Training Camp Delivers First EC-Council CEH Boot Camp in Philadelphia

PHILADELPHIA — 2004 — Forty students filled a Philadelphia classroom for Training Camp’s first EC-Council Certified Ethical Hacker boot camp.

The Certified Ethical Hacker credential took an approach that still felt new in 2004. Rather than teach defense in the abstract, it walked students through the attacker’s own methods, reconnaissance, scanning, gaining access, and covering tracks, on the reasoning that you cannot protect a system against techniques you have never seen. The syllabus ran across a long list of topics, from network scanning and enumeration to malware, packet sniffing, social engineering, and attacks on web applications.

The course drew security administrators, penetration testers, and network staff who wanted to understand threats from the other side of the keyboard. That framing made some employers uneasy at first, since it meant teaching people the same steps an intruder would take. The counter-argument was simple enough. Defenders who do not know the attacks are guessing.

Forty students filled the Philadelphia classroom for that first run. Training Camp taught the material in its usual compressed format, full days of instruction and hands-on lab work rather than a drawn-out schedule. Because the class was large by boot-camp standards, instructors leaned on the lab exercises to keep forty people working rather than lecturing at them for days on end, so students left having actually performed the techniques rather than only read about them.

“You learn to defend a network by seeing exactly how someone would break into it,” said Chris Porter, Chief Executive Officer. “That first Philadelphia class took to it quickly. Forty people, a lot of questions, and a lot of hands on keyboards.”

The class began a working relationship with EC-Council that later widened to include CHFI forensics training and the CCISO credential for senior security leaders. CEH itself became one of the better-known names in offensive security certification.

About Training Camp: Training Camp delivers accelerated, exam-focused certification boot camps for IT and cybersecurity professionals, working with major certifying bodies to prepare individuals as well as corporate, government, and military teams.

Media Contact: Magnus Carter, mcarter@trainingcamp.com