Subject-matter expert
Erik Choron
Erik brings over 20 years of IT experience to his training. He holds nearly 20 IT certifications, the majority of which focus on cybersecurity. Prior to joining CBT Nuggets, he served as a First Sergeant in the U.S. Army. His interest in tech and eventually IT was spurred after receiving a 486 computer from his grandfather and learning Basic and Pascal. When Erik isn't creating training videos, he enjoys spending time with his family, going to professional wrestling events, and doing mechanical work.
Credentials
Certifications Erik Choron holds
Vendor-issued credentials Erik holds — the hands-on IT background behind the courses your team will train on.
- Certifications: Certified Ethical Hacker
- GIAC Continuous Monitoring Certification (GMON)
- GIAC Systems and Network Auditor (GSNA)
- GIAC Critical Controls Certification (GCCC),GIAC Certified Intrusion Analyst (GCIA) - Gold
- GIAC Certified Incident Handler (GCIH)
- GIAC Certified Enterprise Defender (GCED)
- GIAC Security Essentials (GSEC)
- Microsoft MCSA: Server 2012
- CompTIA Security+
- CompTIA Cloud+
- CompTIA A+
- PMI® Project Management Professional (PMP)
Training coverage
Courses that carry Erik Choron's expertise into your team plan
Use these courses as proof of coverage for the roles and technologies your team needs to support.
Courses Erik Choron teaches
12 courses
Cisco
Cisco CCNP Security Core 350-701 SCOR
Security teams often inherit fragmented controls across firewalls, VPNs, endpoints, cloud services, and identity systems. That fragmentation slows incident response and raises change risk. This intermediate, 32.3-hour course gives IT Directors one structured path that maps those controls to the Cisco CCNP Security Core (350-701 SCOR) v2.0 exam. It is built for network administrators, security engineers, and IT practitioners who already know networking fundamentals. They work through threat concepts, cryptography, IPSec and remote access VPNs, Layer 2 hardening, Cisco FTD, cloud shared responsibility, Splunk basics, endpoint and email threat defense, Cisco ISE, exfiltration, visibility, and zero trust. Many lessons include configuration and verification. Learners build an FTD lab, apply decryption, IPS, malware, and URL filtering policies, and use ISE policy sets with 802.1X, MAB, and CoA to move authenticated users into the right VLAN. Your team can rehearse changes in a lab before they reach production. Training Managers can assign the course through CBT Nuggets Playlists and track progress with Team Reporting. That supports a consistent certification push or a security operations handoff.
CompTIA
CompTIA CySA+ (CS0-004)
Security operations break down when every analyst investigates, prioritizes, and escalates differently. This CompTIA Cybersecurity Analyst CySA+ (CS0-004) course gives IT Directors and Security Team Leads a shared analyst playbook for detection, vulnerability management, and incident response, aligned to the CySA+ certification. It is built for SOC analysts, vulnerability management staff, incident responders, and infrastructure practitioners moving into security operations. Learners work through logging architecture, OS hardening, and enterprise access controls, then move into malicious activity indicators, malware and script analysis, regex, threat intelligence and hunting, vulnerability scoring and reporting, structured incident response, and after-action review. A dedicated module covers AI in security operations, including prompt injection, data and model poisoning, and AI usage policies. At roughly 20 hours of video across 23 skills, the course can be assigned over several weeks without pulling analysts off shift for full days. Training Managers can use CBT Nuggets playlists to sequence modules by role and team reporting to track progress across the security team.
CompTIA
CompTIA SecurityX (CAS-005)
Senior security staff often understand the technology but struggle to turn it into governance, risk, and budget decisions leadership will fund. This CompTIA SecurityX (CAS-005) training helps IT Directors close that gap by moving security architects and technical leads from implementation thinking to executive-level oversight. Learners work through governance frameworks like COBIT 2019 and ITIL, configuration and change management, GRC, data governance, threat modeling, cloud and zero trust architecture, threat hunting, and incident response. Realistic scenarios include evaluating an RFC for a subcontractor FTP share and framing a Windows 11 licensing rollout in budget terms. Your team comes away able to vet changes for risk before they reach production and present security proposals in language the C-suite will act on. SecurityX is DoD 8140/8570-approved, which makes this course a practical fit for government teams and contractors with role-based certification requirements. Virtual labs cover sandboxing in Active Directory, infrastructure as code with Terraform and PowerShell, and threat intelligence work in MISP. At about 26 hours across 32 skills, most under an hour each, the course fits weekly study blocks alongside normal workloads. Training Managers can use team reporting to follow per-learner progress and completion and export completion records for audit evidence.
CompTIA
Security+
This CompTIA Security+ (SY0-701) training prepares your team for a widely recognized entry-level cybersecurity certification. It covers network security fundamentals, cryptography basics, threat detection and mitigation, risk management, and compliance frameworks, and it builds the skills the SY0-701 exam tests: assessing the security posture of an enterprise environment and recommending solutions, monitoring and securing hybrid cloud and on-premises environments, responding to security incidents, and working within applicable regulations and governance policies. For an IT Director in a regulated industry, Security+ is the baseline many hiring rubrics and compliance programs expect of help desk analysts, network administrators, and security specialists alike. Individuals starting a security specialty earn the same credential on the same path.
OffSec
KLCP
Master Kali Linux, earn your KLCP certification, and prepare for the the PEN-103 exam. This associate-level Kali Linux Certified Professional course dives deep into penetration testing, perfect for cybersecurity pros like pentesters and network security analysts. Learn how to leverage the Metasploit Framework, fine-tune system monitoring, and configure Kali at a professional level. Dive in and sharpen your advanced Linux skills to become a Kali Linux Certified Professional.
