Ep. 62, From Hacker to CISO and beyond (with Mike Koss)

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(2019-05-19): black-grey-white, offensive-to-defensive

[00:17:34] Well we take them outside and then we beat them thoroughly for about 20 minutes just to make sure that they're made of the right stuff

On a sunny May day, we had the pleasure of Mike Koss joining us. Mike is a retired hacker with over 2 decades of security experience, currently in a head of security role and served on the InfoSec Europe 2019 CISO advisory board. Some of the fascinating topics covered:

  • a path from a morally bankrupt blackhat teen to whitehat head of information security,
  • CISO experience, hiring and onboarding people into his team,
  • working for Disney, how it differes from other companies,
  • Rant of the Episode: ticking a compliance box, CISOs not knowing security basics.

TL;DL:

  • [00:01:09] I started in infosec on the wrong side of the law back in 1995;
  • [00:09:54] To be honest morally it was kind of like selling my soul a little piece at a time which I now have not, I'm completely devoid of soul;
  • [00:14:36] I think I had dreadlocks at the time as well and occasionally wore the old black nail varnish;
  • [00:57:11] with all the resources at all the conferences and all the avenues to learn I'm still astounded when I go into an organization and I see the lack of care or lack of any sort of progress that has been done for five 10 years or any lack of vision.
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Ep. 62, From Hacker to CISO and beyond (with Mike Koss)