It is a rare thing when a company claims to be the first to do something and actually is the first. Rarer still is when that company is actually solving a significant problem with their product. Upheaval (upheaval.io) appears to be among those rarities with a data security platform that prevents data theft, intrusion and could solve the problem of social media privacy. This interview may be the most encouraging thing that has happened in data security in a long time and has earned them membership Cyber Protection Magazine’s “Holy Grail of Cybersecurity” rolls.

The tech world sees marketing as a necessary “evil” and does it poorly. The cybersecurity industry sees it as a mystery but duplicates what the tech world does, so their efforts are generally poor and clueless.

Good marketing explains the reason budgeting a particular product is a good idea and where that product is most useful. Mediocre marketing looks for the lowest hanging fruit when the ripest fruit is at the top of the tree. Journalists have to cut through mediocre marketing to make that reason clear to the customer. This is why I don’t like writing about product introductions. What is more interesting is the process of discovering why the product exists and who can best use it. That’s why I decided to take this interview with XM Cyber. They have good technology. They have mediocre marketing like pretty much everyone else in the tech world. I thought it might help to see how the sausage is made.

Had a fun conversation with Tim Callan, chief compliance officer at Sectigo on the un-fun topic of phishing, smishing and whether social media platforms even want to stop allowing criminals to scam their users. There is hope... just not from Facebook. See more at www.cyberprotection-magazine.com

I've spent some long, frustrating hours trying to convince realtors to adopt proven technology. I can't imagine how difficult it must be, then, to convince them to practice good digital hygiene. David Moffat is trying to. We spent few minutes talking about how the industry's attitude can make everyone less safe.

I few weeks ago I was mercilessly cajoled by a PR firm to talk to the chief marketing officer of Sepio Systems, Bentsi ben Atar about their products and services. I don't do product announcements but I do talk about the problems the products were created to solve. So Bentsi and I talked for a while about how prevalent the potential for hacking modern vehicles is. And, apparently, public EV charging stations are a slam dunk for hackers. I hope this doesn't ruin your weekend.

The term “slippery slope” is applied to a lot of hypothetical outcomes of everything from legislation to technology. In the case of Apple monitoring the use of products and services for distributing child pornography it appears there are more than one or those lubricated hillsides.

At Cyber Protection Magazine we are internally debating the benefit/risk ratio of this decision and decided to air our thoughts in real time in this episode of Crucial Tech. US editor Lou Covey thinks the GDPR, CCPA and a host of other potential legislation has already begun a slide toward government control of technology. On the other hand, EU editor Patrick Boch thinks Apple’s decision in the impetus. In either case, one has to decide whether making it difficult for child abusers to pursue their kink is worth the potential loss of privacy, or if privacy is an absolute right.

I attended Black Hat 2021 virtually again this year and wrap it up in this grab bag of issues including #AI ethics, #cybercrime legislation, #ransomware growth and control, and building #cybersecurity community to compact the organization of cybercrime. Grab a coffee and take 25 minutes to get up to speed. 

I interviewed George Finney, chief information security officer for Southern Methodist University, a couple of weeks ago for a Cyber Protection Magazine article about the state of ransomware. It wasn't encouraging. But George is a very nice guy who also helps people and companies get their act together regarding good security practices. The entire conversation was illuminating, even though I had to do it over my iPad due to a tech glitch. Ah the modern digital age....

I'm being bombarded with companies trying to get me to interview them about product announcements. If I can figure out a theme to put them in context I will do it. The past couple of weeks though, it's been almost impossible. But I needed to get a podcast out and this is it.

This episode of Crucial Tech is the beginning of a search for Holy Grail of cybersecurity: Products and services that actually make us safer without breaking the budget. There is no one company that delivers everything, but we found one that provides the crucial service of penetration testing that can give a small business a starting point for securing their data with both automated tools and enhanced with professional services cost below $100. Ronin Pentest offers an automated, web-based tool that can be used by anyone to go through the top 10 vulnerabilities as listed by the Open Web Application Security Project (OWASP).