September 28, 2023

Identity Targeting: A Growing Threat with Rachel Wilson

49 minutes

This week, Identity Radicals brings you an insightful episode, with Rachel Wilson, head of Cyber Security at Morgan Stanley Wealth Management, delving into the critical aspects of cybersecurity and information protection. Rachel explores with host, Jason Garoutte, about the ever-growing concern of identity-based targeting, shedding light on the vulnerabilities that persist in our interconnected world.

Rachel characterizes how Multifactor Authentication (MFA) alone falls short of guaranteeing robust security. We dive into the critical scaling security measures practically while maintaining an optimum balance between risk management and compliance adherence.

They also provide invaluable insights into addressing security queries from the board of organizations. Moreover, the hosts highlight the transformative power of automation in fortifying cybersecurity defenses and discuss the ongoing challenge of recruiting and nurturing new talent in the field.

Key Quotes

-We've gotta be reconciled to the idea that our employees, and I tell this to people all the time, they are both our first line of defense and our greatest point of risk. This is why, you know, as you and I have discussed, the monitoring both internally and externally is crucial, and I think that people give short shrift.To that internal monitoring, recognizing that if you can identify an employee whose behavior is abnormal, either because they are doing something strange, or to your point, Jason, their identity has been co-opted in a way that indicates that you've got a problem. These kinds of detective controls are crucial in today's environment.

- Those of us who come from government. We're very used to living in a world where your internal network does not touch the external internet, where you're not bringing personal devices. You know, into a classified environment.Now, obviously that does not work in a private sector environment, and it certainly does not work with our new generation of employees who can't imagine a world in which I left my cell phone in my car all day

-The clients that I work with now, we're telling all of them, they have to assume that it's a when, not an if, right? And that the idea being that in a world where there is no perimeter anymore, where all of us are accessing sensitive data, proprietary data from personal devices on your local home network, your traveling, we've gotta be able to give our employees all of that functionality anywhere in the world on virtually any device, but we've gotta secure it as well.

-If I have someone who is accessing customer data that they really shouldn't be seeing to perform their job function, I've got a bad seed in my midst, right? And I've gotta address that quickly.I can't afford to have a bad apple

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