Tariq Hanif
Cloud & Cybersecurity Engineer, Brisbane, Australia
When I started in IT, the hardest part wasn’t the technology — it was not knowing what to learn next or who to ask. ITwithTariq is the help I wish I’d had: practical, honest and free.
I’m a Cloud and Cybersecurity Engineer based in Brisbane, with more than fifteen years in IT across Pakistan, Dubai and Australia.
How I got here
I started in 2009 on the service desk for a national identity authority in Islamabad, installing servers, biometric devices and the systems behind national ID cards. In 2015 I moved to Dubai, where I spent nine years running infrastructure for large retail groups: thousands of endpoints across hundreds of stores, VMware and Hyper-V, backup and disaster recovery, networks, SQL and ERP systems. In 2024 I moved to Australia to focus on cloud and security.
What I do now
My day-to-day work covers Microsoft 365 security, Azure, Entra ID and Active Directory, Intune and Autopilot, Teams Phone and the ASD Essential Eight. I’m also working heavily with Microsoft 365 Copilot, agents, ChatGPT and Claude, helping organisations adopt AI without exposing their data.
Why ITwithTariq
When I started, I learned most things the hard way. ITwithTariq is where I share the guides, scripts and honest career advice I wish I’d had, so people starting out in IT can grow faster. Everything here is free. If something saves you a late night, it has done its job.
- Based in
- Brisbane, Australia
- Experience
- 15+ years, since 2009
- Worked in
- Pakistan, UAE, Australia
- Certifications
- 22, including 2 Microsoft Expert
- Focus
- Cloud security, identity and AI
- Education
- Master of Information Technology
How I work
The principles behind every guide, script and answer on this site.
Explain the why
Commands change. Understanding why something works is what helps you fix the next problem.
Test before production
Every script and guide is built and tested in a lab first, and you should do the same.
Security by default
Least privilege, MFA and backups you have actually restored from, every time.
Plain language
No jargon for the sake of it. If a first-year analyst can’t follow it, it needs rewriting.
Experience
Fifteen-plus years across three countries, from national identity systems to multi-site retail and government security projects.
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System Engineer / Cloud Engineer
Jul 2024 – presentBrisbane, Australia, Managed services provider
- Microsoft 365 migrations and tenant security reviews
- Teams Calling migrations including TIPT to Teams
- Azure infrastructure and disaster recovery with Azure Site Recovery
- Essential Eight ML1 and ML2 projects for government clients
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Computer Network & System Engineer
Apr 2019 – Jun 2024Dubai, UAE, Retail group
- 6,000+ endpoints across 250+ stores
- Windows and Linux servers on VMware and Hyper-V
- Backup and DR with Veeam, Barracuda and Iperius
- Multi-cloud across Azure, AWS and Google Cloud
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System Engineer
Mar 2015 – Apr 2019Dubai, UAE, Optical retail group
- 5,000+ endpoints across 200+ stores
- Rolled out the Microsoft Defender suite
- Patch management and endpoint security policies
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Service Desk Engineer
Nov 2009 – Mar 2015Islamabad, Pakistan, National identity authority, Government of Pakistan
- Windows Server and client deployment
- Biometric devices and facial identification systems
- Kaspersky Enterprise across 450+ clients
Awards and accreditations
Certifications
22 industry certifications across Microsoft, EC-Council, CompTIA, CrowdStrike and Barracuda.