N-415: Implementing and Operating Cisco Enterprise Network Core Technologies (ENCOR)

Course Overview:

The Implementing and Operating Cisco Enterprise Network Core Technologies (ENCOR) course gives you the knowledge and skills needed to configure, troubleshoot, and manage enterprise wired and wireless networks. You’ll also learn to implement security principles, implement automation and programmability within an enterprise network, and how to overlay network design by using SD-Access and SD-WAN solutions.

Attendees to N-415: Implementing and Operating Cisco Enterprise Network Core Technologies (ENCOR) will receive TechNow approved course materials, expert instruction, and prepare you to take the 350-401 Implementing Cisco® Enterprise Network Core Technologies (ENCOR) exam.

Dates/Locations:

No Events

Duration: 5 Days

Course Objectives:

Illustrate the hierarchical network design model and architecture using the access, distribution, and core layers
Compare and contrast the various hardware and software switching mechanisms and operation, while defining the Ternary Content Addressable Memory (TCAM) and Content Addressable Memory (CAM), along with process switching, fast switching, and Cisco Express Forwarding concepts
Troubleshoot Layer 2 connectivity using VLANs and trunking
Implementation of redundant switched networks using Spanning Tree Protocol
Troubleshooting link aggregation using Etherchannel
Describe the features, metrics, and path selection concepts of Enhanced Interior Gateway Routing Protocol (EIGRP)
Implementation and optimization of Open Shortest Path First (OSPF)v2 and OSPFv3, including adjacencies, packet types, and areas, summarization, and route filtering for IPv4 and IPv6
Implementing External Border Gateway Protocol (EBGP) interdomain routing, path selection, and single and dual-homed networking
Implementing network redundancy using protocols including Hot Standby Routing Protocol (HSRP) and Virtual Router Redundancy Protocol (VRRP)
Implementing internet connectivity within Enterprise using static and dynamic Network Address Translation (NAT)
Describe the virtualization technology of servers, switches, and the various network devices and components
Implementing overlay technologies such as Virtual Routing and Forwarding (VRF), Generic Routing Encapsulation (GRE), VPN, and Location Identifier Separation Protocol (LISP)
Describe the components and concepts of wireless networking including Radio Frequency (RF) and antenna characteristics, and define the specific wireless standards
Describe the various wireless deployment models available, include autonomous Access Point (AP) deployments and cloud-based designs within the centralized Cisco Wireless LAN Controller (WLC) architecture
Describe wireless roaming and location services
Describe how APs communicate with WLCs to obtain software, configurations, and centralized management
Configure and verify Extensible Authentication Protocol (EAP), WebAuth, and Pre-Shared Key (PSK) wireless client authentication on a WLC
Troubleshoot wireless client connectivity issues using various available tools
Troubleshooting Enterprise networks using services such as Network Time Protocol (NTP), Simple Network Management Protocol (SNMP), Cisco Internetwork Operating System (Cisco IOS®) IP Service Level Agreements (SLAs), NetFlow, and Cisco IOS Embedded Event Manager
Explain the use of available network analysis and troubleshooting tools, which include show and debug commands, as well as best practices in troubleshooting
Configure secure administrative access for Cisco IOS devices using the Command-Line Interface (CLI) access, Role-Based Access Control (RBAC), Access Control List (ACL), and Secure Shell (SSH), and explore device hardening concepts to secure devices from less secure applications, such as Telnet and HTTP
Implement scalable administration using Authentication, Authorization, and Accounting (AAA) and the local database, while exploring the features and benefits
Describe the enterprise network security architecture, including the purpose and function of VPNs, content security, logging, endpoint security, personal firewalls, and other security features
Explain the purpose, function, features, and workflow of Cisco DNA Center™ Assurance for Intent-Based Networking, for network visibility, proactive monitoring, and application experience
Describe the components and features of the Cisco SD-Access solution, including the nodes, fabric control plane, and data plane, while illustrating the purpose and function of the Virtual Extensible LAN (VXLAN) gateways
Define the components and features of Cisco SD-WAN solutions, including the orchestration plane, management plane, control plane, and data plane
Describe the concepts, purpose, and features of multicast protocols, including Internet Group Management Protocol (IGMP) v2/v3, Protocol-Independent Multicast (PIM) dense mode/sparse mode, and rendezvous points
Describe the concepts and features of Quality of Service (QoS), and describe the need within the enterprise network
Explain basic Python components and conditionals with script writing and analysis
Describe network programmability protocols such as Network Configuration Protocol (NETCONF) and RESTCONF
Describe APIs in Cisco DNA Center and vManage

Prerequisites:

CCNA certification
Implementation of Enterprise LAN networks
Basic understanding of Enterprise routing and wireless connectivity
Basic understanding of Python scripting

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User: don.seguin

Instructor comments: Tim was a great.

