Detection at Scale

On this week's episode of the Detection at Scale podcast, Jack talks with Emanueal Mulatu, Senior Engineering Manager - Detection & Response at Block. Together, they discuss what success means in security, the most rewarding things about security, and how to address and prevent one of the biggest challenges today: burnout. They also talk about ways to increase productivity through automation, the potential for AI and large language models, and why creating a great workplace starts with a healthy work-life balance.

Topics discussed:

• The most rewarding things about security — like the relationships and trust you build — and the biggest challenges facing security today.
• The value of building relationships across departments as well as with your customers.
• How to recognize the root causes of burnout and address it through meaningful initiatives like fitness or reading challenges.
• Why having a culture of writing can help with problem solving and collaboration.
• Why automation is the biggest initiative that's increasing productivity and morale, and the opportunities that AI and LLMs will bring.
• Advice for security leaders on how to build better workplaces focused on psychological safety and continuous learning.
• How to define security success, especially through the eyes of the C suite.

On this week's episode of the Detection at Scale podcast, Jack talks with Dr. Anton Chuvakin, Senior Security Staff at the Office of the CISO at Google Cloud. They dig deeper into the conversation taking place online around decoupled SIEMs, which both Jack and Anton wrote about. They discuss what a decoupled SIEM is, the evolution of data platforms and security capabilities, if decoupled SIEMs will work broadly with current customer demands, and if having backend data lakes is the best solution for fast, real-time querying.

Topics discussed:

• What is a decoupled SIEM, and why the broader discussion around whether security data lakes will replace SIEMs prompted Anton's Medium post.
• How this conversation is being driven by the fact that we’re coming to the "end of the runway" on previous storage choices.
• The arguments around why decoupling may not work broadly, simply because customers want integrated SIEMs.
• The evolution of data storage platforms and how successful past attempts at integrating security capabilities were.
• Why there's not a straightforward solution to storage — and why it's a challenge that's taking years to solve.
• Why having a data lake on the backend is the best solution to fast querying and real-time detection.
• A discussion around OCSF and the benefits of log normalization. 

Resources Mention: 

• “Decoupled SIEM: Brilliant or Stupid?” by Anton Chuvakin
• “The Transition from Monolithic SIEMs to Data Lakes for Security Monitoring” by Jack Naglieri

On this week's episode of the Detection at Scale podcast, Jack talks with Dhruv Majumdar, Director, Cyber Risk & Advisory at Deloitte. They discuss common challenges when transitioning from a traditional SOC to a detection and response program, what questions to ask when building a threat modeling strategy, and the benefits data lakes can unlock for D&R. They also talk about how LLMs are helping detect exfiltration and –the need for security controls, policies, and good partnerships.

Topics discussed:

• The common challenges that organizations face today when evolving their detection and response programs, including moving away from SOC and managing big data.
• An overview of the maturity model and what organizations can follow to evolve their processes.
• Two critical questions to ask that will guide your threat modeling strategy.
• What big data "unlocks" for detection and response today, and what trade-offs there are in usability when moving to a data lake-backed architecture.
• How LLMs can surface patterns in data that simplify detecting exfiltrations and how it can help with automation to prevent burnout.
• Advice to security practitioners when transitioning to new strategies, including why you need "controls, controls, controls," and why you should take the simplest route to overcome a challenge. 

On this week's episode of the Detection at Scale podcast, Jack talks with Anton Chuvakin, Security Advisor at the Office of the CISO at Google Cloud, and Timothy Peacock, Senior Product Manager at Google. Together, they discuss some of the needs and trends in cybersecurity today, including how to know what level of D&R your organization needs, the use cases for AI today, and how LLMs and SIEMs will handle data at scale. They also talk about the need for more creative solutions to misconfiguration management, three things security practitioners can do to improve cloud security, and why cybersecurity is the "most intellectually stimulating profession on the planet."

Topics discussed:

• What attracted Anton and Timothy to cybersecurity, what makes them stay, and why the intersection of humans and technology make it the “most intellectually stimulating profession on the planet.”
• How organizations can evaluate the level of security they need, why it's crucial to know whether you need to go from zero to one, or five, or a hundred, and how organizations with no detection and response strategies can get started.
• What use cases there will be for AI in cybersecurity, and while it may be good at summarizing, explaining complexity, and classifying, it may not be ready to create usable code.
• Why security practitioners need to think more about whether SIEMs can support planetary scale, and whether decentralization is the solution. 
• The role LLMs will play in helping to manage large data sets, and how it may change the way organizations use MDRs.
• Why the industry needs new, creative ways to solve the ongoing problem of cloud misconfigurations in order to break vicious cycles through shared faith. 
• Three pieces of advice to improve cloud security, including knowing your security needs, practicing, and making friends so you know you're note alone.

