What women in cybersecurity want the next generation to know

What’s the best way to bring the next generation of women into cybersecurity? For industry leaders, that’s a pressing question—and their answers vary.

What’s clear is that cybersecurity faces a significant gender gap. In 2024, the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission found that although women constituted nearly half the total US workforce, they only made up 22.6% of the “high tech” workforce across every industry—and just 19.4% of high tech jobs (i.e., STEM careers as defined by the Bureau of Labor Statistics) in the high tech sector.

A 2024 report from ISC2, an advocacy organization for cybersecurity professionals, estimated women fill between 20% and 25% of the nation’s cybersecurity jobs. More than one in 10 (11%) cybersecurity teams have no women, compared to the 4% who said that women constituted more than half of their team.

“Increasing the representation of women across every industry is needed to help close the global workforce gap,” the ISC2 report stated. “Organizations should review their cybersecurity recruitment policies and practices to ensure that they get a more gender-balanced pool of candidates and that the women in their teams are also part of the recruitment process.”

The next generation. Erin McFarlane, the VP of operations at Fairmarkit, is “always looking for more women in IT.”

“I think there is a need for women’s perspectives in the deeper tech roles,” McFarlane said. “I’m seeing more women in leadership-type positions, which is awesome and certainly more in the business facing technical roles, but less so in the hard, deep technical stuff.”

As field CTO of emerging technologies at Commvault, Vidya Shankaran said that she is part of a “very fortunate group of women leaders in IT and [the] security space” who are taking it upon themselves to foster the incoming cohort of women who can “fill in not just our gaps as we move on but also increase that footprint.”

“In IT, yes, there are lots of women,” Shankaran said. “In cybersecurity and IT, if you were to draw that Venn diagram, the number of women are very, very few.”

Advice for the next generation. Shankaran said that she would encourage women looking to enter the workforce to earn key cybersecurity certifications to increase credibility as someone is starting out. Some examples of certifications include the Certified Information Systems Security Professional (CISSP) certification, which ISC2 describes as a globally recognized certification in the information security market, and the CompTIA Security+ certification, which validates baseline practical skills.

Many of these organizations that offer certifications also include memberships and training, which provides networking opportunities for new IT professionals. “That is immensely helpful because it gives everyone visibility into the new incoming workforce of women,” Shankaran said.

She pointed to these spaces as an opportunity for leaders to begin coaching, mentoring, and hiring the next cohort of women.

Kara Sprague, HackerOne’s CEO, told IT Brew that bias is often introduced early within cybersecurity, due to the stereotype of the industry being predominantly male.

Sprague, who formerly served as a board member of Girls Who Code from 2016 until 2022, said she wants the next generation to know they can use their place in the tech industry to help drive the future.

“I would highly encourage and really strongly advocate for every woman to give it a chance and go there [the tech sector], because that’s where the future is going to be shaped,” Sprague said.

McFarlane, similarly, encouraged women to “believe in themselves and their ability to solve problems,” and to not be scared off by the math and science that comes along with careers within the industry: “Women have the ability to do remarkably in these fields, and I would love to see more of them give it a try.”

However, she cautioned, the industry can be hostile and lonely.

“There’s a lot of times where you’re the only woman in a room full of guys, and that takes a certain amount of resilience,” Sprague said. “It means that you have to put extra energy into finding a community that makes you feel the belonging.”