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Learner Reviews & Feedback for IT Security: Defense against the digital dark arts by Google

4.8
stars
23,669 ratings

About the Course

This course covers a wide variety of IT security concepts, tools, and best practices. It introduces threats and attacks and the many ways they can show up. We’ll give you some background of encryption algorithms and how they’re used to safeguard data. Then, we’ll dive into the three As of information security: authentication, authorization, and accounting. We’ll also cover network security solutions, ranging from firewalls to Wifi encryption options. The course is rounded out by putting all these elements together into a multi-layered, in-depth security architecture, followed by recommendations on how to integrate a culture of security into your organization or team. At the end of this course, you’ll understand: ● how various encryption algorithms and techniques work as well as their benefits and limitations. ● various authentication systems and types. ● the difference between authentication and authorization. ● how to evaluate potential risks and recommend ways to reduce risk. ● best practices for securing a network. ● how to help others to grasp security concepts and protect themselves. ● new AI skills from Google experts to help complete IT tasks....

Top reviews

PK

Apr 9, 2022

Great course for beginners and experts. Easy to understand and a good refresher for those who have been into IT for a long date. Recommend it to everyone looking for a high quality course on coursera.

SM

Feb 28, 2024

I loved the whole experience beginning to end. I came in already having a BA from state university. Well organized, well produced, and combined with note-taking this course is a no-brainer. Go for it!

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3301 - 3325 of 3,822 Reviews for IT Security: Defense against the digital dark arts

By William B D

Mar 29, 2018

This is a great class, and I learned a lot.

However, the final assignment is not very fair. We are asked to provide recommendations and cover certain topics, but the rubric for grading ask for much more than what the assignment wants. This means there is a good change that after you have had the assignment graded by three peers, you will have to re-do the whole assignment and find three more people to review it.

Whoever wrote the assignment should have also been the one to write the grading rubric as well. The disconnect between the two is terrible.

By Jonathan M

Oct 28, 2018

Other than Networking section, this was one of the toughest courses, but very informational. The final peer review test was not straightforward enough on what to produce as a "report" result. It did not provide enough of what was expected (details). They should have hinted that details (password length, times, characters, 802.11x, SIDS, SIPS, etc.) was too specific on what was asked in the peer review and nothing about the concepts of security (layers or security, AD, Radius or other).

By Kitti V

Jul 24, 2023

I really liked the instructor, his vibes impacted the learning experience positivitely. However, in many cases I felt like there is too much theory going on. When he shared specific examples, that was very useful to understand how things work or what has happened like real life scenarios. I would have been happier to learn about more practical tools that could be useful in everydays, in my home environment. But in general, the course made me become interested in cybersecurity more!

By Michael I k

Mar 28, 2023

Really Enjoyed this course. But i suffer a mild form of ADHD and have to read long words afew times for them to register better in my head. This then when having to read things afew times and sections of the course have an added time limit it makes my stress levels and panic levels elevate. I think much more people would enjoy the course better if they felt less pressure of a ticking time limit so information can soak in at their pace. Apart from that loved the course.

By Eddie M

Jun 20, 2018

i wish there was a way to get all the dialogue printed as a pdf file. it takes a lot of time and effort to find the material you need by clicking over one hudred links to see the transcript. im one of those people that likes a textbook for class. overall i think the most difficult course to understand the critical points of security. glad its over on to the next ! probably take the comptia A+ test after reviewing for free online or if coursera has a cheap class on it .

By Teresa M

Mar 29, 2021

Would have been more interesting if there were a variety of instructors. This course was more like a roving dictionary of terms. The videos did not prepare us very well for the qwiklabs. It was mostly acronym based without a good demonstration of the skills needed to pass the qwiklabs. I did appreciate the challenge of the final graded assessments. That is actually what I learned from the most as I researched a variety of websites in order to write the project.

By Ian M

Aug 4, 2020

Instructor was very clear and did a great job overall. Sometimes it was obvious that someone wrote this out. Teleprompter or not, it read like a George Lucas script in places. Just technical jargon flying at us. Not the teacher's fault. Could use a little more writing or a few more images on screen to help make sense as the jargon is being thrown at us. Overall, though, intelligently designed and professionally done. Again, the instructor was great! Thanks.

By Mikey B

Aug 15, 2020

It was not bad, definitely better than the last course. My only issue was sometimes the topics were very broad and then would get very detailed. This made the quizes difficult because the questions had range of difficulty. Sometimes the quiz questions would ask something that was only mentioned in one sentence of the lecture which made it difficult even to review. Would like to have used more tools in the class than just learning about computer security.

By Rodrigo G L

Dec 16, 2020

It's a huge amount of information fired like a machine gun. In general it is a good course, but I do not see the point of so many minutes of video dedicated to defining one term after another that could well be delivered in written format, the real benefit of audiovisual language is not taken.

Of the total of the course could be a complete specialization. Something like "Google Cyber Security Professional Certificate" would be appreciated in the future.

