How we got here - why the lack of women in tech has everything to do with misogyny

I've spent the past week posting pictures of old adverts for tech solutions. There are dozens of adverts, and hundreds when it comes to gaming, that reinforces the view that tech is for men. Many of these adverts simply target men and ignore women, but many are pure misogyny and even advocate violence against women.

The idea that women aren't interested in tech is pervasive. Progress is being made but it hasn't gone far enough (24% of the cyber industry now identifies as female compared to 11% a few years ago according to ISC2). I've heard this said many times and it is nearly always used as an excuse for inaction. For many, it's natural that women are not interested; almost biological and immutable.

When computer studies was in it's infancy, women were studying it at an equal rate to men. This dropped significantly in the early '80s, around the time that tech became available at home. The way in which this was advertised is often given as a cause of that drop. A societal norm was set that has influenced how children learn, play, and are taught.

Women were interested in tech before. Women are interested now. Women and girls are interested when they are shown it's safe to do so (safe from judgment but also physically). And the evidence that diverse teams perform better, is overwhelming.

The great news is we can change this. There are so many wonderful women (and men) going into schools and colleges, showing girls that there are women in tech. There are initiatives to attract women into the industry later in life too. But if we are going to change it, we need to understand how we got here. We need to remove the excuse that women just aren't interested.

This isn't about complaining, or being a victim. We didn't double the number of women in cyber by complaining; we did it through action. But I don't believe you can fix a problem without changing the cause of that problem. And here is that cause.