Been in cybersecurity for a while (mostly the offensive side) and realized my networking knowledge had gotten a bit stale. Not completely gone, just rusty enough that I wanted a proper structured refresh on the core concepts instead of jumping straight into something heavy.

Ended up going through Cisco Networking Academy’s free Networking Basics course. It’s self-paced, includes a decent number of Packet Tracer activities, and covers the actual fundamentals network types and components, how data moves, media, IP addressing and segmentation, TCP/UDP, application services, and building/configuring a basic home network. Passed the final exam and got the Credly badge.

https://www.credly.com/badges/df08c026-3ba0-4a19-886f-27472ba5aeee

This felt like the right level for what I needed. Full CCNA goes significantly deeper into Cisco’s own platforms, IOS specifics, and proprietary features. That’s valuable if you’re moving into network engineering or working day-to-day with Cisco gear, but for security work the priority is understanding how networks and protocols actually behave how traffic flows, where things can be abused, and how to reason about connectivity and failures. The fundamentals cover that without the extra vendor-specific depth.

Curious if others on the security side have done a similar “just the solid basics” refresh, or if you found the full CCNA still worth it even outside pure networking roles.

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I need your feedback. this is a real deal for networking

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net-doc-ai.vercel.app/

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