According to TheRegister.com, cybersecurity training provider TryHackMe is scrambling to recruit women professionals after facing backlash for announcing an 18-person helper lineup with zero female representation for its Advent of Cyber event. The annual program offers 24 days of free beginner-level training throughout December and kicks off next week. The company admitted the omission wasn’t intentional, claiming they reached out to several women creators who either declined due to prior commitments or didn’t respond. TryHackMe is now working with Microsoft’s Eva Benn to add women to the helper list, with Benn already confirmed and others being finalized today.
The “We Tried” Defense
Here’s the thing about the “we tried but they were busy” explanation – it’s cybersecurity‘s version of “some of my best friends are…” The company claims they reached out to multiple women, including ethical hacker Katie Paxton-Fear who confirmed she was approached but couldn’t participate. But honestly, if you can’t find a single woman across the entire cybersecurity industry to join an 18-person lineup, maybe the problem isn’t availability. Maybe it’s your outreach strategy, your timing, or the fact that women might not feel particularly motivated to bail out a company that clearly didn’t prioritize diversity until called out.
The Influencer Culture Problem
Lesley Carhart, an infosec veteran at Dragos, nailed it when she called out how influencer culture is making the industry’s diversity problems worse. Cybersecurity isn’t ready to have the real conversation about sexism and ageism in the pen test/red team community. And when you combine that with the saturated influencer market, you get exactly this kind of situation – a bunch of guys taking spots that could have gone to qualified women who don’t have the same platform visibility. The company even defended itself by pointing out that only two of the top 100 cybersecurity content channels are run by women. But that’s not an excuse – that’s the problem they should be helping to solve.
Where Were The Men?
Michelle L’s criticism hits hardest – why didn’t any of these 18 men ask “who else is involved” before signing on? Every single one of them could have pushed back when they saw the all-male lineup. But as she put it, “ego is the biggest vulnerability in cyber and tech.” They were apparently too busy fighting for crumbs from a table they should be flipping over. This is exactly why diversity initiatives fail – when the people with privilege and platform don’t use their position to demand better. It’s not enough to not be part of the problem; you have to be part of the solution.
Bigger Than One Event
This isn’t really about TryHackMe’s Advent of Cyber event. It’s about why women like Michelle L are leaving tech and cybersecurity careers entirely. When she says “we aren’t safe, welcome, or paid fairly,” that’s the real story here. The industry keeps wondering why it can’t attract and retain diverse talent while simultaneously creating environments where that talent doesn’t feel valued. TryHackMe’s scramble to fix their lineup before December is just damage control. The real work – changing the culture that made this happen – is much harder. And honestly, I’m not convinced the cybersecurity industry is ready to do that work.
