It's "real" security work. Not related to the 'cyber security' degrees and certificaitons that have come up in recent years
an analogy:
The school nurse putting a band-aid on your knee is "real" medical work, but that same nurse has no place in spinal surgery operating room.
The school nurse is every "certified ethical hacker" and "certified cybersecurity expert". The spinal surgeon is the reverse engineer. We need nurses, but we also need spinal surgeons more. Every spinal surgeon can practice as a school nurse, but (perhaps) 0.1% of school nurses can practice as a spinal surgeon.