The Beatles song "With a Little Help from My Friends", written by John Lennon and Paul McCartney, was specifically penned as Ringo Starr’s track for the album “Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band”.  In other words, Lennon and McCartney were giving a little help to their friend Ringo. The song became what some consider one of the greatest songs of all time, proving that helping your friends is an excellent strategy for success.

The word community is derived from the Latin word communitas, defining a group with common interests. Geographically, it could also be a small settlement or city-state. One of the first city-states was Sumer, located in ancient Mesopotamia (now southern Iraq).   The people of Sumer made many advances in technology, including a form of writing called cuneiform. They also were pioneers in military technology.

Their walled cities provided security against outside attacks, just as firewalls protect our networks today. Guards or soldiers were employed to provide added protection, particularly in times of war. As long as enough guards were available to thwart the attacks, the citizens remained safe. 

Cybersecurity engineers, the guards of cyber-space, are becoming very scarce and putting us at risk. Recently a director in Cisco’s (News - Alert) services group, Rashesh Jethi, stated that it is “10- to 12-times harder to find cybersecurity professionals than it is to find general IT professionals."  In ancient times, help could sometimes be made available from friendly neighboring city-states. Today’s cyberspace community is global and comprises millions, so looking to your neighbors may not seem logical at first, but this ancient technique remains a solid strategy albeit for a much larger community. Actually, the growing shortage of cybersecurity professionals combined with the proliferation of malware and other threats means that we need friends more than ever before. But where can we we find them? 

The best place to start is with established virtual communities that have a robust global presence. For example, TMCnet’s Online Communities allow access to more than 4 million pages on TMCnet covering a wide range of topics including cybersecurity. They are a way to identify other players with similar security interests. Cloud Computing, INTERNET TELEPHONY, and the IoT Evolution Magazine also reinforces the value of developer communities working together to help each other.   

Max Schroeder is vice president emeritus of FaxCore Inc. (www.faxcore.com ). Rich Tehrani is the CEO and group editor-in-chief at TMC (News - Alert), and conference chairman of ITEXPO.