Transforming the Defender's Dilemma into the Defender's Advantage - Charlotte Wylie, Bhawna Singh, Lenny Zeltser - ESW #381

Security Weekly Podcast Network (Audio)

Ever heard someone say, "the attacker only has to be right once, but the defender has to get it right every time"? On this episode, we'll dispel that myth. There is some truth to the saying, but only with regards to initial access to the target's environment. Once on the inside, the attacker's advantage flips to the defender. Call it the 'Home Alone' effect. Or the Goonies effect? Die Hard? So many movie metaphors work here!

The conversation isn't just about setting traps for attackers, however, there's also a conversation to have about fundamentals and ensuring practitioners are prepared for whatever attackers might throw at them. This segment is inspired by the essay from Lenny by the same name: Transform the Defender’s Dilemma into the Defender’s Advantage

The vast majority of the folks working polls and elections are volunteers. This creates a significant training challenge. Not only do they have to learn how to perform a complex and potentially stressful job in a short amount of time (most training is one day or less), cybersecurity-related concerns are usually not included for individual poll location and election workers.

Kirsten Davies has a passion project that attempts to solve this, with some concise, accessible, and straightforward training material. It is made available through two PDFs on her new organization's website, instituteforcybercivics.org.

Customer Identity is everywhere. It's powering secure experiences for billions - enabling people to check their luggage at the airport, watch their favorite Major League Soccer games, or take their favorite Peloton class. Because it’s everywhere, threat actors now see customer identity as a path to financial gain. Bots now make up nearly 50% of all internet traffic and are being used to steal sign-up bonuses or breach accounts. And cybercriminals are bypassing the login box completely, stealing authenticated session cookies at record rates. Bhawna Singh. Chief Technology Officer of Customer Identity Cloud at Okta joins host Mandy Logan, from Security Weekly, to discuss the current state of customer identity, what developers need to know about securing their applications and what Okta is doing to help developers build applications that decipher a human from a bot.

Segment Resources: https://www.okta.com/oktane/ https://www.okta.com/press-room/press-releases/okta-helps-builders-easily-implement-auth-for-genai-apps-secure-how/

Whether it’s phishing techniques, password spraying, or social engineering, security leaders today are constantly needing to see past blindspots, educate their workforces, and rethink the enterprise security checklist. Many companies, like Okta, are finding ways to incorporate security within their company culture, as every employee has a role to play in keeping a company secure. Charlotte Wylie, Deputy CSO at Okta, joins Security Weekly's Mandy Logan to discuss what security leaders are being challenged with today when it comes to securing their workforce and from experience with implementing Okta’s Secure Identity Commitment how companies can be prioritizing security within their culture to help prevent threat actors from taking advantage of the weakest link.

Segment Resources: https://www.okta.com/blog/2024/08/how-okta-fosters-a-security-culture/ https://www.okta.com/press-room/press-releases/okta-openid-foundation-tech-firms-tackle-todays-biggest-cybersecurity/

This segment is sponsored by Oktane. Visit https://securityweekly.com/oktane2024 and use discount code OKTNSC24 to pay only $100 for your full conference pass!

Visit https://www.securityweekly.com/esw for all the latest episodes!

Show Notes: https://securityweekly.com/esw-381