Cybersecurity functions can be divided into seven broad categories of jobs, says the National Initiative for Cybersecurity Education, which released Nov. 8 a draft taxonomy of the cybersecurity workforce.

The seven NICE categories, with their subcategories, are:

• Securely provision - conceptualizing, designing and building secure IT systems;
  • Information assurance compliance
  • Software engineering
  • Enterprise architecture
  • Technology Demonstration
  • Systems requirements planning
  • Test and evaluation
  • Systems development.
• Operate and maintain - the support, administration and maintenance necessary to ensure effective and efficient IT system performance and security;
  • Data administration
  • Information system security management
  • Knowledge management
  • Customer service and technical support
  • Network services
  • System administration
  • Systems security analysis.
• Protect and defend - the identification, analysis, and mitigation of threats to IT systems and networks;
  • Computer network defense
  • Incident response
  • Computer network defense infrastructure support
  • Security program management
  • Vulnerability assessment and management.
• Investigate - investigation of cyber events or crimes, which occur within IT systems or networks, as well as the processing and use of digital evidence;
  • Investigation
  • Digital forensics.
• Operate and collect - the highly specialized collection of cybersecurity information that may be used to develop intelligence;
  • Collection operations
  • Cyber operations planning
  • Cyber operations.
• Analyze - review and evaluation of incoming cybersecurity information to determine its usefulness for intelligence;
  • Cyber threat analysis
  • Exploitation analysis
  • All source intelligence
  • Targets.
• Support - specialty areas that provide critical support so that others may effectively conduct their cybersecurity work;
  • Legal advice and advocacy
  • Strategic planning and policy development
  • Education and training.

NICE is a federal interagency effort coordinated by the National Institute of Standards and Technology.

A single worker, NICE acknowledges, may perform the tasks of more than once category and the taxonomy doesn't necessarily match job titles or occupational terms in federal agencies. "There is little consistency throughout the federal government and the nation in terms of how cybersecurity work is defined or described (e.g., there is significant variation in occupations, job titles, position description, and the Office of Personnel Management series)," a NICE framework document says.

An individual within a category may also perform only a subset of the tasks associated with it--securely provision, for example, includes enterprise architecture and software engineering.

The goal of the taxonomyy NICE says, is to provide a common framework and language to describe cybersecurity work and work requirements and to permit a baseline assessment of skills gaps and talent-development efforts.

Ultimately NICE wants the taxonomy adopted across all relevant sectors within the Untied States, but that will require input from the private sector and academia, NICE says. Comments on the draft are due by Dec. 16.

For more:
- go to the NICE cybersecurity workforce framework webpage
- download a copy of the framework (.pdf)
- download a comments template (.xls)

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