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Kaleigh Muko ’20, an intelligence analyst at the National Cyber-Forensics & Training Alliance (NCFTA), was named one of Pittsburgh’s 30 under 30 by the Pittsburgh Business Times in March. 

“Even as a kid I always wanted to help people,” Kaleigh said. “I was drawn to the criminal justice system. For a long time I thought about going to be a police officer and hopefully moving towards a detective position.”

Kaleigh was drawn to a career in cybersecurity after a conversation with a teacher in high school.

“I said, ‘I don’t know if I can really do that… I don’t know how to code, I’m not familiar with a lot of that technical stuff.’ They said it’s not as technical as you think, you can be more of an investigator. That’s when the door opened, and I thought this is something that I want to do,” she said. “I love technology and I want to help people and this is the best way for me to do that.”

“That’s the beauty of cybersecurity – you can be super technical and you can focus on the code and the nuts and bolts, or you can be on the investigative side.”

Kaleigh enjoys working with her team at the NCFTA, which is headed by Stacy Moore, a cybersecurity instructor at ��������Ƶ, and includes another ��������Ƶ alum Justin Timothy ’20 who focuses on more of the scripting and coding side of cybersecurity.

“There’s always something different, there’s always something new and it’s really helpful to have people across all skillsets working together,” she said.

She attributes much of her success to her teammates, many of whom are around the same age and joined the NCFTA directly from college.

“They are a huge part of the reason as to why I got the award – because of the support and countless hours that we’ve put in together to do this work.”