It is funny how life throws us unexpected curveballs, some good, some bad and some interesting surprises that we could not have imagined. Writing is one of those surprises for me, it was something that I had never considered doing, I was never a book lover as a child or even most of my adult life. I don’t have a large book collection like many authors, yes I have a few favourites like the inheritance, rangers apprentice and I am number four series but outside of that, I have mostly educational books that I have collected during my studies over the years.
Writing is one of my passions that truly enriches my life, it gives me an outlet to share my thoughts and ideas. It allows me to escape my reality when desired and allows me to do the same for my readers. I certainly don’t follow any traditional writing rule book, I do what feels right.
My writing journey started with what I call a need to share a message, a hidden threat that I didn’t feel my industry was talking about and it scared me. It was 2018, I was attending the last ACSC cyber conference in Canberra Australia, the audience was mostly government and large enterprises. I was working for a Brisbane-based MSP (Managed Service Provider) and had been listening to session, after session all focused on internal defences and malicious actors. The sessions were great and I learnt a lot from peers but the whole time I had this nagging threat that no one was talking about, one I had been thinking about for a while.
MSP’s.
Yes, that’s right the MSP like the organisation I worked for was a bigger threat to most of these organisations that were at the conference and many organisations in Australia and around the world. They held all the keys to organisations, they had access to almost everything (if they didn’t have complete access) and they were essentially unchecked.
If a malicious actor gained access to an account for a senior member of an MSP team they could get access to potentially hundreds of organisations, they could have a smorgasbord, taking whatever they wanted and it could go undetected for months or even years if they wanted it to.
I know, you are sitting there reading this and going. ‘What does this have to do with his writing journey?’. Well, it actually has everything to do with it. let me explain why.
That problem, the lack of discussion brought about a decision that changed my life. It gave me a choice, one I had not considered before. What was that decision? I wanted to raise the issue with MSPs and the risk they posed and have a robust conversation with my peers about how we could fix it or at least make sure we were all aware of it. I needed a platform, a way to give my thoughts and perspective on the issue but the conference was finished.
I had been reading articles from the CSO Online cyber news site for a few months prior and remembered seeing a comment on the bottom of one of the newsletters “if you have something you want to share or an article you would like to contribute reach out to an email address.” Was an article a way to start the conversation, it was worth a shot. I reached out and received a response from someone who I now call a friend, Charlie-Mae. She gave me some guidelines of what they would expect and indicated she would be more than happy to take a look at a potential contribution if I sent something through to her.
It took me a few days to put that first article together, I was a bit nervous about how it would be received, whether it would even be published, would my peers value the contribution. I took the leap and submitted the article. A few days passed and I received a response. It was a slightly edited version of my piece and a confirmation that it was going to be published on the website. My first article lays bare the risk from MSPs. The start of my writing journey that sparked almost 100 articles for CSO and hundreds more since for publications like Top Cyber News, Women in Security, Cyber Today, Cyber Australia and more.
It wasn’t just articles though it is much more than that now with my sixth book in the works for publication and more. Writing has truly become a part of my everyday life, a big part of who I am. I am now the proud author of three different book series, two related to cyber education and awareness and a third is a cyberpunk hacker fantasy series. Each of the series has meaning to me, problems that I wanted to help overcome or solve. Let me break them down individually so you can get the true meaning behind them and a true insight into why they have been brought to life.