In this episode, Jack speaks with David Seidman, Head of Detection and Response at Robinhood. David has worked for large tech companies like Google, Microsoft, and Salesforce in a variety of D&R roles. 

During this episode, David shares his tactical advice on how his team is building the pipes and engines of security at Robinhood, his top tools to improve fidelity of detections, and what he’s learned in his career that’s made him a better practitioner and leader. 

Topics discussed: 

• The ‘unusual strategies’ and hypothesis on the kill chain model David has not shared before publicly 
• His top five tools to use to improve the fidelity of your detections 
• How David has seen composite detection be effective in practice and why it is most effective when it’s analyst driven 
• His experience working on Google Cloud's Event Threat Detection 
• What a mature IR process look like today and how to train staff that’s run IR in the past
• A big challenge and growth area in the industry that doesn’t get enough attention 
• The new frontier of what the detection and response stack will look like in the future
• David’s keys to an effective IR program, such as regular exercises, communications plan, having access and permissions to data, strong controls, and more.  
• The three actionable takeaways David learned from his roles at Google, Microsoft, Salesforce, and now Robinhood that make him a better practitioner and leader today

In this episode, Jack chats with Christopher Witter (aka Witter), Engineering Manager, Detection & Response at Spotify and a founding member and former lead for Crowdstrike’s Falcon OverWatch managed hunting service. 

Witter has nearly two decades of experience in incident response and information security, holding leadership roles on computer security and incident response teams (CSIRT) with both a top five global bank and a top ten defense contractor. 

During this episode, Witter shares his behind the scenes experiences helping build the Falcon Overwatch Team at Crowdstrike, why it’s critical to measure queries in seconds, not minutes, his tips on running highly effective D&R teams at scale, and more! 

Topics discussed:

• Witter’s experience as one of the first 100 people on the Falcon Overwatch Team at Crowdstrike 
• Why the Overwatch team didn’t follow traditional SOC mentalities 
• The various data sources Witter uses to improve accuracy and gather context 
• How D&R is like going to court – telling the story around Who, What, Where, Why, How, to prove beyond a reasonable doubt that this incident happened
• Why Witter measures in seconds, not minutes and why timescale is critical 
• Why it could be a mistake to choose cybersecurity tools based on financial capability and budget and what criteria should be considered instead
• Why Witter still believes in custom systems 
• Witter’s rule of thumb that if a human does the same thing 10x manually, it should be automated  
• Managing a remote D&R team and building psychological safety
• Witter’s advice for how others can get involved in the D&R community 
• His 3 pieces of advice to build a high-performing D&R team at scale, including a focus on ‘Jack of all trades’ people, avoiding distractions, and why it’s critical to capture everything to improve search. 

In this episode, Jack Naglieri speaks to Kelly Jackson Higgins, Editor-in-Chief at Dark Reading. During the episode, they share their thoughts about how cyber threats have changed over the years. 

Topics discussed:

• Kelly offers fascinating insights into how cybersecurity journalism has evolved to keep pace with the ever-changing industry.
• She offers an example of why choosing to patch systems is not always an easy decision for security teams.
• Jack and Kelly talk about how perceptions around which organizations are likely targets have changed over the years.
• Kelly shares some of the crazier threat actor trends she has observed during her career covering cybersecurity.
• She offers three pieces of valuable advice for security teams.

In this episode of the Detection at Scale, Jack speaks with Michael Hanley, Chief Security Officer and SVP of Engineering at GitHub. He also spent five years at Duo Security building their security program, and is passionate about making security easy and accessible for everyone.

Topics include: 

• How to think about managing in a dual role as both head of security and engineering, and what success looks like for both.
• What some of the synergies are between security and engineering, and why the two should work as closely as possible.
• The security strategy of retaining the integrity of the world's important projects at GitHub.
• The importance of democratizing security, and making it accessible for everyone.
• The mentality of baking software development into security.
• When to introduce a security team into an organization, how to build a SecOps team, and the evolution of security within companies.
• Actionable steps for security leaders to take regarding professional development, culture, and sharing notes.  

Resources: 

• Michael's favorite open source security tools: Stream Alert, Cloud Mapper, SiLK Suite
• Keep in touch with Michael Hanley on LinkedIn

Adeel Saeed is VP of Technology Strategy and Execution Management at Kyndryl and is a former CISO/CIO at large financial services companies, aviation companies, and more. 

