Gender Gap: Women Represent Only 11% of the Information-Security Workforce & 14% of Computer Science Graduates

By Zubair Alexander

- On November 5, 2013

I read an interesting article today written by Michael Kassner for TechRepublic. In his article he explains why International Information Systems Security Certification Consortium (ISC)2 and the consulting firm of Frost & Sullivan believe they understand why digital bad guys are winning. They are winning primarily because not enough attention is being paid by Information-Security departments to company business objectives and they aren't communicating effectively with other departments. Basically the two organizations go on to make the point that the reason the bad guys are winning is that there aren't enough women in the Information-security field, as documented in their report: Agents of Change: Women in the Information Security Profession. Here are a couple of noticeable statistics.

Women only represent 11% of the Information-Security workforce.
In 2012, women accounted for 46.9% of the United States total labor force and 51.5% of United States management, professional, and related positions.

For more information you should check out Michael Kassner's article and read the report Agents of Change: Women in the Information Security Profession. My Take It doesn't take a rocket scientist to figure out that women are under-represented in the Information-Security workforce in United States and we desperately need more diversity. Although the report points to the under-representation of women in Information-Security workforce, I have been talking for at least a decade about the under-representation of women in technology in general. As of November 3, 2013, only 14 percent of computer science graduates are women. There are too many skills where women often outperform men and by diversifying the workforce we will be able to even out the playing field and reduce gender-dominance, which will lead to a more prosper nation. The Information-Security white paper referenced above makes the point for me. Frankly, I believe we need more women not just in technology but in other industries as well. We need more women entrepreneurs, CEOs, judges, astronauts, and even presidents of the United States. Here are some more statistics. According to New York Times article published on April 17, 2010: "Women own 40 percent of the private businesses in the United States, according to the Center for Women’s Business Research. But they create only 8 percent of the venture-backed tech start-ups, according to Astia, a nonprofit group that advises female entrepreneurs. That disparity reaches beyond entrepreneurs. Women account for just 6 percent of the chief executives of the top 100 tech companies, and 22 percent of the software engineers at tech companies over all, according to the National Center for Women and Information Technology. And among venture capitalists, the population of financiers who control the purse strings for a majority of tech start-ups, just 14 percent are women, the National Venture Capital Association says."