Mirzad Ismail

IT Operations & Security Engineer

Hey, I’m a MSc Cybersecurity grad who’s happiest keeping systems secure, automating the tedious bits, and building infrastructure that just works. IT support, cloud, and security are my playground. Have a look around.

Featured work

MSc Dissertation

Shield-Right DevSecOps

Embedding security at the right of the SDLC — runtime protection, drift detection and continuous compliance instead of pre-deploy gates only.

100%
block rate on SQLi / XSS · <3ms overhead
40%
faster mean-time-to-detect vs. shift-left baseline

What I can do — and where to check

Pick one; the work filters to what proves it.

WordPress on AWS + Ansible

2025

A hardened WordPress stack on AWS EC2, provisioned entirely with Ansible playbooks — repeatable, versioned, torn down as easily as brought up.

  • SSL, backups and alerts baked in
One-command deploy under 6 minutesEC2 · RDS · Nginx · CloudWatch · SNS

n8n Cyber-News Pipeline

Raspberry Pi

A daily workflow that scrapes cybersecurity feeds, summarises them with Gemini and pushes a curated digest — all on a Raspberry Pi.

  • Zero-touch daily brief
n8n · Docker · Gemini API · Telegram~30 min/day saved

OpenClaw · Home SOC

Proxmox Homelab

A self-hosted security-operations lab — SIEM, IDS and vulnerability scanners wired together to detect and triage attacks against a simulated network.

  • Wazuh + Suricata on Proxmox VE
Detected & investigated 200+ synthetic attacksRebuilt as IaC — reproducible in <15 minutes

Active Directory & Hybrid IT Network Simulation

Created a corporate Active Directory (apex.local) environment on VMware (Windows Server 2025, Windows 10 client) setting up OUs and user accounts for centralized management. Combined Linux server (Proxmox), Raspberry Pi and IoT devices to emulate hybrid corporate IT scenarios. Gained practical experience managing, monitoring and troubleshooting a multi‑platform network.

IT Onboarding Automation - Python and Keycloak

CLI app that provisions a user in a Keycloak identity provider using the Admin REST API. Added support for provisioning role-based access to group resources from a single source and enforcing MFA enrolment when a user logs in for the first time. Supports batch onboarding of CSV with fail‑soft error handling: only standard library, offline mock mode for demos.

Self-Hosted Nextcloud

Raspberry Pi

A private cloud drive on a Raspberry Pi — encrypted file sync for the household.

  • Nginx · Let's Encrypt · UFW
5 users · 400+ GB served99.6% uptime over 8 months

Where this happened

Kept short on purpose — the work above is the argument.

01/2024 - 06/2024

Junior DevOps Engineer Trainee

Crozaint Technologies Pvt Ltd, India · Responsible for performing daily technical support, troubleshooting analytical and workloads to ensure secure workstation configurations for both Windows and Linux users.

05/2023 - 08/2023

AWS Cloud Intern

F13 Technologies, India · Developed and deployed a web application on AWS, gaining first-hand experience with software development tools.

Jan 2026 - Aug 2026

IT Support Consultant

Spark Technomedia · Handled user support tickets for hardware, software and access issues that were prioritised for fast resolution with minimal disruption. Resolved Linux systems, identified service and configuration issues, and maintained systems to ensure stability. Worked independently with a small-scale environment taking issues end to end from initial report to resolution. Documented fixes, troubleshoots for quicker resolution in the future.

Education

  • MSc Cybersecurity2025 — 2026

    National College of Ireland

  • BCA, Computer Science2020 — 2023

    Mahatma Gandhi University

Certifications

Leave a note

Thoughts on the work, a question, or anything you think I'd find useful.

No account needed, and nothing appears on this page.

Or reach me directly