OffSec
OSCP PEN-200
Security teams that rely on outside contractors or annual audits to find exploitable weaknesses often learn about them too late. This advanced PEN-200 course helps IT Directors build an internal penetration testing capability, so teams can validate vulnerability findings in controlled, authorized environments before they turn into incidents or audit findings. Built for security engineers, IT practitioners moving into offensive security, and Team Leads standing up a red-team function, the course follows a practical testing workflow. It starts with reconnaissance and scanning using Nmap, Nessus, OpenVAS, and passive discovery. It then moves through web application assessment with Burp Suite, Metasploit exploitation and post-exploitation, password attacks, Windows and Linux enumeration, tunneling, and antivirus evasion concepts. Trainer Erik Choron covers the topics that support OSCP+ preparation. The course runs about 37 hours across 46 skills. Training Managers should plan roughly a full training week per learner, plus extra practice time for certification readiness. Assign the course within clear rules of engagement, use Playlists to sequence the rollout, and use Team Reporting to track per-learner progress and completion. To see how it fits your team plan, Book a Demo.
OffSec
PEN-100
PEN-100: Network Penetration Testing Essentials is foundational OffSec training for aspiring ethical hackers. Learn Linux and Windows command line, network protocols, scripting with Bash and Python, and explore essential security tools like Nmap, Kali Linux, and Metasploit. Build a strong ethical hacking mindset with hands-on practice in reconnaissance, exploitation, and post-exploitation techniques. Perfect for beginners looking to start a cybersecurity career.
Security
Digital Forensics
This digital forensics training teaches you how to collect, preserve, and analyze digital evidence with confidence. You’ll master skills in digital forensics and incident response, from recovering artifacts in memory and unallocated space to analyzing network traffic and hidden data. Explore tools like hex editors, registry analyzers, and steganography software to uncover what others miss. Whether you’re training to become a digital forensics examiner, advancing as a digital forensic analyst, or building computer examiner training into your team’s skill set, this course gives you the legal, ethical, and technical know-how to succeed. You’ll learn proper chain of custody, expert witness testimony, and lab setup for professional investigations.
Splunk
Splunk Certified Cybersecurity Defense Analyst
This course gives IT Directors and SOC leads a shared, repeatable detection and response process built on Splunk Enterprise Security (ES). It is built for SOC analysts, SIEM administrators, and security engineers who already work in Splunk. Your team will learn to run common SPL triage queries and map activity to attack vectors and adversary TTPs. They will also enrich findings with asset and identity context and work through defined investigation stages. Later skills cover risk-based alerting, correlation searches, threat hunting, adaptive response, and SOAR playbooks, which shortens the path from detection to containment. Sequence it after Splunk Core Certified User with CBT Nuggets Playlists, and use Team Reporting to track per-learner progress and export completions as audit evidence.
Splunk
Splunk Core Certified Power User
When only one or two analysts understand the saved searches, dashboards, fields, and event mappings a SOC depends on, every shift change and staff departure becomes a risk. This course helps IT Directors and Team Leads move Splunk users from personal searches to shared knowledge objects and repeatable workflows the whole team can rely on. Built for SOC analysts, SIEM administrators, and IT practitioners who already work with Splunk, the training covers charts, filtering and formatting, event correlation, fields, tags, event types, macros, workflow actions, data models, and the Common Information Model (CIM) add-on. Throughout, the instructor frames Splunk objects around SOPs, corporate policy, and team handoffs, so the skills apply directly to how your SOC operates. At 6.6 hours across eight skills, Training Managers can assign the course in short blocks alongside daily operations. CBT Nuggets Virtual Labs provide a Splunk VM with a preconfigured data set for hands-on practice, and the course aligns with the Splunk Core Certified Power User certification, a practical next step for teams standardizing Splunk skills.
Splunk
Splunk Core Certified User
Many security and operations teams collect large volumes of machine data but lack a shared, repeatable way to search it and act on what they find. This course gives IT Directors and Training Managers a consistent Splunk baseline for SOC analysts, security analysts, SIEM users, and IT operations staff. Across 11 skills and about 9.3 hours, learners move from Splunk navigation and basic management into searching with indexes, hosts, and fields. They write foundational SPL, summarize data with the top, rare, and stats commands, and build reports, dashboards, lookups, scheduled reports, and alerts. All practice runs in an isolated lab loaded with realistic data from many system types, so no one touches production while they learn. The course aligns with the Splunk Core Certified User certification and fits teams adopting Splunk or moving past basic navigation into repeatable reporting. Assign it through Playlists, and use Team Reporting to track progress across your SOC and operations staff. The Splunk Core Certified Power User course is the natural next step.
Wireshark
Wireshark
This intermediate Wireshark training is designed for network engineers and SOC analysts who want to sharpen their packet analysis skills. You'll dive into key protocols like TCP, UDP, and DNS, build advanced Wireshark filter techniques, and learn how to identify performance bottlenecks or signs of malicious activity. By the end, you’ll have the hands-on experience and practical skills to confidently analyze real-world network traffic and support faster, more secure network operations.
Buyer proof
How Comcast Saved Hundreds per seat with an Efficient, Scalable Training Program by CBT Nuggets
Enterprise Tech / Telcom · Florida, U.S. · 29
Comcast’s Sales Engineering division has a highly technical job, and needed a training solution that could keep up. CBT Nuggets helped them reduce their per-SE training cost by hundreds per seat, and is now the training standard across 10 out of 13 Comcast SE regions.
Read the full case study“CBT Nuggets is interesting because they can give you these little certificates that say, hey, you completed this content and got certified. As a policy, we accept that.”
Chris Layfield
Director of Engineering at Comcast Business