5 cybersecurity resume examples & templates (beginners-advanced)

As a cybersecurity professional, the strength of your resume can make or break your first impression with recruiters and employers. So it’s pretty important to get it right. 

We’ve created five downloadable cybersecurity resume examples and templates for some of the most popular cybersecurity career paths.  

These cybersecurity resume examples cover beginner, entry-level, and intermediate careers in both offensive and defensive roles.

Remember: these templates are for inspiration only and you should always incorporate your own experiences and preferences. And if you’re looking for a job in the industry, browse the Hack The Box (HTB) Cybersecurity Jobs portal for access to hundreds of organizations that are actively hiring right now.

1. Entry-level cybersecurity graduate resume example

Landing an entry-level cybersecurity job can seem daunting for many fresh graduates with little professional experience. But it doesn’t have to be if you know the right experience to highlight. 

Not sure which career path is right for you? Then follow our ESE framework (experience, skills, and end goal) to assess your current skills and experience against your cybersecurity career goals:

Some common entry-level positions include: 

• IT support specialist. 

• SOC analyst. 

• System administrator. 

• Penetration tester. 

💡Cybersecurity graduate resume tips

The two key things you need to get into the cyber industry are evidence of your passion and persistence. 

The jobs market for entry into the cyber sector is tough but not impossible. You really need to go above and beyond to show you're interested in a career in cyber by writing blogs, networking, and volunteering where you can. 

You need to make yourself visible to people who are in the position to make hiring decisions.

Kunjal Tanna, Co-Founder and recruiter, LT Harper:

• As a recent graduate, your resume should demonstrate your desire to learn, ability to tackle problems independently, and your hands-on technical skills.

• Letters of recommendation from your professors can help with your applications if you don’t have experience. 

• Mention previous experience even if not in security—soft skills show that you have worked on a team, led a team, and can interact with higher-ups.

📖Recommended content: 

• 4 of the best entry-level cybersecurity jobs for aspiring hackers

• How to learn hacking: The (step-by-step) beginner's bible for 2023

• Hack The Box Starting Point

• HTB Certified Penetration Testing Specialist (HTB CPTS)

2. Junior cybersecurity analyst resume 

Junior analysts tend to come from an IT background, perhaps you’ve worked as a desk support or system administrator in the past. These technical skills will give you a strong foothold in the analyst career path. 

Junior SOC analysts tend to be responsible for monitoring incidents and raising any suspicious activity to the wider team. This requires basic technical, administrative, and analytical skills for proactive identification and reporting of incidents.

💡Junior SOC analyst resume tips

Research the certifications that are relevant to your position, watch reviews and videos, and read blogs on how they’ve helped others in the industry before you spend your hard-earned money on them. 

A lot of positions will ask for experience with a large variety of tooling—if you have the resources, then build a home lab. If you don’t have the resources available, maybe you can make use of some free AWS, Azure, or GCP credits.

Sabastian Hague (sebh24), Defensive Content Lead, Hack The Box

• List what you’re doing to further your professional development outside of IT if you don’t have any direct security experience.

• Relate your experience to security, for example, what tools and technologies translate well into an analyst role?

• Demonstrate your passion and side projects such as a GitHub profile, showing your active engagement with the community.

📖Recommended content: 

• What is a SOC analyst? Skills & career path Q&A (with a seasoned Blue teamer)

• HTB SOC analyst job role path

• How to become a cybersecurity analyst: the ultimate guide

3. Cybersecurity analyst resume example 

SOC stands for Security Operations Center, which makes a SOC analyst someone who keeps an eye on an organization's computer systems 24/7, looking for any suspicious activity, potential threats, or security breaches. 

If something looks fishy, it's the SOC analyst's job to investigate it and determine if it's a real threat or just a false alarm. 

This cybersecurity resume template is for SOC analysts with several years of experience looking for their next role:

💡SOC analyst resume tips

• Tooling is important to SOC analysts, especially security information and event management (SIEM) solutions. Ensure you list all relevant tools you are confident in and be prepared to elaborate on them during an interview.

• For more experienced SOCs, you can remove any previous IT-related experience, such as desk support roles, as this is no longer relevant. 

• Place skills and certifications above education, as practical proof of analyst experience holds more weight.

• Make quantifiable impact statements when discussing your experience. For example, how many endpoints were you supporting?

📖Recommended content:

• 18 SOC analyst interview questions (answered by an ex-analyst)

• HTB Certified Defensive Security Analyst (HTB CDSA)

4. Cybersecurity engineer resume example

A cybersecurity engineer is a “digital fortress builder” entrusted with the blueprints and keys to safeguard an organization’s critical infrastructure and assets from emerging threats. 

