Empowering Women: Pioneers in Cybersecurity Break New Ground

At a glance

• More women in security: Women are a growing share of the cybersecurity workforce, though still a minority.
• Women’s History Month events are being used to draw students into the field.
• Student-run event at FIU: The campus chapter of Women in CyberSecurity (WiCyS) held a Women’s History Month event on March 3, 2025.
• Challenges and opportunities still shape women’s careers in security, with mentorship a recurring theme.

Women in security, then and now

Security has become one of tech’s fastest-growing fields, and women are a bigger part of it than they used to be. They are still outnumbered. Events tied to Women’s History Month have turned into a way to celebrate their work and recruit the next group of students.

Inside the FIU event

On March 3, 2025, the Women in CyberSecurity (WiCyS) chapter at Florida International University hosted a Women’s History Month event to promote inclusion and show students the range of careers in the field, according to the student newspaper PantherNOW. The session was open to all FIU students and included networking.

The Code Girls and mentorship

WiCyS Vice President Pamela Uriarte led the event. Her presentation covered women in STEM history, including the Code Girls, thousands of women recruited by the U.S. Army and Navy whose codebreaking work was crucial during World War II. “Cybersecurity is an evolving field that opens up different pathways,” Uriarte said, as quoted by PantherNOW.

Barriers that remain

Women have made real gains in security, but the field is still mostly male. Bias, sometimes subtle and sometimes not, still gets in the way. Community support helps women push through it.

Mentorship came up again and again at the event. “There are barriers in mentorship,” Uriarte told PantherNOW. “Personally, I would like to have someone to lean on.” WiCyS pitches itself as that support network.

More women, more defenders

Demand for security staff will keep growing as more of life moves online. Women bring perspectives and leadership the field needs, and events like this one point students toward it. Encouraging more women to join will help close the talent gap and make the field stronger.

Frank Jones, CISSP

Frank Jones has loved computers from the age of 13. Frank got his hacking career started when he downloaded a war dialing program that he used to detect dial up modems in his hometown of Chicago. Frank Jones now works as a JAVA coder and cyber security researcher.