Ingalls Spring 2024 Intern Review: Nathaniel Funderburk

In this Intern Review, we hear from Nathaniel Funderburk about what it's like working at Ingalls and what's next in his cybersecurity career journey.

Our Spring 2024 Internship cohort has four determined interns who’ve joined us from LSU to learn what it’s like working in a Security Operations Center (SOC). Now that they’ve had a moment to breathe, we thought it was time to conduct an interview to learn about them and their experience inside the SOC at Ingalls! 

Read on to hear from our intern, Nathaniel.

What have you learned about working within a SOC during this internship?

So far, I've learned a lot about the culture of shared knowledge between analysts, and I've learned some really interesting techniques unique to each of my teammates.

What has been the most interesting technique you've seen a threat actor attempt?

Going off that last answer, I think the most interesting technique I've seen a threat actor use so far has been a malware obfuscation using filler blocks of strings that may or may not have contained essential processes. After decrypting, I could see the amount of work that went into the Houdini RAT itself as well as how many layers of misdirection went into an individual not being able to easily see the code itself, or any of the files it created.

How has this internship influenced your outlook and career path in cybersecurity?

I think so far, I've understood more about which niche I would want in the workforce. I am interested in analyzing malware, and I want to research pen testing.

What are your favorite resources for what's happening in cybersecurity?

My biggest resource right now is my community. Whether that be co-workers, friends, or an online forum. I find the best way to keep up to date is to seek out new information, and a simple "what's new in our space" will usually reap a lot of valuable responses.

What are your upcoming activities/educational goals for the next year?

For the rest of this year and leading into next, I will be graduating from college. I also plan on putting my nose to a book/YouTube playlist to design my own operating system as a fun little project.

What do you enjoy doing in your free time to reach a work-school-life balance?

My free time mainly consists of playing new video games with my friends, reading books on subjects I find interesting, and researching how to not blow up my virtual machine this time.

Are you interested in becoming one of our awesome interns? Check out our SOC Intern Yearbook and reach out to our team directly for more details.