In this episode of Exploited: The Cyber Truth, host Paul Ducklin sits down with RunSafe Founder and CEO Joseph M. Saunders to explore why the future of cyber defense depends on disrupting attacker economics rather than racing to keep up with every new threat.

Joe breaks down how organizations can gain an asymmetric advantage by reducing exploitability across entire classes of vulnerabilities, especially persistent memory safety flaws that continue to expose critical systems. He shares why adding lightweight, automated protections at build time is one of the fastest ways to shift the cost curve onto attackers without forcing massive code rewrites or slowing development teams down.

Together, Paul and Joe discuss:

• Why attackers’ resource advantage requires a new defensive mindset
• The power of “patchless” protection in embedded and OT environments
• Why memory safety flaws persist and how to neutralize them at scale
• The risks of AI-generated code and how to prevent silent vulnerabilities
• How Secure by Design practices improve resilience for critical infrastructure

If you're responsible for securing embedded systems, OT assets, or long-lived devices where patch cycles are slow and risk is high, this episode offers a new mindset that gives defenders the upper hand.