Facilities comments: The classroom was great.

User: jrtrussell

Instructor comments: Awesome

Facilities comments: Great

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PA-243: Palo Alto Networks Firewall Debug and Troubleshoot (EDU-311)

Course Overview: PA-243: Palo Alto Networks Firewall Debug and Troubleshoot is a three-day course on how to troubleshoot the full line of Palo Alto Networks next-generation firewalls. Students will receive hands-on experience troubleshooting the security, networking, threat prevention, logging, and reporting features of the Palo Alto Networks PAN-OS® operating system. Upon completion of this class, students will have an in-depth knowledge of how to troubleshoot visibility and control over applications, users, and content. This is not a virtualized theoretical course. This is hands-on, real world instruction, directly relevant to the DoD and Commercial implementations of Palo Alto Networks next-generation firewalls.

Each student is issued a physical Palo Alto firewall and a Cisco layer 3 switch at their desk. Real hardware per student for real experience and real skill development. TechNow provides a very comprehensive client infrastructure that includes Windows, Linux, and multiple packet sniffer agents.

The instructor for this course has been a lead in Unix kernel development to implement firewall and intrusion detection technologies. Additionally, the instructor has taught several security appliance products and carries several SANS, ISC2, ISACA, Cisco, Unix, and Windows certifications.

Attendees to the PA-243: Palo Alto Networks Firewall Debug and Troubleshoot (EDU-311) Training Course will receive TechNow approved course materials and expert instruction.

Dates/Locations:

No Events

Duration: 3 days

Course Objectives: Students attending this foundational-level training course will gain an in-depth knowledge of how to configure and manage their Palo Alto Networks firewall, including hands-on experience in configuring the security, networking, threat prevention, logging, and reporting features of the Palo Alto Networks Operating System (PAN-OS).

Day 1

Module 0 – Introduction & Overview
Module 1: Troubleshooting
- Methodology
Module 2: Platform
- Comparisons When
- Troubleshooting
Module 3: Flow Logic
Module 4: Administration
- Troubleshooting

Day 2

Mod 5: Layer 3
- Troubleshooting
Mod 6: Policy
- Troubleshooting
Mod 7: User-ID™
- Troubleshooting

Day 3

Mod 8: VPN
- Troubleshooting
Mod 9: GlobalProtect™
- Troubleshooting
Mod 10: Performance
- Troubleshooting

Prerequisites:

This course is in no way associated with Palo Alto Networks, Inc.

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TN-545: Certified Network Defender

Course Overview:

This course is instructed with an instructor in the classroom with provided lab equipment and Cyber Range.

Students enrolled in the Certified Network Defender course, will gain a detailed understanding and hands on ability to function in real life situations involving network defense. They will gain the technical depth required to actively design a secure network in your organization. This program will be akin to learning math instead of just using a calculator.

This course gives you the fundamental understanding of the true construct of data transfer, network technologies, software technologies so that you understand how networks operate, understand what software is automating and how to analyze the subject material.

You will learn how to protect, detect and respond to, and predict threats on the network. This builds upon the typical knowledge and skills of Network Administrators in network components, traffic, performance and utilization, network topology, system locations, and security policies.

You will learn network defense fundamentals, the application of network security controls, protocols, perimeter appliances, secure IDS, VPN and firewall configuration. You will then learn the intricacies of network traffic signature, analysis and vulnerability scanning which will help you when you design greater network security policies and successful incident response plans. These skills will help you foster resiliency and continuity of operations during attacks.

This course supports a certification that is DoD approved 8570 Baseline Certificate and meets DoD 8140/8570 training requirements.

