Episodes

In this episode, Kal Sambhangi, Senior Vice President, Cybersecurity Strategy and Architecture at Truist, shares his vision of the future of cyber governance. According to him, the leadership mindset needs to change whereby they are optimistic and opportunistic about cybersecurity and view developing cybersecurity capabilities as a source of competitive advantage. Kal also emphasized the importance of attracting professionals from other fields. He said, “I think cyber security as a community sho...

Comprehensive asset discovery is foundational to robust and proactive cybersecurity governance. The Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency recently issued a directive (BOD 23-01) requiring federal enterprises (civilian executive branch) to perform automated asset discovery every 7 days. Among other things, the directive also requires federal enterprises to initiate vulnerability enumeration across all discovered assets, including all discovered nomadic/roaming devices (e.g., laptops), ...

In a highly engrossing and in-depth discussion, Tej Patel, Vice President, and CIO at Stevens Institute of Technology sheds light on the various information security challenges that plague academic institutions and how best to deal with them. He talks about establishing a highly collaborative and security-centric culture, structuring an ideal CIO-CISO relationship, effective execution strategies, and more. To access and download the entire podcast summary with discussion highlights -- https://...

As more organizations embrace cloud-based services, securely migrating to the cloud is becoming an important capability. Keith Weller, former Vice President, Enterprise Technology Services, American Cancer Society (ACS), spearheaded a highly successful migration initiative where they transitioned a 5000-square-foot donation processing on-premise data center to the cloud. Keith and his team completed the implementation on time (in eight weeks), under budget, and helped the organization realize s...

Insider threats are often considered the biggest risk for organizations because they can cause the most destruction. Survey reports, and studies, have found that organizations have spent millions of dollars to recover from insider threat attacks. Proactively detecting and thwarting such threats is a critical aspect of robust information security governance. Doron Hendler, CEO, and Co-Founder at RevealSecurity, sheds light on a context-based detection model that analyzes activity sequences perfo...

The Security Operations Center (SOC) is at the heart of an organization's cyber defense system. Highly skilled and motivated personnel must work in these centers. James Risler, Senior Manager, Cisco Learning and Certifications, discussed the roles of the security engineer and the security analyst and the hard and soft skills needed to be effective in those functions. While the ability to code, learn computer forensics techniques, and know how to operationalize MITRE attacks are top skills, the a...

Daniela Almeida Lourenco, Chief Information Security Officer (CISO) at Tinka, firmly believes that CISOs have the very best of intentions -- "we all mean the best; we all want to protect the organization, and that is all we want to do." However, often the reality of the Board's lack of a cybersecurity mindset coupled with insufficient budget and resources results "in a reactive posture, unpreparedness, unclear risk management strategy, and low response maturity." She also highlights "the misinte...

With the growing move towards a hybrid and remote work environment, more and more people are relying on their smart devices to get work done. Keeping track of all of these devices, and ensuring that they are being used in a very secure manner, can be a challenging proposition. A recent survey finds organizations unprepared and overwhelmed with managing thousands or hundreds of thousands of these endpoint devices. Mike McNeill, CEO, Fleet Device Management, sheds light on some of these critical s...

With increasing digitization and the use of cloud-hosted assets, managing attack surfaces continues to be a major challenge. A recent survey report on the state of attack surface management (ASM) finds security teams drowning in a flood of legacy and ineffective tools with limited discovery capabilities. The need for ASM platforms with advanced digital asset detection capabilities is revealed in the survey findings. David Monnier, Team Cymru Fellow, sheds light on the latest ASM platform capabil...

"If you can plan for the zombie apocalypse, you can probably face just about anything," said Tim Callahan, Senior Vice President, and Global Chief Information Security Officer, Aflac during a talk in my Master's level class on cybersecurity readiness at Duke University. In this podcast, Tim describes the key elements of an effective crisis management framework and shares several best practices. Some of the highlights of a robust business resiliency and recovery posture include -- a) well thought...

Security Operating Center (SOC) staff members are often consumed with tedious manual tasks that lead to burnout and can cost organizations millions of dollars in losses due to human error. Thomas Kinsella, Co-Founder & Chief Operating Officer at Tines discusses at length the challenges faced by SOC team members and makes actionable recommendations on how to decrease burnouts, increase retention, and create a better work environment for the security analysts. To access and download the entire po...

In a recent news release, Reuters reported that "United States has offered a $15 million reward for information on Conti ransomware group. The FBI estimates that more than 1,000 victims of the Conti group have paid a total in excess of $150 million in ransomware payments." Victoria Kivilevich, Director of Threat Research at KELA Group, describes the cybercrime ecosystem and provides guidance on how to gain and leverage actionable intelligence from dark and deep web resources. To access and down...

