3 key tips from Mia Landsem from Orange Cyberdefense to advance in your career

While only 8% of women in Tech are C-Level in Europe, at 50inTech, we want to highlight powerful and positive role models; women leaders who are spearheading innovation in Tech. Mia Landsem is a best-selling author with numerous TV appearances. As an ethical cyberhacker for?Orange, she focuses on fighting online harassment and blackmail. Mia has lectured at over 300 schools and regularly helps train law enforcement to catch criminals posting pictures of minors.

“Women have a great potential to do good in this world of tech. We are hacktivists, anti-child abuse crusaders and great leaders. I think every company would do better by having close to having a 50/50 gender balance. Also, women are badass and they should do whatever they want!”

Turning online image abuse into a blossoming career?

Mia Landsem was horrified when she discovered her ex-boyfriend had spread a nude photo of her online. After receiving hundreds of unwanted messages and being recognized in public, she had to get away from it all and left her hometown. Even after enrolling in a bachelor's in sports psychology at the Norwegian School of Sports Sciences, the photo continued to haunt her.?

A year later, when she tried to report the incident to the police, she was told the case was “too old” to be filed as harassment. Mia challenged the decision, arguing it should be filed under sexual child harassment and won. But her ex was only fined $500 for ruining her life. Since then, Mia has dedicated her life to helping other girls report these crimes to the police.?

Along her journey, Mia picked up a lot of IT skills, which she then developed by studying Network and IT Security.?“I was a gamer with no technical training. But my friends and I, we found some security mistakes made by the owners of those pages that revealed their IP addresses. This enabled us to identify who was posting these pictures. Then we just started contacting the girls and telling them how to use this evidence, go over the logs, and report these crimes to the police. I wanted to be there for the girls and offer them support — to tell them in a safe environment that they were victims of sexual abuse.”

Today, she works as an ethical cyberhacker at Orange Cyberdefense.?“As ethical hackers, we’re using the same techniques as bad hackers to break into websites, APIs, systems and networks — but we're doing it on behalf of the customer. Whenever they launch an app or a new website, a lot of people are going to attack it, so they need us to look for weaknesses.”

1. Find your crew and nurture your connections

Mia highlights the importance of finding your community in finding career success. “Gaming is a great place to connect. Some of my best friends come from the gaming community we had at my school. Two of those girls now work with me. You just have to find your crew, talk every day, go to conventions, security festivals, listen to talks, and ask your school for help in finding contacts.”

Due to widespread sexism in the workplace and online, finding safe spaces that support women is all the more important. Even online on platforms such as Linkedin, many women have to deal with unwanted approaches.

“Linkedin is not a dating app,” says Mia. “It might scare women to speak up and join important discussions because of the fear of sexual harassment and sexism. Or just not being seen as professional. But I will not stand here and watch others get harassed.”?

That’s why Mia has found and nurtured several safe spaces throughout her career. “I made a Women in Cybersecurity Norway group on Facebook — there’s almost 200 of us, and it's great to just connect and to be able to say ‘hi I'm having a hard time here, could someone please help me?’”?

??Mia will be sharing her story and key learnings at our upcoming virtual Women in Cyber and Cloud Bootcamp.

?? Register now, for free.

However, that doesn’t mean that Mia isn’t optimistic about the generational shift taking place today when it comes to the Internet’s appeal to young women. And she sees gaming as a frontrunner for greater inclusion.

“I think a lot of women have been scared away from the Internet. I was the only girl gamer in my class, but things are changing; today, half the girls in the class are gamers. I think I would never have ended up in cyber if it wasn't for gaming.”

She also underscores the power of having strong female role models.

“Each time I go on TV, girls approach me afterward telling me they applied to programming schools after seeing me. Still, most women in tech end up in non-technical roles like sales, marketing, and risk and compliance. That’s why it’s also important that women in tech recruit other women and show them it’s a safe space.”

2. Roll up your sleeves: practice makes perfect

• Focus on what you enjoy:?“Everyone can make bread, but to make really good bread, you need to practice. I always tell young women: What course did you enjoy the most in school? Then focus on that and roll up your sleeves and gain experience.
• For instance, I’m not just a hacker. The course I enjoyed the most was forensics, where you basically search for digital evidence of a crime. It’s a bit like being a former criminal of a gang and now you're working for the police solving gang crimes — even though I was never an illegal hacker, just for the record.”
• Build a personal brand… or don’t:?“Tech recruiters are so hungry for people. If you choose a career in cybersecurity, they will be scrambling to reach out to you via email and LinkedIn, especially if you're a woman. Of course, not everyone needs to build a brand. Some people don't even have social media, but they are still highly in-demand professionals. There’s no right answer for building your career.”
• Publish on GitHub:?“A lot of people look at GitHub, so if you're a programmer or you make stuff, you should absolutely have something there.”
• Talk at events: “You can also apply to give talks and presentations at events. Tech conventions will often publish a call for papers. You can reach out saying, ‘I want to talk about this specific topic’, and if you're lucky, you will get invited to speak on stage. Afterwards, you can connect with lots of people from the industry. A lot of the more technical people are anxious about being in the spotlight, but I think people should push themselves to go out there and just do it.”

3. Don’t let a lack of skills hold you back

“A lot of people applying to technical roles are afraid of the technical interviews. When I applied to?Orange, I was brutally honest with them. I said, I know nothing about this nor that, but I'm here to learn and I am ready to do whatever it takes.?

Just be completely honest with yourself, and with the recruiter, about what you want to learn. What do you want to be great at? That's what they care about. They want people that are eager to learn, that are passionate about what they're doing.?

Another thing is: you don't have to prove yourself to anyone. Just do your job and know your own worth. People will feel threatened because you are a woman in tech, and you will probably face sexist comments during your career. Just don’t let these get to you.”

Remember that confidence is something that you can build. For Mia, her confidence is founded on her being able to see the value of what she is doing.?

How to accelerate your career?

Join 50inTech.?Get access to the jobs that suit you in the most inclusive startups, scales up and corporates in Tech. Equal pay, work/life balance, fair career paths, anti-discrimination actions, we have over 60 companies listed that are committed to these critical pillars.

????Get matched on 50inTech

Other news to help Women Take The Lead:

??Upcoming event: Women in Cyber and Cloud - April 27 & 28?

With only 11% of women in Cybersecurity and 14% in cloud computing in Europe,?this free Bootcamp?is designed to give women interested in Cybersecurity and Cloud a chance to meet other women in the industry, especially ones in leadership roles. They can inspire each other and exchange tools, tips and tricks to help them kickstart or upskill their careers.

????Register for free here

??Missed our last edition? We heard from Amandine Durr, CPO at Back Market

“There are many writings about impostor syndrome and I know it's easier said than done, but trust yourself, I mean you're your worst enemy, if you get prepared and build your story you’ll build your self-confidence.”

????Read it now