What’s Included:

EC-Council official E-Courseware
EC-Council iLabs access included for 6 months
EC-Council official Certificate of Attendance
CND Exam Voucher with 1 FREE RETAKE VOUCHER

Security Course Flow

Dates/Locations:

Date/Time	Event
09/15/2025 - 09/19/2025 08:00 -16:00	TN-545: Certified Network Defender TechNow, Inc, San Antonio TX

Duration: 5 Days

Course Content:

Module 01. Network and Defense Strategies
Module 02. Administrative Network Security
Module 03. Technical Network Security
Module 04. Network Perimeter Security
Module 05. Endpoint Security-Windows Systems
Module 06. Endpoint Security- Linux Systems
Module 07. Endpoint Security- Mobile Devices
Module 08. Endpoint Security- IoT Devices
Module 09. Administrative Application Security
Module 10. Data Security
Module 11. Enterprise Virtual Network Security
Module 12. Enterprise Cloud Network Security
Module 13. Enterprise Wireless Network Security
Module 14. Network Traffic Monitoring and Analysis
Module 15. Network Logs Monitoring and Analysis
Module 16. Incident Response and Forensic Investigation
Module 17. Business Continuity and Disaster Recovery
Module 18. Risk Anticipation with Risk Management
Module 19. Threat Assessment with Attack Surface Analysis
Module 20. Threat Prediction with Cyber Threat Intelligence

Prerequisites:

Basic network and host operations knowledge
Experience commensurate with one to five years of network, host, or application administration
TN-325:Security+ or equivalent

Courses to follow:

Target Audience:

Network Administrators, Network Security Administrators, Network Security Engineer, Network Defense Technicians, Network Analyst, Security Analyst, Security Operator, and anyone involved in network operations

About us:

TechNow has taught security courses for almost 30 years, before most certifications existed and has successfully moved students through certification programs associated with IAPP, SANS, EC-Council and ISC2. Our instructor maintains over a dozen security certifications and has been the director of a company with internationals sales in security training, consulting, and compliance.

Tech Now, Inc. is an accredited Training Center with Ec-Council.

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TN-963: Windows Security Automation with PowerShell

Course Overview:

PowerShell is made for Security Operations (SecOps) automation on Windows. SecOps requires automation in order to scale out security changes and monitoring beyond a handful of hosts. For example, when a vulnerability must be remediated but there is no patch for it yet, automation is needed to quickly and consistently enact the changes necessary. PowerShell “remoting” is encrypted remote command execution of PowerShell scripts in a way that can scale to thousands of endpoints and servers.

Imagine being able to hunt for indicators of compromise across thousands of machines with just a few lines of PowerShell code. Or imagine having the local Administrator account password reset every night on thousands of endpoints in a secure way, and being able to retrieve that password securely too.

We will show you to do these tasks and more. Transcription logging for forensics, strong encryption code signing, application whitelisting of scripts, IPSec port control, and Just Enough Admin (JEA).

As more and more of our systems are moved up to the cloud, PowerShell will become even more important. Amazon Web Services, Microsoft Azure, Office 365, Hyper-V and VMware already support PowerShell administration for many tasks.

Attendees to TN-963: Windows Security Automation with PowerShell will receive TechNow approved course materials and expert instruction.

Date/Locations:

No Events

Duration: 3 days

Course Objectives:

Day One
PowerShell Overview and Tips

- Getting started running commands
- Using and updating the built-in help
- Execution policies
- Fun tricks with the ISE graphical editor
- Piping .NET and COM objects, not text
- Using properties and methods of objects
- Helping Linux admins feel more at home
- Aliases, cmdlets, functions, modules, etc.
- Customizing your profile script

What Can We Do With PowerShell

- PowerShell remote command execution
- Fan-out remoting and security
- File copy via PowerShell remoting
- Capturing the output of commands
- Parsing text files and logs with regex patterns
- Searching remote event logs faster with XPath
- Mounting the registry as a drive
- Exporting data to CSV, HTML and JSON files
- Parsing and mining nmap port scanner XML output
- Running scripts as scheduled jobs
- Pushing out scripts through Group Policy
- Importing modules and dot-sourcing functions
- http://www.PowerShellGallery.com

Write your own scripts

- Writing your own functions
- Passing arguments into your scripts
- Function parameters and returning output
- Flow control: if-then, do-while, foreach, switch
- The .NET Framework class library: a playground
- How to pipe data in/out of your scripts

Day Two
Continuous Secure Configuration Enforcement

- How to use Group Policy and PowerShell together
- Automate with INF security templates
- How to customize INF templates
- Microsoft Security Compliance Manager (SCM)
- SECEDIT.EXE scripting
- Building an in-house security repository for SecOps/DevOps
- NSA’s Secure Host Baseline GPOs

Group Policy Precision Targeting

- Managing Group Policy Objects (GPOs) with PowerShell
- LSDOU, Block Inheritance, Enforced GPOs
- Group Policy permissions for targeting changes
- ADMX templates for mass registry editing
- Deploying PowerShell startup and logon scripts
- WMI item-level targeting of GPO preferences
- GPO scheduled tasks to run PowerShell scripts
- Remote command execution via GPO (not remoting)
- Empowering the Hunt Team to fight back!

