The EPAM Continuum Podcast Network

Sam Rehman—a frequent voice on this podcast network and EPAM’s Chief Information Security Officer and SVP—was in the classroom recently, teaching students, and in the process was “surprised by the density of PII that's in in the system.”

This led Rehman to realize that “at least here in California,” higher education’s investment in cybersecurity is “substantially behind.”

Catching up is a theme of today’s conversation about privacy, education, and artificial intelligence.

Speaking for the (cyber)defense, with Rehman, is today’s guest on *The Resonance Test,* Scott Loughlin, Partner and Global Co-Lead of the Privacy & Cybersecurity Practice at the law firm Hogan Lovells.

“It took a long time to get people to understand that the easiest thing to do is not always the right thing to do to protect the company’s interest and protect the company’s data,” says Loughlin. “And that is an experience that we'll all have with respect to generative AI tools.”

Loughlin and Rehman are put through their conversational paces from questions by Brian Imholte, our Head of Education & Learning Services.

They have much to say about data governance (“Data is not by itself anymore, it's broken up in pieces, combined, massaged, and then pulled out from a model,” says Rehman), data pedigree, the laws—and lack thereof—regarding privacy and generative AI. They also kick around the role that FERPA assumes here. “You’re trying to deploy this old framework against this new technology, which is difficult,” says Loughlin, adding: “There are some key areas of tension that will come up with using generative AI with student data.”

So where might an educational publisher or school begin?

“Focus on your value first,” says Rehman. Do your experiments, but do them in small pieces, he says: "And then within those small pieces, know what you're putting into the model.”

This informative and spirited conversation is even occasionally funny. Loughlin brings up a court case about whether or not a selfie-taking monkey selfie would own the copyright to the photo. “The court said no,” notes Loughlin, adding that US Copyright laws are “designed to protect the authorship of humans, not of monkeys, and in this case not of generative AI tools.”

Download now: It’s sure to generate some new thoughts.

Host: Kenji Ross

Engineer: Kyp Pilalas

Producer: Ken Gordon

Going mobile: It’s going to create vulnerabilities. That’s the way things work with apps. They aren’t just friendly pieces of software that help you beat traffic or bring your favorite tunes into your eardrums… they are opportunities, rich ones, for the bad guys.

Andrew Whaley, the Senior Technical Director (UK) at Promon and our guest on *Silo Busting,* says that with an app, “You have to be able to trust the security model that you've got around it.”

Whaley talks with Sam Rehman, our Chief Information Security Officer and SVP, about how apps operate on a client-server model, but “all the client code is distributed outside of your enterprise.” Some of these users could well be criminals who, once gaining access to that code, could "reverse engineer it and come up with ways to attack that.”

And the code in those apps can be a bit suspect. Whaley says that most apps are made up of 80% open-source software. “You know how many of those app developers go and build that source themselves from source and read over it before they compile?” he asks and then answers: “Probably close to zero.”

Speaking of putting the work in… Rehman talks about calibrating “the level of effort that the attacker would have to go through versus the yield.” The trick is, he says, layering on cybersecurity techniques “so that the yield is not worth it for them.”

Whaley replies that “once you layer obfuscation on, you then have this impenetrable forest” and that the “immediately accessible ways of attacking [an application] are taken off the table.”

Together they chat about supply chain attacks, nonlinear programming, and more. Tune in and be safe(r)!

Host: Glenn Gruber

Editor: Kyp Pilalas

Producer: Ken Gordon

In this special edition of *Silo Busting,* Elaina Shekhter, EPAM’s Chief Marketing & Strategy Officer, interviews Stepan Mitish, VP and Head of Ukraine, about how his role shifted from being a leader navigating war-time crises to a leader embracing the challenges of the business world. Mitish says that the year 2022 was so filled with extreme challenges that he and his team can count it as “three or five years of experience.”

He says the experience truly seasoned his team: “We understood what a great team means, not just in theory.” In hindsight, Mitish says, the experience puts COVID in perspective: “At that time, it was something catastrophical… but now you recall it with a smile on your face."

Mitish talks about how he and his team started preparation for a potential war before it actually took place, creating a very solid business continuity plan (BCP). But if you ask whether he believed it would happen: “I didn't, and even now, for me it's hard to accept how could anybody in the 21st century do what actually was done.”

He tells the harrowing story of how it began very early one morning. Lots of messages pouring in from areas under attack. After that, “It was very loud night and morning,” he says, adding that he was focused on the quiet evacuation of our people to so-called shelters in the western part of Ukraine. Vinnytsia. Lviv. Ivano-Frankivsk. Uzhhorod.

At the beginning of the war, he was orchestrating 15,000 employees but they were working as one. He says that after a week, “I was afraid to start hearing a lot of complaints from our clients about failed delivery, non-delivery in services.” Instead, he received emails from clients “who were praising our teams for working days and nights and even delivering planned releases.”