Adeel is an experienced technology strategist and digital transformation leader with extensive hands-on technology and information security management experience and has led multiple large-scale complex technology transformation projects. 

Topics include: 

• How enabling your internal clients with the right tools and tech empowers them to serve their customer-base easier 
• Tool consolidation, risk metrics, reporting analytics, and more of what Adeel is focusing on in the risk management environment
• The experience that taught Adeel the most about practical security 
• Why experience and exposure are the ultimate teachers 
• Actionable steps to going from reactive to proactive in threat detection and response 
• The benefits of fine-tuned threat intelligence tools to better make risk-based judgments 
• Why security is not an ivory tower, it’s part of the business
• How security can better partner with business versus just being a component of it
• Why gamification can be a great tool to engage the executive team
• Standardization of all the data and the fundamental data problem 
• What Adeel has been paying attention to in the market around detection
• What true secure data governance looks like 
• Adeel's biggest challenge as a CISO, CSO, and overall security technology strategy leader 
• How Covid helped shape business security and where it should be embedded 
• Why it’s critical to position yourself as a business partner to your company 
• Adeel's tips for security leaders to succeed in the future of threat detection and response 

Resources: 

Keep in touch with Adeel on LinkedIn:  https://www.linkedin.com/in/adeelsaeed/

Chris Hodson is the CISO at Contentful, which helps digital teams assemble content and deliver experiences, faster. Prior to Contentful, Chris was at Zscaler and Tanium and also busy writing a book called Cyber Risk Management: Prioritize Threat, Identify Vulnerabilities, and Apply Controls. 

Chris builds and runs cybersecurity organizations that manage technology risks and helps product teams develop security solutions that work. As comfortable in the server room as the board room, he tailors cybersecurity strategy to organizational risk appetite and business objectives. 

Topics include: 

• Chris’s hottest security take on the role of a CISO 
• How Chris started developing the skills that better enabled him as a better technical CISO 
• How Chris works more closely with DevOps teams
• How his team gets smart about what to detect
• How to work with application developers to get more useful data
• Prioritize the services that are most sensitive, so things that are touching customer data get the most attention 
• The application signals Chris typically cares about 
• Building out tools internally to send telemetry to a single source
• The organization of cross-functional security team and the focus on security engineers 
• The Kubernetes 4Cs - Code, Container, Clusters, Cloud
• The importance of organizational-specific context to succeed in fixing symptoms at the cause 
• Chris’s advice that he’d give to detection teams living in a cloud-based world 

Resources: 

• Keep in touch with Chris on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/christopherjhodson/?originalSubdomain=uk
• Learn more about Chris’s book here: https://cybersecuritymattersdotblog.wordpress.com/my-books/
• Kubernetes 4Cs: https://www.enterprisedb.com/blog/4cs-security-model-kubernetes

Thomas Owen is CISO at Grafana and an advisor to startups who helped build the security team at Snyk and is especially excited about fostering conversations around ethics, sustainability, mental health, and inclusivity. 

A cloud-native, innovative and strategic security leader with a blend of people, policy and technical experience and a strong product affinity, Thomas and Jack discuss how to build a team from the ground up, the attributes of a modern security team, how to gauge value of security, and his advice for practitioners around basic hygiene. 

Topics include: 

• How Thomas builds functions from the ground up 
• How to think about functional areas from very early on in the team 
• Practical applications of using GRF for security and the elements that should be looked at 
• The three biggest challenges with modern data security
• The pros, cons, and use cases of open source in security at scale 
• The difference between engineers building features and products solving problems 
• Modern security: telemetry, analysis, and what do you do about it
• The ROI of security and how to gauge value 
• Latest trends in high-scale monitoring 
• Why ‘enabled autonomy’ is critical in a modern security team  
• 3 pieces of actionable advice for practitioners looking to succeed at detection at scale 

Keep in touch with Thomas on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/thomas-rhys-owen/?originalSubdomain=uk

Mike Saxton is Technical Director of Defensive Cyber Operations at Booz Allen Hamilton. His primary focus is on implementing technical solutions to protect against vulnerabilities, exploit software or hardware, data threats and other emerging risks that may threaten critical system operations. 

Not only an endurance athlete and classically trained musician, Mike is a long time proponent of detections as code and in today's episode he and Jack discuss everything from getting started on your detection journey, to broader cloud security adoption, the use of open source in government, and more! 

