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Consumer reports unceasingly share alarming statistics regarding national cyberterrorism, validating consumer fears in which companies have neglected to protect personal data information, resulting in data leaks and personal identification exposure. Corporations such as Uber resulted in consumers waking up to disturbing reports identifying data breaches that impacted over 57 million Uber users. Uber was forced to pay the hackers over $100,000 to purge the consumers' personal data information, including phone numbers, email addresses, and payment information (Burrell, 2018). This vulnerability caused hackers to seek the same data breach weaknesses and exposures (Stump, 2017). Furthermore, the Uber data breaches reminds consumers globally of the recurrent nightmare that many consumers are still reliving. Consumers are reminded of the T-Mobile multi-national wireless network operator that endured their data breach exposing over 1 million customers' phone numbers, billing addresses, account information, and payment details (Stump, 2017). Companies like Uber and T-Mobile bring attention to Capital One, who had a former employee hack the database to obtain personal information from over 100 million people (Stump, 2017). According to Stump (2017), the effects from Cybersecurity security breaches was history making resulting in shocking penalties. Due to negligent security practices, federal and state lawmakers collaborated to improve security protocols, requiring corporations to disclose any cybersecurity incident impacting consumer privacy violations (Burrell, 2018).
NeSmith (2018) insist that Counterterrorism is occurring at rapid speed to the point that Americans have learned to become desensitized and ignore the news that can cause panic and anxiety. Consumers believe corporations and businesses have the responsibility to protect personal data and limit security threats that impact their privacy (Stump, 2017). Furthermore, it is the role and responsibility of our national government to hire, develop, and retain cybersecurity professionals that will protect our data from counterterrorism threats (NeSmith, 2018).
The cybersecurity workforce gap is substantial. As of 2018, there were over 4 million cybersecurity professional vacancy’s (Muncaster, 2019). In addition, United States European allies experienced the same cybersecurity professional declines within the same period. Cybersecurity professional careers increased globally from 142,000 to 291,000 (Muncaster, 2019). Rogers (2019) explains that surveyed organizations have fall short of cybersecurity professional and lack technical fundamental security experiences. The ineffectiveness of continued efforts to reduce this crisis will cause an indefinite risk of staff shortages (Rogers, 2019).
One can argue the cause and effect of cybersecurity professional shortages resting upon the lack of educational programs endorsing technology careers (Rogers, 2019). Throughout this paper, this study will focus primarily on how the cybersecurity industry can inherit innovative strategies, educate, promote, and develop a pipeline of cybersecurity professionals to enhance a more favorable outcome. In the efforts to build a robust talent pipeline, we must advocate for innovative practices to educate the future cybersecurity professionals. Systemically, diverse communities have been ignored and undervalued for advanced technology jobs.