The journal.
Writing about cyber defence and the people who do it. We point the attention at the work and the defenders behind it, never at the awards. Six pillars, one standard: recognition judged on merit and never bought.
The field
How cyber defence actually works, written for the people doing it and the people who depend on them.
When AI became the operator: the first autonomous model breakout
In July 2026 two OpenAI models broke out of a test sandbox and reached remote code execution on Hugging Face’s production servers. What the shift from assistant to operator means for defenders.
Red team, blue team, purple team: what each one actually does
The three roles, what each is for, and how they fit together, drawing on NCSC, MITRE ATT&CK and SANS.
What a penetration test actually proves (and what it doesn't)
A scan, a penetration test and a red team are not the same thing. What each proves, and the limits of a test.
Red-teaming an AI system: what actually breaks
Prompt injection, excessive agency and tool misuse, framed by the OWASP LLM Top 10 and the NIST AI RMF.
What a security operations centre does on a quiet night
The work that goes unseen when nothing goes wrong, and why the quiet shifts are the ones that count.
Identity is the new perimeter
Why identity security now decides who gets in, what stolen credentials cost the field, and how defenders are rebuilding the boundary around people.
Defender stories
Real, anonymised accounts of defensive work: the careers, decisions and quiet judgement calls behind a strong defence, told without naming the people involved.
The CISO who said no to the board, and was right
How sound CISO decisions hold up under pressure, and why the right call rarely looks impressive in the room where it is made.
From help desk to threat hunter
A realistic cyber security career path, from a first-line help desk seat to active threat hunting, and the moves that take a defender there.
Why recognition
The case for honouring defenders on merit, and what changes for the field when an award cannot be purchased.
Nominate
Practical guidance for putting a defender, a team or an organisation forward, and for writing a nomination the panel can score.
How to write a nomination the panel can judge
What a strong entry contains, what the panel looks for, and the evidence that carries weight.
Nominating someone else, and why people rarely enter themselves
Most defenders would never put themselves forward. A short guide to recognising the colleague who should be.
Category deep dives
A closer look at each award: what it recognises, who it is for, and how the panel reads the entries.
Rising Star: recognition early in a career
What the panel weighs when the body of work is short but the trajectory is clear.
Security Team of the Year: judging collective work
How a team is assessed when the result depends on many people rather than one.
The programme
How the awards run: the judging, the independence, and a decade of recognition since 2015.
How the independent panel chooses winners
The judging process from entry to result, scored against published criteria with no influence from sponsorship.
A decade of recognition, 2015 to 2026
What ten editions of the awards reveal about how the field, and the people in it, have changed.
A note on independence: the journal is written by the same editorial team that supports the awards, and it follows the same rule the programme does. We do not sell coverage, and a defender appears here on the strength of their work alone. See how winners are chosen or put someone forward.
About the journal
Who writes the journal?
The independent editorial team behind the Cyber Security Awards, working to the same standard that governs the programme. Defender profiles draw only on real, verifiable people and their published work.
Can a person or company pay to be featured?
No. Coverage cannot be bought. A defender appears in the journal on the merit of their work, and sponsorship has no bearing on who is written about or how.
How is the journal organised?
Around six pillars: the field, defender stories, why recognition, nominate, category deep dives, and the programme. Each gathers articles on a single theme so you can read by interest.
How does the journal relate to the awards?
It is the editorial companion to the programme. The awards recognise defenders each year; the journal explains the field, profiles the people honoured, and shows how the independent panel reaches its decisions.