In this episode of Modern Cyber, Jeremy is joined by Sydney Marrone, a premier expert in the field of threat hunting and the Head of Threat Hunting at Nebulock. The conversation explores the rapidly evolving intersection of threat hunting and artificial intelligence, specifically focusing on how AI agents are transforming the speed and efficacy of defensive operations.

Sydney shares her journey from "crawling under desks" in IT to building elite threat hunting teams at major organizations like Lumen (formerly CenturyLink) and Splunk. She breaks down her newly released Agentic Threat Hunting Framework (ATHF) and the LOCK pattern (Learn, Observe, Check, Keep), explaining how AI can condense a hunt that previously took four weeks into a mere 45 minutes. They also discuss the critical need for AI governance, the risks of "ungoverned access," and why "trust but verify" remains the golden rule when integrating LLMs into security workflows.

About Sydney Marrone

Sydney Marrone is the Head of Threat Hunting at Nebulock and a co-founder of the THOR Collective. With over a decade of experience in incident response, forensics, and blue teaming, she has become a leading voice in structured threat hunting. Sydney is the author of the Agentic Threat Hunting Framework (ATHF) and the co-author of the PEAK Threat Hunting Framework, which won a SANS award for its contribution to the community.

A respected author and educator, Sydney co-authored The Threat Hunter's Cookbook and is currently developing a SANS course focused on threat hunting. Her work focuses on moving organizations from reactive to proactive security postures through advanced data science, automation, and authentic AI integration.

Episode Links

• Nebulock (AI-Powered Threat Hunting): https://nebulock.io/
• Agentic Threat Hunting Framework (ATHF): https://github.com/Nebulock-Inc/agentic-threat-hunting-framework
• THOR Collective (Substack & Community): https://dispatch.thorcollective.com/
• PEAK Threat Hunting Framework: https://www.splunk.com/en_us/blog/security/peak-threat-hunting-framework.html
• HEARTH Repository (THOR Collective): https://github.com/THORCollective/HEARTH
• Threat Hunting MCP Server: https://github.com/THORCollective/threat-hunting-mcp-server