Server Hardening for SecOps/DevOps

- Server Manager scripting with PowerShell
- Adding and removing roles and feature
- Remotely inventory roles, features, and apps
- Why Server Nano or Server Core
- Running PowerShell automatically after service failure
- Service account identities, passwords, and risks
- Tools to reset service account passwords securely

Day Three
PowerShell Desired State Configuration (DSC)

- DSC is Configuration Management built in for free
- Using DSC for continuous reinforcement of settings
- Writing your own DSC configuration scripts
- Free DSC resource modules: www.PowerShellGallery.com
- How to push DSC configurations to many targets
- DSC background job processing in push mode
- Examples: sync files, install roles, manage groups
- Auditing a remote target against a DSC MOF template
- “ApplyAndAutoCorrect” mode for continuous enforcement

PowerShell Just Enough Admin (JEA)

- JEA is Windows sudo, like on Linux
- JEA is Windows setuid root, like on Linux
- Restricting commands and arguments
- Verbose transcription logging
- How to set up and configure JEA
- Privilege Access Workstations (PAWs)

PowerShell and WMI

- Windows Management Instrumentation (WMI) service
- What is WMI and why do hackers abuse it so much?
- Using PowerShell to query WMI CIM classes
- WMI authentication and traffic encryption
- Inventory operating system versions and installed software
- WMI remote command execution versus PowerShell remoting
- PowerShell security best practices
- PowerShell transcription logging to catch hackers

Prerequisites:

GSEC or equivalent experience
UNIX, Windows, Networking, and Security Experience
This is a hands-on skill course requiring comfort with command line interaction and network communications

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PA-242: Palo Alto Networks Firewall Manage Cyberthreats (EDU-231)

Course Overview: PA-242: Palo Alto Networks Firewall Manage Cyberthreats (EDU-231) Training Class is a two-day course that teaches students strategies in defense against cyberthreats. Successful completion of this course enables administrators to better understand the threat landscape. This is not a virtualized theoretical course. This is hands-on, real world instruction, directly relevant to the DoD and Commercial implementations of Palo Alto Networks next-generation firewalls.

Each student is issued a physical Palo Alto firewall and a Cisco layer 3 switch at their desk. Real hardware per student for real experience and real skill development. TechNow provides a very comprehensive client infrastructure that includes Windows, Linux, and multiple packet sniffer agents.

The instructor for this course has been a lead in Unix kernel development to implement firewall and intrusion detection technologies. Additionally, the instructor has taught several security appliance products and carries several SANS, ISC2, ISACA, Cisco, Unix, and Windows certifications.

Attendees to the PA-242: Palo Alto Networks Firewall Manaage Cyberthreats (EDU-231) Training Course will receive TechNow approved course materials and expert instruction.

Dates/Locations:

No Events

Duration: 2 days

Course Objectives: Students attending this training course will gain an understanding of cyberthreats and their characteristics. Students will learn how to manage cyberthreats using security policies, profiles, and signatures to protect their network against emerging threats.

Day 1

Mod 1: Threat Landscape
- Advanced Persistent
- Threats
- Data Breaches and Tactics
- Threat Management
- Strategies
Mod 2: Integrated
- Approach to Threat
- Protection
- Integrated Approach to
- Protection
- Next-Generation Firewall
- Advanced Endpoint
- Protection
Mod 3: Network Visibility
- Zero Trust Model
- SSL Decryption
- Decryption Policy
Mod 4: Reducing the Attack
- Surf
- ection

Day 2

Mod 5: Handling Known
- Threats
- WildFire Analysis
- Security Profiles
Mod 6: Handling Unknown
- Traffic and Zero-Day Exploits
- WildFire
- Researching Threat Events
- Identifying Unknown
- Applications
Mod 7: Investigating
- Breaches
- Identify IOCs Using
- App-Scope
- Log Correlation
- Finding Infected Host
Mod 8: Using Custom
- Signatures
- Creating Custom App-IDs
- Threat Signatures

A

Prerequisites:

Students must complete the PA-213: Install, Configure, and Manage course
Understanding of network concepts, including routing, switching, and IP addressing
In-depth knowledge of port-based security and security technologies such as IPS, proxy, and content filtering

This course is in no way associated with Palo Alto Networks, Inc.

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