Security+ Beta Exam

[bowlfreak]

Anyone in the AO community taken the CompTia Security+ Beta exam?

I took the exam on Monday and found it to be fairly easy and straight forward. Most of the material in the exam I had read during my studies for the CISSP exam I hope to take early next year.

I will not share information on what is on the exam, but will be happy to share comments on the exam itself if anyone might be interested...

Thanks.

[MrLinus]

I would be interested in hearing more about the exam, Security+. As it's in beta form, how long is it? Types of questions (I'm not looking word-for-word here) but rather multiple-choice, essay? And would this be the kind of exam/cert that would be good for budding, new security admins? Say a step towards taking the CISSP, which requires 2 years experience in the field (IIRC).

[bArGuS_4_$]

I would be curious if you have a URL to find more information on the exam. I am a little wrapped up with some SANS certs right now, however I would be interested in seeing more on this cert.

[MrLinus]

bargus,

Given that the exam/cert is a CompTia one, visiting their website would be logical (http://www.comptia.com). CompTia is recognized mostly for their A+ certification and the Network+ certification. CompTia is supposed to be non-partial to developers and thus, tends to be viewed as an independent authority. They have numerous other certifications including Linux+, Server+ and a few others. From what I can tell, this might be a good certification to start with and then to move on to others such as CISSP and/or SANS, and especially if one has limited to no experience in the field of security.

[bowlfreak]

Sorry for the delayed reply...the wife is hogging the computer I regularly use to play her new game Emperor, while I tend to the child care duties.

The exam questions (125 in all) are all multiple choice format. Most of the questions are "ground level," meaning the exam covers security basics (disabling unused services, what ports are used for what protocol, etc). I won't know whether or not I passed until at least November, and exam candidates can only take the beta 1 time. Some questions covered DoS, man-in-middle, and PKI. Nothing major or in-depth like one would find on the CISSP exam (my opinion).

MsMittens is correct...The Security+ could be used as a stepping stone to the CISSP exam, if one wished to pursue that route (as I am currently). The Security+, along with the Network+ exam, would serve as a nice background for budding security admins.

[bowlfreak]

Finally...back to AO (after the wife plays her 14 hours of games per day).

Keeping along the security track...Has anyone recently taken any security exams (TICSA, etc)? Just curious what the current in-demand security certs are (aside from SANS and CISSP).

Thanks.