By the second or third week, everyone understood that Russia could not do a “so-called blitzkrieg in three days” and that it wasn’t “possible to break Ukrainians and to break EPAM in Ukraine.” He says: “Despite all the challenges, all the craziness that was going on,” he and his team continued to deliver. Relentlessly.

“People were doing incredible, heroic things on the ground, but also doing delivery from bomb shelters and various faraway locations where people ended up moving to in order to avoid actually being in the midst of ongoing attacks,” says Shekhter. “From your point of view, why do you think they did it?”

Mitish says it was a combination of two things: (a) “Probably it's part of Ukrainian values or DNA to be very much focused on results”; and (b) “We don't have any other home and we understand that we fight for our lives, for our workplaces, for our families. And if not me, then who's going to do that?”

So where are we now in Ukraine?

“I believe that the worst, worst days are already behind us,” says Mitish who wants to encourage our clients and future clients to support Ukraine and bring more business there. “I strongly believe that once this war is over and Ukraine wins, there will be a huge queue of those companies’ investors… and if you're going to be on the end of the queue, probably it will be much harder to find the best talent for you and your business.”

You’ll want to listen to our resilient colleague tell his amazing story. Do so!

Host: Alison Kotin

Engineer: Kyp Pilalas

Producer: Ken Gordon

Equity is not easy. It’s tough enough to talk honestly about equity in US healthcare, and troublingly difficult to create solutions that can, and will, be implemented.

But trouble—good trouble, as Representative John Lewis once put it—is precisely what interests the people on the latest episode of *The Resonance Test.*

Dr. Djinge Lindsay, MD, MPH, and Arianne Graham are here to talk about their stalwart attempts to solve for equity. Johnathon Swersey, Senior Director of Innovation at EPAM, creates all kinds of necessary trouble by putting tough questions to our two guests.

Swersey begins by addressing the idea that given the less-than-optimal state of US healthcare, why are we focusing on equity?

“If we don't fix the health disparities in our country, those will spread to the rest of the population and it becomes not just a public health issue, but frankly, a national security issue,” says Graham.

Or conversationalists agree that there has been much talk about equity but that talk is far too insufficient.

“There has been a lot of verbal acknowledgement of the fact that structural racism is pervasive and all of our systems, including healthcare, but that verbal acknowledgement hasn't necessarily been followed with action,” says Dr. Lindsay.

To move things forward, we need to align our moral imperatives with proper levels of funding. Dr. Lindsay asks us to consider the history of social change: “There have been few successful social change movements that haven't been aligned with some financial incentive for those who hold power.”

One such alignment must just be possible with the new Health Equity Index that's being introduced to Medicare Advantage. Healthcare players, says Dr. Lindsay, will now be required to not only “look at their data, not only stratify their data but to action on closing disparity gaps. Closing differences in health outcomes for people based on their race.”

Ultimately, it’s about beginning from what Graham calls “an asset- as opposed to a deficit-based approach.” She says that understanding the history, pain, and ramifications of structural racism is important but also “there is space to celebrate what makes different cultures unique and use that as a leverage point to engage folks in conversation about health. To tap into the trusted messengers, trusted leaders, and representative figures within communities that are delivering messages of self-actualization and self-efficacy in managing our health.”

Let’s hope we can manage to take a step in a healthier direction. Begin by listening.

Host: Alison Kotin

Engineer: Kyp Pilalas

Executive Producer: Ken Gordon

Financial inclusion is one of those topics that banks are often eager to discuss. After all, their efforts here can have profound impacts on their customers and the communities in which they operate and can generate positive PR spins that showcase the brand in a different light. However, it’s rare to see true innovation in the realm of financial inclusion that profoundly alters things for customers and their communities.

Enter Briana Marbury, CEO at Interledger Foundation, who aims to reshape the payments and remittance space as a way to drive major positive changes for communities across the globe. Briana sat with EPAM’s Alex Jimenez to discuss how innovations in payments technology and the proliferation of the Interledger Protocol are rewriting the financial inclusion story.

“Financial inclusion means accessible and equitable access to…accounts and other financial services banks offer like access to credit and housing loans,” says Marbury. In the past, banks have been hesitant to invest in infrastructure in poorer communities as they don’t view such areas as a good return on investment in the delivery of those services. As a consequence, millions of low-income people found themselves with limited access to bank accounts and services. “This lack of infrastructure led to the adoption of mobile money and underbanked consumers moving money digitally among their peers.”

When viewed on a global scale, this lack of access to banking infrastructure is a massive issue. The World Bank reports that there are 1.4 billion adults without access to banks. To which Marbury says: “One thing many of [unbanked adults] do have access to is mobile phones.” As a result, there have been a number of payments apps that have been adopted around the world to help these individuals transfer money via mobile transactions. But many of these apps are powered by payments remittance systems that are siloed regionally or geographically.

