to study, meet up with friends.. you know ;) the usual stuff... Anyway, recently I finally layed my hands on MCP certificate... after a year since I passed the exam.. lol.
I decided that this job is not for me anymore. I plan to put some effort into certification from Microsoft and Cisco now. I have passed the exam for the first course of CCNA (at least thats how it went in my University). I'd like to ask for some advice, which certifications I should invest into? It has come to my mind that I am more interested in network security and programming. At least thats the kind of technical literature I like to read most.
Back to the point :) Sorry for the long prelude...
The question is: what certifications should I get first if I am into network security and progamming? There are loads of them out there, so I will gladly accept any piece of advice you can give.

Thanks in advance.

Yours truly. Jazz

P.S. - Sorry for my english, any misspelling or grammar mistakes;)) I didn't have much practice lately, I hope to make up for that in the close future.

[kryptonic]

check your local community college for certs. I start at one on monday to become a networking systems tech.

[Jazzmaster]

You didnt quite understand the question :) I know WHERE to get certificates. The thing is, I asked for advice as to WHICH certificates to get, and in what order... I plan to get CCNA, MCSA, eventually MCSE and CCNP. What else?

[zENGER]

Thats almost like asking what should I buy at the store if I want to make dinner, but you don't offer up what it is you want to cook.

There are many many many routes you can take in the IT/IS field. With these different routes there are different education paths. Even inside of just the network security portion there are many paths. You should decide what it is that you want to do in the end, and then find the certs/education that lead you down that road.

For instance, SANS offers a very wide variety of security courses. These range from securing windows to auditing networks to finding unknown vulnerabilities. Each of these is very interesting but might not necessarily be something that is needed if you were say, a unix systems administrator.

With that, I can offer up a list of some certifications and education that are available and you can research those to possibly determine something that interests you. If you find that topic that you want to expand on, then maybe we can give you some more decisive certs to go after.

CISSP - Very all around security cert (requires 4 years exp)
IAM/IEM - auditing methodolies (requires 4 or 5 exp, I can't remember)
Security+ - all around security cert but is more of an entry level
SANS courses - Track courses that focus on different parts of security
CISA - Auditor course
CISM - Security manager course
Cisco security track - This is very vendor specific as far as security, but cisco is the most prevelent
Microsoft security track - Also very vendor specific but Windows is also very prevelent

I hope this helps some.

[Jazzmaster]

Thanks a lot for the insight :) I will look into those paths and post up later on which one attracts me most. I guess Cisco and Microsoft security tracks will go in first, because I already study in that direction (MSCA + CCNA - should be a good addition to those two).