Topics include: 

• How Mike went from the healthcare field to cybersecurity 
• Where the government is in their shift to the cloud 
• The zero-trust model and broader security adoption in the cloud space  
• Where Mike thinks most teams start in their detection journey
• Mike’s positive thoughts on closing the cybersecurity skills gap and how interviews for detection at scale competency  
• The usage of open source there is in government 
• How acquisition and new leadership is changing cybersecurity products and frameworks in government 
• Why it’s critical to find a niche when working in cybersecurity 
• His advice to get outside your comfort zone and not just push yourself, but push the industry as a whole

Keep in touch with Mike on LinkedIn at: https://www.linkedin.com/in/mikesaxton/

JJ Agha is the CISO at Compass, the largest real estate brokerage in the US, and previously spent over four years as VP of InfoSec at WeWork, along with time as a security engineer at Vimeo and Priceline. 

Having worked for and advised for multiple startups and Fortune 500 companies he enjoys the challenge of building security teams and maturing programs and disciplines within an organization while embracing and learning new technologies.

In today’s episode, Jack and JJ discuss how he builds his team, buy vs build, what he expects from a modern SIEM, and more! 

Topics include: 

• How JJ went from changing his degree nine times, to a help desk analyst to discovering cybersecurity and entering the industry with Northrop Grumman and Edgecast 
• How JJ thinks about the human element of security when it comes to running a team and being a CISO 
• What Ikigai is and how the mindset can empower security professionals 
• Building vs buying and the projects JJ’s security team is working on 
• What JJ is looking for in a modern SIEM 
• JJ’s focus on Relentless Iteration and his mission to constantly improve and iterate security programs 
• How JJ balances the cost of his detection program with the needs of his security team 

Keep in touch with JJ on LinkedIn at: https://www.linkedin.com/in/jonathanagha/

Kathy Wang is the CISO at Discord, an internationally-recognized malware expert who has researched, developed, evaluated, and operationalized various solutions for detecting and preventing client-side attacks used by advanced persistent threats (APT). 

As a security executive and leader, Kathy has a strong background in project management, research, and business development. She has worked in government, commercial, and technology startup environments, and currently advises security services/products startup companies.

In today’s episode, Jack and Kathy discuss the talent pool in cybersecurity.

Topics discussed in this episode:

• What made Kathy want to go from researcher to security leader 
• The impact remote work and remote teams has had on cybersecurity teams 
• What Kathy looks for when hiring security professionals 
• Why transparency and multi-modal communication is mission critical for cybersecurity teams 
• How attacks have changed in the past 5 years 
• The tools Kathy is paying most attention to 
• What she enjoys most about working in security 
• Kathy’s advice for security professionals, especially early in their career 

Keep in touch with Kathy on LinkedIn at: https://www.linkedin.com/in/kathywang/

Nir Rothenberg is the CISO at Rapyd, managing security and IT for the soaring Fintech company, on a mission to ensure that the future of financial services will be democratized and secure. 

Prior to Rapyd, Nir led information security in NSO Group, a well known cyber-intelligence company, where he was charged with protecting a high profile and high risk enterprise. Before NSO Group, Nir worked as a consultant, helping with some of Israel's leading companies to reduce risk and improve information security. Nir is very active in Israel's cyber startup scene, advising and partnering with many of them.

In today’s episode, Nir and Jack discuss lessons learned in transitioning from an on-prem environment to cloud infrastructure, building a modern team, scaling at Rapyd, and tips to help organizations build a modern security team that’s capable of detection and response at scale. 

Topics discussed:

• Nir’s unconventional path to becoming a CISO.
• How Nir’s mentality shifted in his transition from detection in an on-prem environment to cloud and the pivotal moment he realized he had to move to cloud or be left behind. 
• What Nir learned about threat detection at scale when he moved to Rapyd. 
• Why Nir is against SOCs and his alternate systems. 
• How Nir had to change his approach to detection at scale as Rapyd scaled.
• Cybersecurity nuances in the finance industry. 
• Three pieces of advice for leaders building a modern security team and who he sees succeed the most. 

Keep in touch with Nir on LinkedIn at: https://www.linkedin.com/in/nir-rothenberg-5a6b48ba/

Joe Uchill is a Senior Reporter at SC Magazine — the leading trade publication for the cybersecurity industry. Prior to joining SC Magazine in 2020, Joe was a cybersecurity reporter at outlets including Axios and The Hill.

Today’s episode is the first in our mini-series dedicated to interviewing leading cybersecurity journalists. Cybersecurity reporting plays an important role for practitioners, leaders, and the general public to understand recent breaches, latest malware trends, and best practices that can help us all stay safe on the internet. Our goal with this series is to help our audience learn more about who these journalists are and what it's like to be a reporter in this fast-changing industry.

