This is my overview of the Cybrary course, Python for Security Professionals, For starters, I truly appreciate the Cybrary.it model, the lessons are all free and you can purchase a certificate of completion (which may help validate the 15 CPEs the course is worth, if you want to justify that kind of thing) if you'd like at the end. However, the whole site model is interesting in as you are able to "complete" the courses (lol in fact, I've "completed" most of the courses), and buy the relevant certificate, without ever having clicked the video links. That seemingly large security mistake type of invalidates the certificates, as anyone can obviously say the've completed the course and have the certificate without having done so. All of this aside, I really like the thought of free education material and we will now be delving into this content of the Python for Security Professionals course. Like my other reviews, I'm going to go over the material and recommend this based on your own experience and time commitment. The course contains 10 hours of video content, which are pretty decent especially if you are trying to learn Python from scratch, but slightly less so if you are trying to learn the nuances of Information Security. All of the modules are video focused, but include PDFs of slides, activities in python programs, and the completed solutions to the activities in python programs. Overall, the initial four modules are extremely basic and mostly just cover programming in python vs security specific tasks. Another issue is that currently every one of the videos are pretty blurry and it's hard to read the code / command line used in the video series. For this reason you have to watch the videos in HD, however they address this in the comments and mention how they will be re-releasing the videos in an increased resolution. By the end of the weekend, I'd recommend this course to a person who is attempting to master Python from scratch having an Information Security focus, but also for someone with more of a background in Python, I would actually recommend a text more like Black Hat Python, for more of an Information Security focus. Nevertheless, even though you are knowledgeable about Python and Information Security, you may find the past two modules interesting (The Packet Gathering Module and the Info Gathering Module).
The initial module, Intro and Setup, is pretty basic and be easily skipped when you yourself have any prior Python experience. Here he covers just how to setup and install Python, as well as why it's an excellent language for rapid prototyping and security professionals.
The next module, Apprentice Python, is also very basic and still doesn't touch on anything security related. This module is focused on basic usage and arithmetic in Python. There is also a stumbling block in the next video, as it's a little odd when he googles for solutions and then reads stack overflow through the tutorial.
The Journeyman Python module is interesting, but nevertheless doesn't delve into anything necessarily Information Security specific. In this module he talks a lot about networking protocols and RFCs that govern these. These modules are interesting in that they're informative, but fairly incomplete in the data they relay, an example of this will be when he starts talking about ports and protocols he doesn't differentiate which transport protocol the application protocols are traveling over, despite discussing the differences between the TCP and UDP transport protocols. In this chapter you are shown you how for connecting to arbitrary TCP ports, that could be useful for banner grabbing. The last activity in this module shows you how to be controlled by a TCP port and thus create your own personal arbitrary file server, however these lack really any security controls.
With Advanced Python he covers ctypes, regular expressions, multi-threading, and finally fuzzing. The multi-threading exercise in this module is pretty interesting, but nevertheless nothing really advanced, merely a quick launching of multiple independent threads (vs something that's to take into account deadlocks). The fuzzing section is also pretty interesting as this could be a core Information Security technique, so I appreciate the videos for Slides part 3, jperry even alludes to a stream overflow in this video. Unfortunately, he also says fairly uneducated things like fuzzing and password cracking are similar the theory is that (the technique of bruteforce might be similar, but that hardly scratches the theory associated with either subject) or that writing a password cracker is against the CFAA, which is unquestionably false as industry professionals use password cracking all the time in penetration testing (trafficking hacked information or the actual act of hacking another person's system is illegal, not writing a password cracker). In this module's activities he also writes a reasonably insecure file server implementation. I say it's insecure not because it lets you arbitrary read / write to a whole drive, but because it uses no authentication or encryption to protect the communications, meaning anyone could trivially hijack your fileserver activities.
Packet Analyzer module is where things get really cool. Simply two, jperry starts implementing an IP protocol parser and demonstrates bitwise manipulation to read exact fields from the protocol. This is a pretty awesome tutorial for writing a network protocol parser in Python and something I would truly call Python for Security Professionals. I recommend this section for those interested in getting a more thorough handle of protocols and automated parsers.
The Info Gathering module is also really interesting, as here jperry writes a fast post-exploitation RAT in Python for Windows. This is excellent and where in actuality the class really starts digginging to the Python put on security specific applications. I like where he uses python to parse the Windows registry key values, this really is super useful for various security applications. Overall, I believe this is a very good Python for Security Professionals video. This module also covers all the content from the Post Exploitation Hacking course in this script. I recommend this module for moderately experienced hackers looking to begin writing their own implants go url.
Overall, the modules were done well and I appreciate the relaxed approach of the course and exercises. Nevertheless, I believe the whole course is great for someone trying to master Python from scratch, however if you already are a newcomer Python / Information Security enthusiast you must checkout something more like Black Hat Python, and even though you are well versed with Python and Information Security you may find the past two modules interesting. As for Cybrary.it, I truly appreciate what they're doing with free education, I believe this is a good program and it deserves a lot of support, however I don't think the certifications are worth anything, on the basis of the lack of business-logic security preventing anyone from just acquiring the certificates without having to go through the courses.
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