The CyberCamp Story

"We need reskilling!"

The story of CyberCamp began in late 2021 with a simple, yet important realization: cybersecurity is a shortage profession, and many people are struggling to start or renew their careers. This has shaped our mission, which is still current today: to help and support the "next generations" of cybersecurity in demystifying the profession, starting and developing in it. Starting with the realization that cybersecurity offers not one, but many, interesting, future-proof and secure career paths and professions!

As technology has advanced at an ever-increasing pace, cyber threats have kept pace – or perhaps even outpaced it. However, the experience has been that cybersecurity knowledge and training has not reached the broadest possible audience, not only in terms of everyday knowledge but also in terms of professional training.

Thus, the idea was born to create a reskilling bootcamp that would make the basics of cybersecurity widely accessible and prepare everyone to protect themselves and their environment against the dangers lurking in the digital world -- and even build a career in this field!

Luck favors the brave!

The launch in early 2023 was full of "FOMO"; at that time, developer, "coding" bootcamps were in their heyday, and the concept was born. Of course, while developing the basics, we kept clicking (at least Imi certainly did) - that these "rival" bootcamps would also launch cybersecurity versions.

Our first "stage" started in February 2023, in the form of a five-month bootcamp training cybersecurity experts. The competitors did not come. The first iteration was full of operational challenges, because although we had many years of experience in adult education by then, a multi-month, continuously organized training requires orders of magnitude more organization than a few-day course.

So we "launched it" on the market quickly, but that's okay, because we got the feedback from the best place -- from you! To the best of our knowledge, we managed to heal the "wounds" of our shared experience in every case.

There were problems, dissatisfied students, which was also painful for us because we often knew what we had done wrong -- but reality often turns out differently than we imagine.

We have continuously developed our professional material (I intentionally don't write "course material", it's so school-like...), the technical background, lab environment, exam system, etc.

The second, third, fourth, and in October 2024, the "CC 5" has come to an end, during which we launched a total of 146 colleagues in their careers or helped them transition from other professions.

So the start was not easy, we were constantly faced with countless, not so trivial questions.

• How can a complex IT world be presented simply and clearly to those who may not have any technical background?

• How can a course be designed so that it not only provides theoretical knowledge, but also develops real, practical skills?

• Who should teach and in what form?

• How can all this be achieved in a way that ensures that participants do not lose their motivation, but rather, on the contrary, enthusiastically develop and delve into the world of cybersecurity?

• How should we respond to the extra administration related to domestic adult education?

Where is the future in Hungary today?

We analyzed a variety of approaches – from university curricula, international professional courses, training programs at fast-growing startups, internal mobility programs at multinational companies, and the methods of "Youtubers" and "influencers". We realized that traditional educational methods are often too rigid or outdated to keep up with the ever-changing cyber threats.

Meanwhile, we continuously asked for and received feedback, enriching ourselves with some very important lessons.

Our biggest challenge was (and still is) related to our most important "principle". We believe, freely quoting the chef from "Ratatouille", that "Anyone can succeed in the field of cybersecurity!" This does not mean that everyone is created to be a cyber expert, but that it is worthwhile and possible to start with any background (accountant, beautician, lawyer, marketer, cashier, ....) or even without a background! Of course, this does not happen by itself! We worked together with our CyberCampers (our students, but let's forget this word along with the "curriculum") on the challenge that everyone has a different background and habitus. While we helped many colleagues through various dead ends and knowledge-related "walls", we also experienced and learned a lot from this, which we will continue to use to help the CyberCamp community!

We knew it before, but CyberCamp really taught us the importance of community and personal connections, mutual support, and personal mentoring, both for easier knowledge transfer and to maintain motivation.

Competitors haven't really come since then -- maybe they know that this is not "easy bread"...? Towards the end of 2024, there were 1-2 cybersecurity training courses, but we couldn't say that there was dumping, so, 3 years later, perhaps what we are doing here is more of a gap-filling course, even if it's not "just for fun" training!

The next generation

Where are we in 2024? The fact that we are "here" is a huge experience, because with the covid epidemic, economy, recession, market situation, inflation, war, cash flow, -- "and everything" that is usually blamed for business failures -- we could have given up. We could have given up, because we have implemented almost any idea we had in recent years, either it didn't work out, or it took longer, or it cost three times as much. (cool, you might say...)

But for us, all this is our calling -- that's why we are here, that's why we will be here!

We are not a foreign franchise, nor the daughter of a multinational company, nor do venture capitalists or backward training dogmas tell us what is possible and what is not.

Since we don't have a lot of money to spend, we mainly sacrifice our own time and energy to create new modules, functions, and opportunities.

Meanwhile, we are constantly working on how to make even better use of both our own and your time and attention. One of our most frank innovations is the "involvement of artificial intelligence into the community", in the form of an AI mentor, "with whom" we can only interact via chat for now, but it will still multiply everything we can learn together!

The bell rang!

Breaking away from the rigid school system required several rounds of running, but we made the leap! So, we hope that the new, flexible and meaningful CyberCamp Online will be extremely useful for all our subscribers!

We encourage everyone to move from the "Prussian" school to active self-development in the community; "What paper do you give?" is no longer the best question. The time for announced, authorized, "okay" trainings is over. The paper is not the point, but knowledge, skills and enthusiasm!

CyberCamp has become more than just an educational program. It is not adult education, or a course, or anything like that, it is much more than that! It is built around a community in which participants are dedicated, constantly developing, supporting each other, and working together for a safer digital future. Our shared achievements and the continuous positive feedback all prove that despite the initial difficulties, it was worth creating and raising this program to a new level. We are proud to be able to participate in such a great community and to help everyone live safer in the digital space, and last but not least, build a fruitful career in the profession!

From learning to doing

Over time, one thing became increasingly clear.

Even the best structured learning, the most practical labs, and the strongest community support can only take you so far. At some point, real growth happens elsewhere — in messy, ambiguous, real-world situations where there is no single right answer. We’ve seen it again and again: people understand the concepts, pass the exams, complete the exercises — and still feel uncertain when facing actual GRC problems. Because real work is different. It’s not clean. It’s not predefined. It requires thinking, discussion, trade-offs, and experience you can’t simulate alone.

This is where the idea of GRC: Live comes from. Not another course. Not another set of materials.

A space to work through real situations together — with others who are already in the field, facing the same complexity, asking the same questions, and figuring things out in real time.

So we're now offering a new format to support the growth of our profession - GRC LIVE.