“What we’re trying to do is expand on the work that’s already being done to create interoperability among systems… and create more opportunities for people to participate in their digital financial world,” Marbury says, explaining how the goal of her work with Interledger is to increase the global adoption of a more transparent remittance system. And if her work is successful, it has the potential to have a very real and positive impact on communities around the world.

Right now, it’s time to enrich your understanding with the complete *Silo Busting* conversation. Get clicking!

Host: Mo Banjoko

Engineer: Kyp Pilalas

Producer: Scott MacAllister

Executive Producer: Ken Gordon

The hype around generative AI remains strong. Right now, we’re nestled (un)comfortably atop the peak of this hype, wondering what in the world might come next. We’ve seen generative AI beat the bar exam. We’ve also, more recently, seen it fail to answer simple math equations.

Regardless of some of its failings, there’s no denying that these extremely rapid advancements in generative AI *and* its adoption trajectory are akin to the advent of the internet and the smartphone.

Big things are surely on the horizon.

Still, the path ahead is fuzzy, and many companies aren’t sure how to move forward. The biggest question that’s holding them back: “Is our data going to be safe?”

Our own Sam Rehman, SVP, Chief Information Security Officer, and Val Tsitlik, VP, Head of Data & Analytics, convened to acknowledge this mass consensus and how modern enterprises *should* be reframing this question.

When companies start thinking through AI data security, “You can get pretty deep down [a] rabbit hole and start thinking about very, very complex scenarios and very complex attack vectors,” says Tsitlik. “Really, the best place to start is with the fundamentals, before you go ahead and start building applications.”

And the discussion doesn’t stop there. Adoption is going to require a monumental culture shift and, “to change an entire organization to be comfortable to embrace working with some form of computer assistant; that’s a whole different ball game,” says Rehman.

Slowly crawling toward exploration and experimentation is futile. Change is knocking at your door, now.

And let’s get one thing straight, folks—things are going to be messy. But that’s all part of disruption, isn’t it? The curious innovators who embrace the messy unknown are the ones who come out stronger on the other side.

“If you don’t start now, I don’t know how much time you’ll need to catch up… Do it and try to embrace it in small chunks,” says Rehman.

Now let’s hear more about what Sam and Val have to say on the fundamentals of data security in an AI-first world.

Host: Alison Kotin

Engineer: Kyp Pilalas

Producer: Hillary Tiene

Executive Producer: Ken Gordon

The cloud creates “cloud cowboys,” says Yinon Costica, VP of Product and Co-Founder of Wiz.

This creates, as you might imagine, security issues.

“Cloud allows people to really own their stuff end-to-end. They can basically create whatever they want,” says Costica. But he says that security professionals need to ensure that the cowboys can “govern their environments in a way that is secured while they continue to build.”

These issues set the theme for this #CyberesecurityByDesign conversation between Costica, Sam Rehman, EPAM’s Chief Information Security Officer and SVP, and Aviv Srour, our Head of Cyber Innovation.

Rehman notes that the frequency of change in cloud is “great for software engineering,” but adds: “It also makes it very, very difficult for you to actually find your baseline, your footing,” regarding security.

One of the most useful things we learn in this episode is how cloud might help spread the responsibility for security. In the past, security was solely the problem of the security team but with cloud and its self-serve nature, Costica says: “Security now should be democratized to those who are actually managing the environments, running the resources, have the right context.”

As a group, the guys talk about the differences between on-prem and cloud security, the role of visibility plays in cloud, the pragmatism cloud brings to security, and more.

Understanding the manifold nature of cloud is critical, and it will require a lot more education than many organizations realize. Says Rehman: “If you don't have a good understanding of what your cloud looks like, which is majority of people out there, then you still have a huge problem.”

Be part of the solution: Listen.

Host: Kenji Ross

Engineer: Kyp Pilalas

Producer: Ken Gordon

When it comes to financial literacy, many banks and financial institutions claim it’s something they actively prioritize for their customers. In reality, this often tends to be lip service. “Banks like to think they’re doing something in this space….They’ll write a long blog that will sit in a resource page on their website. But if you look at the analytics behind those pages, generally they have very few views. They’re not teaching anything to anyone, and this content is just not visible.” This is the claim of Alex Jimenez, EPAM’s Managing Principal of Financial Services Consulting, as he and Theodora Lau, Founder of Unconventional Ventures, discuss the shortcomings of retail banks when it comes to providing customers with financial literacy and guidance.

