Professor Irwin is a PhD graduate of Computer Science from Rhodes University. He spent several years working in the network security field before returning to lecture at Rhodes. He heads the Security and Networks Research Group (SNRG) within the Department. The coursework based MSc specialsing in Information Security falls within this group. He holds the CISSP certification. He is involved in the National Cybersecurity Centers of Innovation program.
Network security technologies, passive security monitoring, data visualisation, information security awareness, information warfare and national cyberdefence.