How do you make security a first-class citizen of the software development process? According to an industry report, “many information security engineers don’t understand software development—and most software developers don’t understand security. Developers and their managers are focused on delivering features and meeting time-to-market expectations, rather than on making sure that software is secure.” Harshil Parikh, CEO and Co-Founder Tromzo, shares best practices for reducing the disconnect ...

In a wide-ranging discussion, Vishal Salvi, CISO & Head of Cyber Practice at Infosys, sheds light on a range of topics from CISO empowerment to creating and sustaining a high-performance information security culture. He highlights the importance of "delivering on your agenda" for CISOs to gain trust and credibility. Vishal also recommends making the CISO role independent of the CIO, uniformly enforcing security policies across the organizational hierarchy, and operating at a high state of readin...

Using compelling stories and metaphors, Ted Harrington, author of Hackable: How To Do Application Security Right, and Executive Partner at Independent Security Evaluators, explains the process of hacking and the importance of being able to think like a hacker. He encourages leaders to get excited about information security investments and look for ways of gaining a competitive edge from those investments. To access and download the entire podcast summary with discussion highlights -- https://w...

"The story of the RMS Titanic has served as a grim reminder that regulatory compliance does not guarantee safety or security. The ship was carrying 2,224 passengers and crew when it sank one April night in 1912, killing over 1,500 people. The designers of Titanic had followed the British Board of Trade by equipping it with 20 lifeboats, and even threw in four more than the regulations required." (securicon.com) Dixon Wright, Vice President, Vice President, Compliance Management and Automation Pl...

"Security experts are split on cyber insurance and its place in business, with just as many arguing that it is a useless add-on as an essential business enabler." A KPMG study indicated that these policies were not overly trusted by business leaders. In this podcast episode, Erica Davis, Global Co-Head of Cyber, Guy Carpenter & Co, discusses at length the different types of coverages, how underwriters evaluate and assess cyber risks, the current state of the market, re-insurance mechanisms, and ...

The phenomenon of cyber trauma is very real and individuals and organizations are often not adequately prepared to deal with it. Patrick Wheeler, a Luxembourg-based cybersecurity practitioner and Director of the Cyber Wayfinder program, shares his experience in dealing with cyber trauma incidents. He also talks about the Cyber Wayfinder program that is designed to help people with diverse life experiences and skillsets pivot to cybersecurity careers. Patrick passionately argues for removing the ...

Art Ehuan, Vice President, Palo Alto Networks, and Former FBI Special Agent, discusses at length the unfortunate evolution and escalation of ransomware attacks. He explains how the threat actors have upped their game and are now engaging in double, triple, and quadruple extortions. While lamenting that "organizations continue to make the same mistakes," Art also acknowledges the challenges of vulnerability management. He offers some interesting insights into ransomware negotiations and provides ...

Cybersecurity communication should be simple, immersive, attractive, continuous, and multi-channel, says Marcin Ganclerz, a subject matter expert. He passionately argues for creating a 'culture of enablement and not fear' so employees can play a vital role in enhancing cybersecurity communication effectiveness. Marcin also shares several examples and best practices in support of his recommendations. To access and download the entire podcast summary with discussion highlights -- https://www.dch...

In episode 18, Alan Mihalic, President IoT Security Institute, speaks to the challenges and success factors associated with securing Internet-of-Things (IoT) devices in smart supply chains. He draws upon the IoT Security Framework to share some guiding principles and practices to help supply chain participants specify, procure, install, integrate, operate, and maintain IoT securely for smart cities and critical infrastructure. To access and download the entire podcast summary with discussion hi...

When justifying cybersecurity investments, Andy Bates, Chief Development and Strategic Partnership Officer, Global Cyber Alliance, recommends making the business case from the standpoint of reducing the carbon footprint. He feels people will make a stronger emotional connection with the carbon reduction argument and thereby be more willing to fund and participate in cybersecurity initiatives. Changing up the cyber conversation and making it more relatable was one of the key takeaways from this d...

Nadia El Fertasi, Human Readiness and Resilience Expert and former NATO senior executive, highlights the importance of leveraging emotional intelligence to create and sustain a healthy information security culture. During a very thought-provoking discussion, Nadja made some poignant statements and recommendations such as a) build a culture of empowerment and not fear, b) use empathy to counter social engineering attacks, c) make cyber hygiene practices non-technical and reduce human firewalls, a...

Renowned authority in human-technology interactions and Presidential appointee Prof. Missy Cummings of Duke University, spoke to the importance of understanding human motivation and behavior to proactively predict and detect deception. In a very candid and engaging conversation, Prof. Cummings expressed her concern about cybersecurity as a field not receiving the necessary scientific recognition and support. "Cybersecurity is not like changing the oil of your car, it is its own science," she sai...