“What is their [the bank’s] intention for putting this information out there? Is it just to check a box? Or are they doing it because they genuinely want to help?” asks Lau. If it’s truly the latter, then their efforts are genuinely falling short, especially in this time of unprecedented technological innovation. Worse yet, the one-size-fits-all approach—like an online resource center—fails to address the unique and varied needs of a large swathe of customers. “In the data from a recent survey we conducted, we found that Gen Zers were using physical branches at nearly the same rates as Boomers. It’s because mainly they want to have someone in person to talk to them. And part of that is because we have not done a great job to give young people an understanding of finance,” says Jimenez .

To that extent, banks also need to be cognizant of how they’re training their frontline staff to have financial literacy conversations. Jimenez touches on this, saying, “From a banking side, we also don’t tool our customer-facing employees to be able to do some of this. The philosophy has been, ‘Consumers know us as a bank and therefore will come to us because they trust us and that’s when we can give them guidance about managing their money.’” However, this shortsighted approach can actually leave banks vulnerable to their FinTech and big tech competitors, providing an opening for them to take away market share.

The good news is, there are plenty of opportunities for banks to close this gap with technology. Jimenez says:, “My credit card gives me an alert every time I make a purchase. I love that. But every once in a while, I want that alert to be more than just an alert saying, ‘You just spent $100 on Amazon.’ Give me some contextual advice specific to that transaction. That’s the sort of thing that we in the industry could do if we had the wherewithal to do it.”

Right now, it’s time to familiarize yourself with the full *Silo Busting* conversation. Get clicking!

Host: Mo Banjoko

Engineer: Kyp Pilalas

Producer: Scott MacAllister

Executive Producer: Ken Gordon

The era of generative AI needs humans… not just the data sets they create. Now and going forward, companies will need to depend on perceptive, intelligent, creative humans who can evaluate and, when necessary, stand up to the black box output AI throws at them. What kind of traits do such people embody? Where might we find them? What might they teach the rest of us? That’s what this episode of *Silo Busting* is all about. Tariq King, our VP and Head of Product-Service Systems, and Ira Livshits, Senior Data Scientist at EPAM, meet the test-based questions of Producer Ken Gordon with knowledge and aplomb.

King, who spent much of his career hiring testers, says he looks for “the way that someone actually approaches solving problems and thinking perhaps in a different way or from a different perspective.”

Livshits notes that with testing in generative AI, “sometimes there is no right or wrong” and that a tester will “have to act or decide based on his or her understanding of the field and maybe intuition.” In short, she says, testing has become much less of a black-and-white job.

Together King and Livshits create a model conversation. They talk about how explainability fits in here, why musicians and liberal arts people make for good testers, the importance of being able to relate findings to a given audience (“[if] I have a PhD focused on machine learning, probably I can understand certain things in a different way than someone who may not have that degree,” says King), and how generative AI is bringing the role of testing closer to the fore.

Go on, give it a test-listen.

Host: Alison Kotin

Engineer: Kyp Pilalas

Producer: Ken Gordon

When it comes to empowering women—truly empowering them—The Estée Lauder Companies is doing something different. We know this because Michael Smith, CIO of ELC, recently dropped by *The Resonance Test* to talk about the extensive success they’ve had in this area.

In a conversation with Regina Viadro, EPAM’s VP and Co-Head of North American Business, and *Resonance Test* Producer Ken Gordon, Smith details how his organization promotes women’s leadership and diversity within the company and in the broader community.

When your company serves people, whether colleagues or consumers, Smith says: “Your organization should reflect that and be representative of the people you serve.”

One way they do this is through their Open Doors program which is, in Smith’s words, “a learning community. It's a movement that develops talent and it's focused on building culture.”

The program features a weeklong leadership intensive, a year of coaching support, and access to an online interactive learning community. It's an impressive approach to creating a talent ecosystem, and the effects of the Open Doors initiatives are undeniable.

• Nearly 90% of the intensive participants are still with the company.

• 52% have been promoted.

• 100% of the Open Doors participants self-report, Smith says, “an increase in their growth mindset.”

When it comes to women in tech, ELC is doing well. “The tech industry is at 28% women. We're sitting today at 34%,” Smith says. “I'm not satisfied with that number. We know that we can do better.”

Smith notes that his organization is interested in professional development at every layer. “We've doubled and tripled our internship program over the last few years, and we have a strong focus on recruiting women,” he says, adding: “We're seeing great success in people continuing to be promoted, continuing to grow into new roles.”

Speaking of growth: ELC has a wonderful dual career path initiative in place. “In a traditional organization, people hit that manager level and the only way they can continue to grow is to get bigger jobs,” he notes that his organization has another, attractive option: “They don't want to lead large teams, they want to be experts and make an impact with their subject matter expertise.” (We know all about such a path!)

Finally, Smith talks about The Tech Day of Pink, an initiative with a great mission: aiming to end breast cancer within our lifetime.

All in all, it’s a fine, instructional conversation. Open your mind by listening to the stories of all the doors ELC has opened.

Host: Alison Kotin

Engineer: Kyp Pilalas

Producer: Ken Gordon