Theres plenty of alphabet soup certifications out there now for security pros (CISSP, SSCP, CEH, all of the SANS certs, etc) Which ones are best for which jobs, i mean i've heard CISSP is gunned for by more of a manager type than a field consultants, and the CEH is pretty worthless when it comes to the resume. Anyone with these certs or others be able to clear up the rumors? How much more valuable do some of these certs make you in the eyes of a potential employer? Was it worth it?
I went on a certification binge a couple of years ago (cissp, ccsa, ccnp, ccdp, netwok+, security+, nsa-iam)
Looking back on it, I think having certifications helps your resume stand out from others. But I really don't think any of them were requirements of any of my employers. The only one that did seem to help was the CISSP. But that was more because of an internal rivalry on which security team at this company had the most CISSPs... not because of the certification itself. So its easier to get an interview because of certs, but after that, it matters little (for me)
The general view is that CISSP is more slanted toward management and I suppose I would agree with that. There is little technical knowledge needed for the CISSP. (I'm thinking of when i first learned to subnet for the CCNA) More than anything the CISSP forces you to get a good high-level overview on every single area of Information Security. And while I haven't used much of this other information (practically) it has helped me make decisions with little information, and it makes me feel more confident when talking about areas that I'm not an expert in (because I at least know something about it)
If you are looking for certs to help you with potential employers, then I would tend to concentrate on vendor specific certs that the employer would need. If you wan't to learn more about the field, I would go with CISSP.