Topics discussed:

• How Joe began covering cybersecurity in 2015 and how the landscape has evolved over the past few years. 
• Joe’s favorite story he’s covered since he began covering the space in 2015.
• What motivates and excites Joe most about cybersecurity. 
• How Joe feels about the responsibility journalists have when it comes to keeping the public and security community informed. 
• What trends Joe feels people should be paying attention to when it comes to the future of cybersecurity.

To keep up with Joe’s latest reporting, join him on twitter at https://twitter.com/JoeUchill

Aaron Zollman is the CISO at Cedar — a patient payment and engagement platform for hospitals, health systems, and medical groups that elevates the patient experience. Prior to Cedar, Aaron spent time in security at companies like Bridgewater, Palantir, and MUFG Bank, Japan’s largest bank. 

In today’s episode, Aaron and Jack discuss lessons and tips to help organizations build a modern security team that’s capable of detection and response at scale. 

Topics discussed:

• What Aaron learned as he transitioned from the public sector to the private sector. 
• How security tools have evolved over the time. 
• How Aaron’s background in software engineering contributes to his mindset when it comes to security.
• Aaron’s approach to building the security team from scratch at Cedar and how the strategy had to change in order to accommodate the growth of both data and employees.
• Why Aaron created the conference Fwd:cloudsec
• Three pieces of advice for leaders building a modern security team.

Thomas Kinsella is the COO and co-founder of Tines — a no-code security automation platform that frees teams from manual work so they can focus on higher-value strategic work. In today’s episode, Thomas and Jack explore what it's like to transition from a security practitioner to a startup founder and how tools like Tines and Panther can be used to transform the way security teams operate. 

Topics discussed:

• What Tines does (and what the name means).
• Reflecting on the stresses of dealing with major incidents while Thomas worked as a security practitioner at organizations like eBay and Docusign.
• Why frustration with the automation platforms available led Thomas and his co-founder to quitting their jobs to build the solution they wish they had.
• The risk of building — instead of buying security tools.
• The Tines use cases that Thomas finds the most surprising.
• How automation platforms and threat detection platforms should work together.
• What’s next for Tines as a company and how they help security members get the most out of their platform.
• 3 pieces of advice for any security operator working at scale. 

What does it take to shape an early-stage security project into a product that solves real problems? 

Understanding your customers is a key first step. Knowing the personas who can use your product and the leverage they can get out of it, it's what ultimately brings value to security teams and even other teams that can seize their benefits.

We had a great conversation with Joren McReynolds who is the VP of Engineering, IT and Security at Panther Labs. In today's episode he shares the experiences and lessons over the course of his journey at Facebook, Airbnb, and how they shaped his knowledge on what building a great product takes.

Topics discussed:

• What led to the creation of osquery and why open source.
• What the progression was to build that as an MVP.
• Joren's approach to building the IR Team at Airbnb.
• How different Airbnb's cloud-based environment was from Facebook's.
• How Joren's past experience at Facebook influenced his work at Airbnb.
• Joren’s thought process around implementing security monitoring.
• What inspired StreamAlert.
• 3 pieces of actionable advice to security teams looking to excel in detection at scale.

Clint Gibler is the Head of Security Research for r2c, the company behind SEMGREP, a popular open-source static analysis security scanning tool used by teams all over the world.

He joined r2c to help build and shape the future of AppSec; one that includes secure defaults along with lightweight enforcement of those defaults.

In today's episode, Clint talks about SEMGREP, operationalization of tools for security teams, intersection between AppSec and D&R as well as tips to succeed in AppSec at scale.  

More topics discussed in this episode:

• SEMGREP's origin story and benefits.
• The security startup creation pattern of recent years.
• Trend shift to developers operating security problems at scale.
• r2c's mission and products in addition to open source.
• How application logs are useful in detection and response.
• Type of vulnerabilities Clint is seeing more often.
• Application security developments he is most excited about.

Other resources:

tl;dr Sec Newsletter: tldrsec.com

Robin Smith is the Head of Cyber and Information Security at Aston Martin and he brings a fresh and unique voice to the security industry.

He advocates for a lean, progressive security mindset where it's crucial thinking around processes to make sure that organizations are not unnecessarily wasting resources while committing to continuous improvement at the same time.

Tune in to learn more about what lean security is, why Robin has always seen security as an asset, and how you can embed that value into your organization.

Topic discussed in this episode:

• How Robin arrived in information security.
• Why he believes we need new voices in the industry.
• The time he wrote 'The Lean Information Management Toolkit'.
• Why he considers security as an asset and how to embed that value across an organization.
• What the concept of lean security implies.
• How lean security applies to security monitoring and detection.
• Desired outcomes for security detection platforms.
• Metrics for a lean security program.
• The approach of practicality when deploying technology.
• 3 Pieces of advice to succeed at effective detection at scale.

