Hello,<p>My name is Rafael. I am a third year college student studying math. I am trying to learn about careers in computer security but I can’t find any good resources. Maybe you could help me out? I would really appreciate it.<p>1) Where have you worked? Where are you currently working?<p>2) What are the major differences between working in software development and computer security?<p>3) What security firms would you enjoy working for? Why? Any in Chicago?<p>4) What do new hires usually do for their first year? Do you have a lot of freedom to explore different fields?<p>5) What do you like least about your job? What do you enjoy the most?<p>6) What do you spend most of your time doing? Coding? Debugging? Reading? Code Reviews? Talking to clients?<p>7) What sort of skills do you wish you had before you started working in computer security?<p>8) Do you know of any security focused open-source projects that use Python or C?<p>9) Did you intern somewhere? Do you have any recommended places to intern at?<p>10) Do you mind if we talked more? How can I contact you? My email is turnersr [you know what] uchicago DOT edu<p>Thank you so much,
Rafael
First of all, put your contact info in the 'about' section of your profile.<p>There are a <i>lot</i> of amazing people on HN, and some of them are involved in various aspects of computer security. Contacting them privately might be your best bet.<p>Thomas Ptacek (in the Chicago area)<p><a href="http://news.ycombinator.com/user?id=tptacek" rel="nofollow">http://news.ycombinator.com/user?id=tptacek</a><p>Cody Brocious is around here somewhere, but I can never remember his HN user name, and I "think" he works with tptacek (above) at Matasano.<p>Nate Lawson<p><a href="http://news.ycombinator.com/user?id=NateLawson" rel="nofollow">http://news.ycombinator.com/user?id=NateLawson</a><p>The above have posted to the monthly 'jobs' thread, so they are looking for people to hire. If you didn't know, on the 1st of each month there is a jobs thread and a freelancer thread here on HN.<p>There are also people involved with crypto work:<p><a href="http://news.ycombinator.com/user?id=cperciva" rel="nofollow">http://news.ycombinator.com/user?id=cperciva</a><p><a href="http://news.ycombinator.com/user?id=JoachimSchipper" rel="nofollow">http://news.ycombinator.com/user?id=JoachimSchipper</a><p>There are many others, so you'll need to dig around.