Let's talk about digital identity with Jesse Kurtto, DPO and Data Scientist at Ubisecure.

Is now the right time to invest into Identity and Access Management (IAM)? Join us for episode 101, as Oscar is exploring why now is the right time to invest into IAM with Jesse Kurtto, DPO and Data Scientist at Ubisecure – as they delve into the current economic situation and some of the key factors of investing into identity management.

[Transcript below]

"Digitalisation is ongoing, it's accelerating, it's unstoppable."

Known as the guy who shortened the world and lived to tell the tale, Jesse’s career is gradually arching from the Wild West world of finance to his current position as the DPO and Data Scientist at Ubisecure. Learning to program before learning to read Finnish and visiting 25 countries before 25, he’s no stranger in exploring uncharted waters and discovering connections that others might miss. Surrounded by a delicate balance of the latest technology and dozens of carefully tended houseplants, his secret hobby is putting the hiking boots and RPGs aside for a moment in order to write to his beloved snail mail friends across the world.

We’ll be continuing this conversation on Twitter using #LTADI – join us @ubisecure!

Go to @Ubisecure on YouTube to watch the video transcript for episode 101.

Podcast transcript

Oscar: Is this the right time to invest in Identity and Access Management? This week Jesse Kurtto from Ubisecure has joined us to answer this question and discuss the current economic situation. Stay tuned to find out more.

Let’s Talk About Digital Identity, the podcast connecting identity and business. I am your host, Oscar Santolalla.

Oscar: Today’s guest is Jesse Kurtto. Jesse’s career has gradually arched from the Wild West world of finance, to his current position as a Data Protection Officer and Data Scientist at Ubisecure. Learning Program before learning to read Finnish and visiting 25 countries before 25. He is no stranger to exploring unchartered waters and discovering connections that others might miss. Surrounded by a delicate balance of the latest technology and dozens of carefully tended houseplants, his secret hobby is writing to his beloved snail mail friends across the world. Welcome Jesse.

Jesse: Thank you for the invite, Oscar. Nice to be here.

Oscar: Great having you, Jesse, definitely. We’re going to have a super interesting conversation about the market in Digital Identity and Identity and Access Management.

First of all, we always want to hear more about our guests. So please tell us a bit about yourself and your journey to the world of digital identity.

Jesse: All right. So, like many or even most of us in the digital identity field, I actually never really actively sought to be a specialist, IAM specialist, on purpose. And my personal background is actually nothing technology even, but in finance and investing more specifically. So, a chance encounter and I liked the people who interviewed me and decided to stay for a while, and that while has been over seven years now. And I'm still learning something new every day, checking out how we really the world of digital identity like and frankly haven’t ever regretted decision. No two days have really been the same and the field continues to evolve and develop quite a bit every year.

Oscar: Yeah, excellent and definitely hearing at Ubisecure, we definitely appreciate having this – well call it, like a blend of knowledge - the financial market, not lesser than what you bring with the security and digital identity knowledge, very practical knowledge you also had. So, it's always super interesting having those conversation with you.

And for the first time here on the podcast, we are going to have that, a bit more financial touch on that - What is coming, especially in this well this year, and I think also the years to come. The previous year and the year to come I think, we are already end of 2023 in which - well the financial situation is not good we're going to talk about. But of course, no matter how the economy is, the companies organisation has to protect their services, have to upgrade the services, maintain them, so they have to invest some money in that.

So, from the perspective of companies who today need to upgrade their digital capabilities, what would you say is the piece of the current macroeconomic situation that they should know well? So that was at least what they should know well, from what is happening now?

Jesse: Well, first of all, we all know the macroeconomic situation hasn't really been dancing on the roses over the past few years. But first, we had a massive shock with the COVID pandemic starting from spring 2020. Then we got massive economic stimulus to recover from that slump. And right after we were starting to climb up, then the war in Ukraine saw that all kinds of new problems everywhere around the world seemed to emerge just within three or four months.

The energy uncertainty in Europe and the economy went down the drain, and macroeconomic in quite a difficult situation here in Europe. But we would actually want to have some kind of stimulus in order to recover. But at the same time, we are suffering from quite persistently high inflation, which makes any kind of stimulus package basically equal to pouring more gasoline to the flames.

So, the European bank is really between a rock and a hard place here. And I can only look over the Atlantic to the States and be very jealous how they are able to both fight inflation and with high interest rates, five and a half percent this talking and meanwhile still have a blisteringly red-hot labour market all but there.

So, my first point would be that not all markets are equal. And the second important point is that now is actually a really great time to invest in any digital capabilities, including digital identities. Because now, we are in the middle of a small recession in Europe and investing in recession has historically been the very best time to invest in growth.

And if we think for a while, it actually makes perfect sense. After all, the alternative is to invest in the middle of a growth season when everybody else wants to invest in growth as well. Pushing prices even higher and reducing the availability of experts to help with these transformation projects. But now it's still for a while kind of a buyer's market.

So best time to invest in future growth is now.

Oscar: So, time to invest is now.

Jesse: Yes.

Oscar: Okay. So, let's go into what - because there are many things that the company can invest now and many things that many companies might need. But if you were one of the - chief executive, like CISO, or someone who is top decision makers in companies and there has to be some budget for digital identity. Thinking of - first of all broadly. Broadly but in digital identity, what would be the most important products that today would be the top priority for buying now?

Jesse: Today I would say that the absolute top priority would be - to establish really low friction user journeys from the very beginning account registration to the actual purchase, including solid online self-service. And now this low friction user journey is no way exclusive with security or compliance, but it is actually reaping the benefits of digitalisation. Digitalisation is ongoing, it's accelerating, it's unstoppable.

So, the question is for every organisation – should they try to fight this change to the last or embrace it and be among the first to actually reap its benefits. It's actually interesting because my background in finance, the many finance sector operators were among the first to embrace digital identities, but they kind of stopped it halfway there; “Okay, we can build self-service portals for our users, but for many, many procedures we still require hand signed paper documents being sent via physical mail.” And this is really only reaping a very small part of the benefits of digitalisation. So, there is plenty to go.

Oscar: Yeah. Interesting what you say in finance services. That's correct. For reasons of security had to be always in the latest of technology for security. But some of the process has been, as you say, very old fashioned like the old school, many paper fax I think still use or cheques. So, these kind of.

Jesse: Oh yes, those ones to.

Oscar: Still alive.

Jesse: Yes. And it truly hurts the user experience a lot. It even causes direct missed opportunities. Let's say new bond is coming to a market and you wish to buy a piece of it and participate. But if it takes three or four days just to do all the paperwork, then the opportunity has simply passed.

Oscar: And indeed, the price changed completely. Okay, so you say that the top is to - the user journey has to be digitalised. So, what is the category of products that address that?

Jesse: Would say a real CIAM system would be the one to go here, and not try to build the user journey from, let's say 4 to 6-point solutions and then somehow glue them together. I think the best solution would be an IAM solution that's designed for a whole user journey from the scratch and not something homemade or batched together.

Because when business grows, as it will eventually grow, no recession will last forever. And to user numbers pick up and suddenly there's a nightmare of issues of having 4 to 6 different vendors and trying to keep their products up and running with ever increasing user numbers. And that again, is doing digitalisation the wrong way, if I may say.

Oscar: Yeah. CIAM being - so how, well the evolution of the more broadly speaking, Identity and Access Management. Maybe you can give us an overview of that evolution of the Identity and Access Management, what - how we started and what we have today.

Jesse: Yeah, that's a very interesting topic.