If you were building a detection program today, what would be your top resources to start with?

As we head into a cloud-based future, the ability of handling increased data sets becomes crucial, teams need to have processes in place that cover the entire detection lifecycle, and develop skills necessary to help build, grow and improve a successful detection program.

In today's episode, we had an insightful conversation with Snowflake’s Global Threat Intelligence and Detection Engineering Leader, Haider Dost and Senior Security Engineer, Daniel Wyleczuk-Stern where we discovered why data and being able to query that data is a critical first step.

Topics discussed in this episode:

• Haider's and Daniel's background in security.
• The precursors and skills necessary to becoming an engineer.
• A high level approach to building strong detection teams.
• The importance of collecting and correlating log sources for a proper incident response.
• How to be proactive when building your detection baseline.
• What a detection lifecycle process is and why every team should have one.
• What the biggest challenges of building a detection program are.
• Why it’s critical that responders or analysts have a sense of ownership on the detections that are being built.
• How security teams at Fortune 500 and Silicon Valley companies differ from each other.

Have you ever thought you could find more assets in your network that you thought you would have? Do you have segments that haven't been scanned yet? Or maybe subnets that you have ignored?

These and much more is what asset discovery brings to the table to any security team, helping to prevent the next big incident.

In today's episode we sat down with Chris Kirsch, CEO and co-founder of Rumble and chatted about why covering the basics, like having a full inventory of your network with all the managed and unmanaged devices, is a best practice to secure any environment.

Topics discussed in this episode:

• Rumble's founding story and background
• Why Rumble's engine is very benign to the network
• Where customers that migrate to Rumble come from
• Why vulnerability scanners don't tell much about what a particular asset is
• A two point approach for asset discovery in a cloud environment
• How customers use Rumble in a response style situation
• 3 Pieces of advice to succeed at asset management and device security in the future.

Why is SIEM an area of unease for so many security officers?

To make detection and response successful, we need tools capable of upscaling the practitioners as well as equipping them to be successful. We need tools we can rely on.

In today's episode, we had an inspiring conversation with J Wolfgang Goerlich, Advisory CISO at Cisco Secure. We discussed how trust is a determinant factor in building the security tools of the future, why so many CISOs lost trust over SIEMs and what we can do to rebuild it.

Topics discussed in this episode:

• Wolf's role as advisory CISO.
• How we can use technology to solve business problems
• How CISOs perceive SIEMs today and security monitoring as a practice
• The investigative side versus the detection side of SIEMs
• How the detection personas have changed with the movement to the cloud
• Challenges of doing detection in the modern day
• The story of when Wolf worked in an open source project
• How Wolf advises CISOs on making a build versus buy decision
• How detection and response will evolve in the coming years
• 3 pieces of actionable advice to succeed with building effective detection programs at scale

Securing the environment and scaling operations of the world's leading streaming entertainment service is massive.

Srinath Kuruvadi is the head of cloud infrastructure security at Netflix. Before Netflix, he spent more than 15 years building security solutions and leading teams at Google, Facebook, Snapchat, Lyft, and Mapbox.

In today's episode, he shares how his leadership skills have evolved over time, where he puts his focus when approaching infrastructure security, and what he believes are the key ingredients any security team should have today.

Topics discussed in this episode:

• How Srinath got his start in security and landed as head of infrastructure cloud security at Netflix 
• Lessons in leading a team that’s 10+ years old
• ConsoleMe and why they built it 
• Srinath’s unique approach to infrastructure security 
• Why ‘people challenges’ carry more weight than ‘technical challenges’ when it comes to infrastructure security 
• Why security teams should seek out the open source tools big tech companies use
• His take on trends and tools in the cloud security space 
• 3 pieces of advice to succeed in detection at scale 

How does anything scale as a leader? 

For today's guest, security has always been a puzzle in which the only variable we do get to control is time; specifically, all the decisions that enable us to control how fast we detect threats.

Am I going to be agile with this tool? How fast can I deploy detection if something happens today? How many hours is it going to take me to understand if it happens again or if it's still happening? 

These are some of the questions Matt Jezorek likes to ask himself. Matt is the Vice President of Security and Platform Abuse at Dropbox,  an Information Security Executive with multinational fortune 50 experience who can think like an attacker and still speak to the business. 

