Cyber Security Interview Questions For Freshers, Seniors and Experts

The right place for cyber security job aspirants to get to know the most common interview questions in various examinations. Read on to find out cyber security scenario-based questions asked by the experts. 

Introduction 

Are you preparing for the most in-demand IT domain, i.e. cyber security job role? We got you covered. With the ever-high demand for cyber security professionals, there’s also cutthroat competition among the cyber security jobs. Nowadays, business organisations also give significance to the cyber security infrastructure due to increased digital transformation and extensive migration to cloud platforms and services. 

Cyber security skills alone are not enough to be the best among others and increase your chances of clearing the interview and getting selected. Having proper technical knowledge and applying skills plays a vital role too. Check out the best curated cyber security interview questions and answers.

Cyber Security Interview Questions and Answers 

We have divided these cyber security interview questions and answers into three parts for your convenience:

• Cyber Security Interview Questions for Freshers 
• Cyber Security Interview Questions for Seniors And Experts
• Common Cyber Security Interview Questions

Cyber Security Interview Questions for Freshers 

These entry-level interview questions are asked to test your fundamental knowledge of concepts and insights related to cyber security. 

1. What Is Cyber Security?

The basic goal of cyber security is to secure sensitive data within a company from cyber-attacks. Cyber security protocols protect a company’s key systems and personal information and fight and prevent security breaches compromising the institution’s data and cyber security framework. Security engineering and architecture, incident response, advice, testing, and ethical hacking are all included. Generally, the cyber security field comprises infrastructure, network, cloud, and application security. 

2. What are Most In-Demand Cyber Security Skills?

The most in-demand and must-have cyber security skills include:

• Ethical Hacking
• Firewall Administration
• Reverse Engineering
• Application Design
• Encryption
• Network Security Control
• Coding
• Internet Of Things (IoT)
• Artificial Intelligence 
• Blockchain Security
• Knowledge Of Operating Systems And Virtual Machines 

In addition to these competencies, cyber security experts should be well-versed in other in-demand technical skills useful in building secure networks, analysing and detecting security issues, and implementing risk management solutions.

3. Distinguish among Threat, Vulnerability, And Risk

Threat: 

Classifying something as a threat should have potential and adverse effects on the company that could cause damage to the computer system, including the network, server, or company as a whole. A threat can appear in any form as an individual, technology in a malware form, or even natural disasters. 

Vulnerability: 

This can also take many forms, such as an unpatched server, weak passwords, an open port on an unmonitored computer on your network, etc. Vulnerability is a gap in the system security protocols which is an open gate for various attacks and breaches. Cybercriminals can use this to gain unauthorised entry, thereby causing security breaches. 

Risk: 

The worst-case scenario is the risk that can happen when a threat is carried out against vulnerability on the network. This is potential damage to the company and is used to help motivate any security-related issues to be detected, prevented, or corrected. 

4. What are the Common Cyber Security Attacks?

The most common cyber security attacks that are attempted to obtain unjust benefit through stealing, corrupting, modifying, or destroying an organisation’s information are as follows:

• Malware and Phishing Attacks
• Man-In-The-Middle Attacks
• SQL Injections
• Password Attacks
• Dos Attacks
• Insider Threats
• DNS Tunnelling
• Zero-Day Exploits
• Cryptojacking
• Watering Hole Attacks
• Ransomware

These are malicious offensive attempts committed by gaining unauthorised access to an entity’s system or network. 

5. Define These Important Terms – VPN, Botnet, Traceroute, Man-In-The-Middle Attack and a Three-Way Handshake

Virtual Private Network (VPN): When using a public network, VPN is used to hide your IP address by connecting to a distant host server and establishing a secure network connection. It prevents third parties from tracking user activity by securing the data travelling across the network. It can also encrypt the network traffic in real-time, allowing for securing and protecting the data. 

Botnet: Botnet, also known as a robot network, is a carefully designed and advanced malware-infected network. It is centrally coordinated and capable of implementing Distributed Denial-of-Service attacks and assaults using brute-force or malware threats.

Traceroute: It is a data route that traces the movement of data across devices and the web from the source to the destination. It also identifies the locations where data is failed or is unable to be transferred. Traceroute takes the help of Internet Control Message Protocol (ICMP) packets to trace data. 

Man-In-The-Middle Attack: As the name itself suggests, Man-In-The-Middle attacks are committed by bad actors that are interfering with the conversation between two parties to gain unjust advantages such as information theft or data corruption, among other malicious intentions. 

Three-Way Handshake: This enables the reliable transmission of data between devices. In this, TCP/IP networks create client-server connections using three-way handshakes, allowing both ends of the connection to transfer data securely. 

Cyber Security Interview Questions for Seniors and Experts

These are framed to throw light on your comprehension of advanced cyber security concepts. Cyber security professionals must deeply understand the advanced concepts to qualify for higher positions in the related fields.  

1. Difference between IDS and IPS

Intrusion Detection Systems (IDS): IDS is an alert system which detects any malicious activity. It alerts the administrator if any potential threat is identified. 

Intrusion Prevention Systems (IPS): IPS is a preventive measure or protocol that responds to threats and can reject them. IPS manages to issue firewall directives and server connections in addition to rejecting data packets.

2. HIDS vs NIDS, Are They the Same?

Host-Based Intrusion Detection Systems (HIDS): To catch the inside threats and malicious data packets that are originating from within the entity, HIDS is implemented. HIDS works by reviewing the historical information to identify the unusual cyber attacks and host-based action changes that trigger an alert. 

