Ethical Hacking

The Ethical Hacker course prepares learners with skills to proactively discover vulnerabilities before the cybercriminals do. Learners will become proficient in the art of scoping, executing, and reporting on vulnerability assessments, while recommending mitigation strategies.

Ethical hacking is the use of hacking techniques by friendly parties in an attempt to uncover, understand and fix security vulnerabilities in a network or computer system.

Ethical hackers have the same skills and use the same tools and tactics as malicious hackers, but their goal is always to improve network security without harming the network or its users.

In many ways, ethical hacking is like a rehearsal for real-world cyberattacks. Organizations hire ethical hackers to launch simulated attacks on their computer networks. During these attacks, the ethical hackers demonstrate how actual cybercriminals break into a network and the damage they could do once inside.

The organization’s security analysts can use this information to eliminate vulnerabilities, strengthen security systems and protect sensitive data.

The terms "ethical hacking" and "penetration testing" are sometimes used interchangeably. However, penetration tests are only one of the methods that ethical hackers use. Ethical hackers can also conduct vulnerability assessments, malware analysis and other information security services.

While there are many ways to assess cybersecurity, ethical hacking can help companies understand network vulnerabilities from an attacker's perspective. By hacking networks with permission, ethical hackers can show how malicious hackers exploit various vulnerabilities and help the company discover and close the most critical ones.

An ethical hacker's perspective may also turn up things that internal security analysts might miss. For example, ethical hackers go toe-to-toe with firewalls, cryptography algorithms, intrusion detection systems (IDSs), extended detection systems (XDRs) and other countermeasures. As a result, they know exactly how these defenses work in practice—and where they fall short—without the company suffering an actual data breach.

Through the gamified narrative in the course and real-world inspired hands-on practice labs, students develop essential workforce readiness skills, laying a solid foundation in offensive security.

• Get job-ready for Offensive Security roles such as Ethical Hacker or Penetration Tester.
• Understand the mindset and tactics of cybercriminals to strengthen your defensive security skillset.
• Gain needed skills for implementing security controls and monitoring, analyzing, and responding to current security threats.

Fall 2025: 

September 2 - November 20, 2025 | Tuesdays & Thursdays | 5:30 - 9:00 pm 

Total Instructional Hours: 77; Total Sessions: 22; ONLINE

$995 + $25 registration fee

Total: $1,020*

*CCNY students, staff, and Alumni Association members receive a 10% discount.
Payment plan options are available to assist with tuition affordability.

Arnold Ramsaran

Arnold holds a Master of Science degree in Cyber Security and Cyber Terrorism, he is a Systems Engineer for Cisco Systems, starting in 2013 he was a Network Engineer for the National September 11th Memorial & Museum at Ground Zero, in his time there he helped to open the Museum (May 2014) by completing their wired and wireless IT infrastructure to host the President of the United States and subsequently the Pope. Arnold is also an ITQ Instructor for Cisco Networking Academy for Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute. As an ITQ Instructor he trains the U.S. Navy training officers on naval bases, other Cisco Academy instructors and legally blind students. Arnold also holds a Bachelor’s degree in Computer Science.