Topics discussed in this episode:

• Matt's background and his number one motivator: "taking care of his family"
• What he enjoys the most about security (what he likes to call ‘The Grayness of Security’)
• Why educating others can help scale security
• How Matt keeps up as a security leader
• The value of agility in detection at scale
• What he considers should be prioritized in automation and problem solving
• How we can maintain customer trust
• How Matt knows if he is doing a good job as a security leader: hygiene, aspirational and agile metrics.
• Why time is the only variable we can control
• Lessons learned from bad management experiences
• 3 pieces of advice for security teams that are working hard to protect customers

Risk management has shifted from a traditional mindset to an integrated view, where engagement of all departments across an enterprise is crucial to address threats properly.

In today's episode we sat down with Miguel Viana from Talkdesk to discuss how security teams provide guidance to identify vulnerabilities and how risk management processes evolve in a fast-paced growing team.

Topics discussed in this episode:

• Miguel Viana's background in the security industry
• How risk management evolves as company grows
• Threat modeling in the risk management process
• Typical security threats that worry Talkdesk the most 
• The importance of due diligence in third party management
• Miguel’s advocacy for security education programs
• How to build a strong security culture in a company

"The people who actually work with me (not for me), do their jobs better"

Gusto is a People Platform and as the Chief Information Security Officer, Fredrick Lee (AKA Lee) knows company value starts with your employees. If you don't take care of your employees, you can't take care of your customers.

Being a great leader is not only about inspiring your team and making them want to do more but also, and more importantly, is about transparency and building trust.

Tune in into today's episode for a master class on how to lead a security organization from the trenches.

Topics discussed in this episode:

• What makes a great security leader
• The power of transparency in leadership.
• Why it is important that security leaders have experience practicing beyond management.
• What inspired Flee to make the jump from being a practitioner to being a leader.
• How to join a new company and build a security program from zero.
• What security teams can do when working in a hypergrowth environment.
• Why Flee trusts people but not computers.
• 3 Pieces of advice to security leaders that you can't miss!

Not so long ago security was 'more manual' and therefore, riskier. Important systems would drift in their configuration, people would go on and change things manually.

Over the past decade, there has been a shift from tools that were doing infrastructure as code to immutable infrastructure. Technology now allows you to be updated, gives you the ability to retrain, and have a repeatable process. 

Gilbert Martin is the Head of Cloud Security at OutSystems and a big believer in taking a developer first approach to a lot of the things that we do in security. One of those is creating an image pipeline.

In today's episode, Gilbert walks us through the idea of how using the right tools can help you promote better cloud infrastructure security.

Topics discussed in this episode:

• Gilbert’s background in security.
• What the cloud environment was when he started.
• How immutable infrastructure has helped remove unpredictability and insecurity.
• Why it's important for any organization to have a software asset inventory.
• Gilbert's approach to dealing with systems that he finds some issue/ violation.
• How he uses Kubernetes and Serverless: pros and cons.
• Why visibility is essential for doing security at scale.
• Keys to interact with instant response teams.
• How to succeed at applying cloud security at scale in the future.

Cyber security is difficult. It's asymmetric and the advantage falls on the attacker side.

When Omer Singer realized this, he felt inspired to join the military service in Israel. After what he saw by being on the offensive side, moving to the defense was challenging. How would he reconcile both sides of the same coin? 

Omer Singer is now Head of Cyber Security Strategy at Snowflake and in this episode, he shares what was the game changing approach that made him flip into doing detection. 

Listen to Omer for great insights and advice on how to break into today's data driven cyber security industry.

Topics discussed in this episode:

• Omer's beginnings and background in penetration testing.
• How Omer made the flip into doing detection.
• How joining Snowflake changed his perspective about being on the defense side.
• The power of data in security and how it tells you things you didn't know how to ask for.
• When Snowflake started their security journey.
• Omer's approach on building a high fidelity system and retaining high fidelity alerting.
• Advice on how to build a strategy around data when you're starting from scratch.
• How security programs and systems scale along with data growth.
• First objectives when he started leading Snowflake cyber security.
• 3 Pieces of actionable advice to succeed at detection at scale.

Cassio Goldschmidt is the Senior Director and CISO at ServiceTitan. Awarded for his leadership in cyber security, he has over 20 years of experience in various technology companies. He has been a speaker at the most respected international conferences and even helped improve the security integrity of Brazil's voting system. 

In today's episode, Cassio shared unique insights on the importance of bringing the right people for your company needs, whether you are a startup or a fortune 500. 

Who is best for what? When is the right time for outsourcing? What kind of experts should you bring to your team in the beginning? We asked Cassio these questions and also dove into leadership, decision making, and what the future demands for security teams will be.

