Talya Parker, the founder of the nonprofit Black Girls in Cyber, tweeted from the account of the National Security Agency’s Director of Cybersecurity as part of the #ShareTheMicInCyber movement on Oct. 22.
Nearly 23 million Twitter users saw #ShareTheMicInCyber posts, as part of the event to showcase the stories of Black cybersecurity practitioners and raise awareness of systemic racism in the field.
NSA cybersecurity director Rob Joyce lent his platform to Parker, who shared her path to cybersecurity and how the isolation of being “the only Black woman” in the room led her to create her nonprofit.
“With over 3.5 million unfilled #cybersecurity #jobs, my goal is to bring awareness to opportunities in cyber and #informationsecurity to create a pipeline for organizations to find women of color,” Parker tweeted.
Launched in July 2020, Black Girls in Cyber prepares women for careers in cybersecurity, STEM and privacy.
BCiG will offer webinars on a variety of industry topics, as well as mentorship in the form of a biannual cohort and a yearly conference in Atlanta.
Last month’s #ShareTheMicInCyber event was the fourth since the inception of the movement in June 2020, following the murder of George Floyd and the subsequent protests. The latest round focused on the theme of public-private partnerships and celebrated Cybersecurity Awareness Month.
Camille Stewart, global head of Product Security Strategy at Google, and Lauren Zabierek, executive director of the Cyber Project at Harvard Kennedy School’s Belfer Center, co-created the #ShareTheMicInCyber movement. Stewart wrote extensively on the subject of racism in cybersecurity in a blog post on the Council on Foreign Relations website.
“The places where democracy breaks down and the ugliness of our past sins are laid bare and unaddressed are where we are most vulnerable,” said Stewart in the post. “Technical and policy mitigations to cybersecurity challenges will never reach their full potential until systemic racism is addressed and diverse voices are reflected among our ranks at all levels.”
The cybersecurity industry is predominately white and male with only 9% of workers identifying as Black, 4% identifying as Hispanic and 24% identifying as women, according to a report from the Aspen Institute.