Their main duties revolve around designing and improving security infrastructure around an organization's unique environment. This includes the monitoring and customization of firewalls, VPNs, or intrusion detection/prevention systems (IDS/IPS) to build barriers against malicious cyber attacks.

💡Cybersecurity engineer resume tips

Ingenuity, innovation, and automation set security engineers apart; it's about doing what you can with what you have. If you can do something or create something that saves your business money, time, or risk, I guarantee you will be loved.

Matt Russo, Cyber Security Systems Engineer, Sargento Foods Inc

• Highlight contributions you’ve made to the cybersecurity industry, whether it’s launching your own blog or contributing to open-source projects.

• Tailor your resume to align with the specific skills the job calls for, tweak previous experiences to speak to an engineering role. 

• When speaking about previous experience, try to highlight the result of your work and how this added value to your company, as engineers are there to make your security team’s lives easier! For example: I reduced the time spent onboarding new team members by 25%.

📖Recommended content: 

• How to become a cybersecurity engineer: ultimate career guide

• 7 of the best programming languages for cybersecurity (offensive & defensive)

• Introduction to Networking

• JavaScript Deobfuscation

5. Penetration tester resume example

A penetration tester (or pentester) is a cybersecurity professional who executes targeted, authorized attacks on IT infrastructure, applications, or forms of physical security to determine vulnerabilities.

A penetration tester's ultimate goal is to help uncover and recommend fixes for hidden flaws in digital or physical networks before “bad guys” or malicious attackers can exploit them. 

To serve this end goal, the daily tasks and activities a penetration tester will engage in include using technical/penetration testing tools to probe for security vulnerabilities, documenting processes and activities, and writing penetration testing reports about discovered insights for senior colleagues and clients.

💡Penetration tester resume tips

It’s hard to match formal qualifications and CVs to on-the-job performance. That’s why I pay attention to a candidate’s attitude and extracurricular activities. 

One example is HTB activity on a resume when hiring juniors. It shows that a candidate is deeply motivated and invested in developing their skills.

Jeremy Chisamore, Senior Penetration Tester, Oracle

• Explain how you use tools to do your work, rather than just listing tools you’re experienced in as this can look as though you’re just trying to list industry buzzwords. 

• If you mention tools on your resume, be prepared to dive into detail during the interview, for example, if you list Burp, you may be asked "What's the most complex task you've done with Burp?” 

• Penetration testing is a competitive field, you need to demonstrate how you’re better than the rest—have you won contests? Given talks? Been the fastest to root a client? Show off your skills wherever you can. 

• For junior pentesters, your passion is your greatest asset. Think about how you can prove it with training and the way you think about flaws in systems etc. 

📖Recommended content: 

• How to become a penetration tester (Practical) career guide

• What is penetration testing? (Explained by a real hacker)

• Penetration tester job role path

• HTB Certified Penetration Testing Specialist (HTB CPTS)

Cybersecurity resume tips from security pros

FAQs on cybersecurity resumes and careers

How can fresh graduates improve their chances of breaking into cybersecurity?

Projects, self-study, and certificates. A degree is no longer the golden ticket, study the industry, work on projects that give you some experience in a home lab or on an education platform like HTB, and get those certificates. 

 

Also don't jump straight into the "hacking" certifications. I'm talking about getting your CompTIA A+, Net+ and Sec+. 

 

If you know your way around a computer fairly well you can skip the A+, but the Net+ is definitely needed before anything else. The Net+ will really help you understand how networks actually work and what you can do to secure them. 

 

Sec+ will help you understand basic strategies for defending against attacks and proper security measures.

Champagne Ryder, SOC Supervisor, Critical Insight

What can junior cybersecurity professionals put on their resume to stand out?

Here are some of the things that I personally look for in a resume:

GitHub profile: Maintaining an active GitHub account where you regularly upload projects or contributions provides proof of your technical skills.

 

Vlog or blog: Having a Vlog channel dedicated to cybersecurity topics or a blog where you discuss recent vulnerabilities, fixes, or tutorials illustrates your ability to communicate complex information effectively.

 

Participation in the hacker community: Engagement in hacker spaces, forums, or groups indicates a commitment to the cybersecurity community and continuous learning.

 

Hack The Box and other platforms: An active Hack The Box account or participation in other CTF competitions demonstrates your practical skills and problem-solving abilities under pressure.

 

Continuous learning and self-education: Highlighting how you stay updated with the latest in the field, whether through online courses, webinars, or self-directed study, showcases your initiative and capacity for self-improvement.

Jayson (P3tA) Ek, Chief Engineer, Oasis Systems LLC

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