Network-Based Intrusion Detection Systems (NIDS): This is more advanced than HIDS. NIDS identifies threats on a real-time basis through live data tracking of network traffic. This approach catches the hacker even before a complete security breach occurs. 

3. Explain CIA Triad and SSL Encryption?

CIA Triad: The CIA Triad is a security model representing the essential components of information security and supporting commercial organisations in developing cyber security strategies. Confidentiality, Integrity, and Availability are the three aspects of the CIA triad. Data access privileges are granted only to authorised individuals and procedures to maintain confidentiality. 

SSL Encryption: Secure Sockets Layer(SSL) is encryption that creates a secure internet connection. It protects the client-client, client-server, and server-server connections, preventing unauthorised third parties from tampering with the online data. An advanced and updated Transport Layer Security (TLS) encryption has replaced the SSL as a standard security certificate. 

4. Difference between Black Hat Hackers Vs. White Hat Hackers Vs. Grey Hat Hackers: Which Type of Hackers are Illegal?

Black hat hackers have malicious intentions for the exploitation of an organisation’s data. The black hat hackers use the knowledge of cyber security in a way that includes the prohibited entry into the company’s related network and systems, which is illegal.

White hat hackers, also known as ethical hackers, are often hired by business entities to analyse the vulnerabilities and weaknesses in their systems and networks. Since it is operated with permission, it is legal and valid. 

Grey hat hackers search for the system’s vulnerabilities without permission and offer to fix the issue for a certain price. They do not exploit the vulnerability directly, but since they committed the intrusion without permission, this can be considered unethical and illegal. 

5. Explain the Difference between Black Box Testing and White Box Testing

Black Box Testing: This sort of testing assesses a software product’s behaviour and functionality. There is no need for software engineering experience, and the testing is done from the standpoint of the end-user. 

White Box Testing: Contrary to black-box testing, white-box testing is implemented by the developers to assess the quality of a product’s code. For this type of testing, the testers must understand the internal operations of the product. 

Cyber Security Engineer Interview Questions

Let’s look at some of the cyber security engineer interview questions, one of the most popular and high-paying job roles. 

1. Difference between Encoding, Encryption, And Hashing

Encoding: This ensures that data is correctly formatted that can be useful for proper interpretation by applications and recipients. 

Encryption: For securing the data over private communications, the data is encrypted here. This makes the data unreadable except for the certain person who has the correct and secret key to decrypt the data. 

Hashing: Hashing method is used to maintain data integrity and authenticity. For the data or information which is being preserved, a data hash is generated against it. The data hash, a string of data, is then compared to its original form after transmission. 

Difference: Technical terminology is to be used in the right scenario in any scientific field. Knowing when to use the correct term can indicate the green flag about the candidate, which is a good sign in the interview process. 

2. Explain Cross-Site Scripting

Cross-site scripting, also known as XSS vulnerability, is a client-side code injection attack. Required security considerations during the development cycle might mitigate the serious negative effects on the business. Data validation can be practised both on the client and server sides to reduce the XSS negative effects. 

3. With Which Techniques Can You Prevent Brute-Force Login Attack?

Where the best practices of information security are implemented, these types of attacks will be at their lowest point. The best password practices should be in place on a system level to avoid the brute-force login attack. 

Cyber Security Analyst Interview Questions

A cyber security analyst is the most sought-after job role in the cyber security industry. Look into the cyber security analyst interview questions for greater insights. 

4. What Are Cyber Security Frameworks?

Four common cyber security frameworks are strictly followed to manage and mitigate the cyber security risk:

• PCI-DSS
• ISO 27001/27002
• CIS Critical Security Controls
• NIST Cyber Security Framework 

5. Explain SSL and TLS 

For secure internet communications, the SSL protocol was developed in the 1990s. Currently, TLS is mostly replacing the SSL and is launched at version 1.0. However, both the SSL/TLS terms are used interchangeably to describe secure HTTPS protocols. 

6. State the Need for DNS Monitoring

DNS monitoring can be useful in testing the connectivity strength of your local connections and the rest of the internet. Understanding the state of your connections and troubleshooting issues plays a vital part in this. Also, DNS monitoring comes into the picture to suspect any malicious activity. 

Common Cyber Security Interview Questions 

These are general interview questions that can assess your soft skills, persona, communication skills, and capacity of operation in that certain work area. 

Why Do You Choose Cyber Security As Your Career Path?

What Is The Best Challenging Project Or Work You Came Through on Your Learning Path?

Are You Always Ready to Learn New Emerging Technological Trends That Might Turn Obsolete In Little time? Are You Open To Learn New And Trending Skills Whenever Required? 

Cyber Security Scenario based Questions

Cyber security scenario-based questions can also be tested in the interview. These are nothing but based on a particular type of scenario and asked to test you for the appropriate answer and understanding of the related concepts. 

Example: 

Question: The mouse on the computer screen started to move around on its own and is clicking random things on your desktop? What shall you do?

Answer: Immediate action is to be taken by disconnecting the computer from the network and explaining the situation to the supervisor. If possible, it’s better not to turn off the computer. 

Conclusion 

Prove yourself as a worthy candidate by preparing for the interviews in advance with useful cyber security interview questions like this. Prepare like a pro and never sweat in the job interviews. Be honest and explain the concepts clearly to show your level of understanding. There’s definitely going to be a lot of pressure on you, but it’s about time you show your skills and potential. With that being said, these are some of the most-asked cyber security interview questions. Check out the other top questions for greater insights and wide exposure in the cyber security field.