By Silvio A D d O

Dec 15, 2023

I have initial experience in system administration and network infrastructure, but this course has expanded my knowledge and allowed me to learn professional techniques and procedures. I wanted to take this course to increase my chances in the job market and improve my skills. I hope that these skills will help me achieve my goals in the near future. I enjoyed the teaching methodology and the possibility of executing some techniques in a practical way

By Richard ( M

Nov 4, 2020

Thanks Google with the GISC Canada project and this opportunity to go through this course. Our course administrator/Google IT Support Certificate Learning Facilitor is great. As a "young whipper snapper" with a teaching career he has had the energy to put 50 individuals through were help was needed. As well as pivoting to accommodate the year from hell and facilitating methods with COVID this has gone amazingly well. Regards,

Richard (Rick) Medlock

By Gerardo A

Sep 2, 2020

This course gives you the total picture of what IT Security as a whole and that it shows the every changing nature of why security in IT infrastructure is important even if you have the latest and most expensive technology does not guarantee that your important data and information are safe. I find it very interesting and it really makes you realize how fragile and vulnerable your system if you are not careful and aware of the threats that abound.

By Bernadette S

Oct 17, 2022

I had to complete this course in three months as per the requirement from the military resource page that I found it on. Thirty weeks of content rolled into three months time is extensive and I would not wish that timeframe on any person. There is alot of useful information to be had and I wish that this course was formulated at a slower pace for people to fully grasp the material that is provided. More hands on labs would also be beneficial.

By Joseph G

Jul 7, 2019

A thorough foundational course in information security, to be sure. But I did find it a bit difficult to absorb the more intricate material given that it was distributed rapidly through longer (than usual) videos. I personally think that this course, its concepts would be better digested via shorter videos and more in the way of diagrams and other visual aids. I found myself stopping many of the videos and rewinding them just to take notes.

By Christopher M

Sep 2, 2019

This course is really superb for introducing cybersecurity best practices, though it offers so many different analytical tools that relatively few are looked at in depth and it would benefit from more labs. That said, this course made me more conscious about how I treat security and helped me think analytically about risks that are taken on a given network, which made it very useful. I'm excited to apply this knowledge in a new role!

By Robert R

Dec 25, 2022

This was a great course for me. I would have given it 5 stars, however, it is a few years outdated. some of the information is 5 years old and that is old in the technology world. They presented WPA2 as the top wireless protection and we are now using WPA3 for one example. also many of the articles that are for external reading are very dated as well. great course just hope they update some of the content soon for future students.

By Thu B

Dec 8, 2019

A bit shock at first. So many concepts to absorb at a very short time. My compliment to the team to condense all these complicated concepts into a concise and easily digested content. This course content gave me the essential frame to expand my knowledge in this area. I read some of the documents on the net and really admired the good job the team had done to convey such huge and complex field to us.

By Luis B

Mar 4, 2022

I really enjoyed this course! One recommendation - please revisit closed captions. Sometimes the closed captions block the demonstrations at the bottom of the video, especially in the lessons demonstrating running a terminal in Linux. Also some closed captions misidentify the lecturers' words and the wrong word is used, which can lead to confusion when the lecturer is teaching a concept. Thanks!!

By Mohamed F A A

Apr 21, 2021

This is an excellent course that I will recommend to any one who want to work as an IT Support Professionnal and thank you to all contributors indeed. However this course will be more effective with more hands on labs or indicating how to setup a fictive IT Infrastructure for a given organisation using simulator tool such as GNS3 for example.... Good continuation Google in helping people!

By Landon M

Nov 13, 2020

The one negative of this course is that it is a lot of information just being thrown at you. There are very few ways to actually put the information you learn into practice through labs or other means. This being said, the overall course is great, it teaches you a lot and reinforces information that you may have already had and I would recommend it for anyone that is interested in IT.

By SecureGive

Jul 1, 2020

It's a great course! I learned a ton, and the presenter did a great job! The only reason I didn't give the course 5 stars is because a lot of topics aren't covered in enough detail to help you really understand them. A lot of topics are given such a high level overview that I had to research the topics on other websites to really understand them. Otherwise, it's a great course!

By Don G M

Apr 9, 2019

Very informative with a broad range of topics, and nicely explained with smart multiple choice quizzes. However, rather than showing the instructor speaking most of the time, it would be MUCH more helpful if they put up static diagrams or key points on the screen. Some of the content is complex, so diagrams on the screen while he's speaking will help greatly.

By Brooke F

Sep 11, 2018

This was a pretty interesting course. I really wish there was some more hands on. It was very much theory and concepts with no demonstration on how to implement most of it. Yes there was links to some third party, or open source, programs that could help with secure, but no real world how to implement or do anything. I did learn a lot though.

By Martin D

May 5, 2019

Pro: Lots of good information. Has definitely motivated me to learn more about this important subject. I really liked having the transcript available.

Con: Hands on labs are good, but they seemed a bit superficial. Would have been nice to have multiple presenters, perhaps teach various concepts through interviews with expert practitioners.

By Josh P

Oct 6, 2023

Overall the course was a fun course to take. Week 3 was a little bit challenging to stay focused with repetitive with the "ticket ticket ticket" stuff but I managed to get through it. I would definitely recommend it to anyone who is interested in cybersecurity or wanting to broaden their knowledge in the IT space.