Topics discussed in this episode:

• How Cassio got into security and became a security leader.
• The differences of building a modern security team in established companies and startups.
• How to decide when it’s the right moment to do it yourself as a first security hire vs hiring other teams.
• What kind of experts you want to bring in to your team at early stages.
• Recommendations on the composition of a detection team.
• Cassio's approach for getting around false positives.
• Major challenges with implementing SIEMs.
• Metrics to gauge the effectiveness of a detection program.
• How security demands will evolve over time.
• 3 pieces of actionable advice to succeed at effective detection at scale.

'Don't make assumptions. Ask the question.'

That's what today’s guest advises to her team on how to differentiate what's normal from abnormal in an evolving threat environment.

Cynthia Moore is the Senior Director of Information Security at BlackLine but she started out in infrastructure operations building telecoms systems. Coming from a non-traditional security background has given Cynthia a true leverage and the versatility not only to better empathize with clients' needs but also to speak their language.

In today's episode, you will get to understand the mindset of a great security leader and learn her secret recipe on how to encourage teams to turn 'impossible' problems into possible outcomes.

Topics discussed in this episode:

• The biggest differences in running security for Disney and BlackLine.
• Building and staffing a team out in a cloud-based environment.
• What challenges Cynthia is facing as a security leader in BlackLine.
• How to detect, respond, and prevent breaches.
• The value of having transparency and an open dialogue with clients in SaaS businesses.
• How speaking a language that is not purely security helps empathize with clients and creates a feedback loop.
• Cynthia’s thoughts on tools to be successful at scale. 
• Keys to augmenting your security team: outsourcing vs hiring.
• How you don't always need to hire security people to do security

Today's guest shared an eye-opening definition: "Application security is an evolving narrative. It's all about collaborating and interacting with the people building the business."

When Ty Sbano started, application security wasn't really called application security. He was fortunate enough to be one of the early folks that had a formal degree in information technology with a focus on security from Penn State University.

From JP Morgan to Capital One to the startup field, Ty collects over 15 years of experience in security. Today, he is Chief Trust and Security Officer at Sisense and he sat down with us to discuss all things AppSec, how to build early, robust security teams, and how to lead with empathy in an evolving agile environment.

Topics discussed in this episode:

• Ty’s background in the financial/fintech industry and his current focus on data science and the conversions of security.
• What application and product security means and why it’s really important to enable businesses to move fast.
• The importance of choosing one vertical in information security and being an expert at it.
• How an agile methodology and manifesto help ship product features and engage engineers.
• How security practical programs differ between large enterprises and startups.
• Security tooling: Building vs Buying
• Building early security teams: good patterns that are important to get established in the beginning. 
• The relationship between an application security function and an incident response function.
• 3 pieces of actionable advice for security teams.

Attackers are always ahead of the game and today you need more than having a lock on your front door. Modern security requires organizations to think outside the box, re-architect their environment, and be able to scale more efficiently and effectively.

In this first episode, we sat down with Brad LaPorte to discuss Endpoint Detection and Response (EDR) in depth.

Brad has spent time in US Cyber Intelligence, large technology companies like IBM, research firm Gartner, and today as partner at High Tide Advisors a firm specializing in go-to-market consulting.

Topics discussed in this episode:

Topics discussed in this episode:

• How Brad has seen endpoint detection and response evolve over the last 5 years.
• How attackers are always well financed and resourced.
• Organizations’ struggles with application control.
• What caused the shift from AV to EDR products and tools.
• How detection as code is critical for many reasons.
• The biggest challenges Brad has seen when deploying EDR in a large organization.
• The importance of educating your leadership, have a proper plan, use case, and assess your operational readiness when implementing EDR. 
• Recommendations for engineers looking to build their own version of an EDR platform.
• Tools and technologies that Brad is paying attention to like zero trust architecture.
• 3 pieces of advice for security teams looking to succeed at EDR at scale.

Welcome to the Detection at Scale Podcast! My name is Jack Naglieri, CEO and founder of Panther Labs and more importantly, I'm also a security practitioner. 

When I was part of the Airbnb and Yahoo security teams, I experienced firsthand the challenges of high-scale security monitoring. In 2018, I left Airbnb to fully dedicate myself to solving this problem.

In this short episode, I will cover:

- Who we are
- Why we are doing this podcast
- What you can expect on future episodes

We can promise you one thing: this is NOT a podcast about selling you what Panther can do. The #1 reason we are doing this, it's because we want to help demystify a lot of techniques that we use to operate effectively at scale. 

Thank you for listening and very excited to start this journey together!