This week we welcome back to the podcast former co-host Eric Trexler, Senior Vice President, U.S. Public Sector at Palo Alto Networks. We examine some hot security topics for the year ahead including growing prevalence of AI/ML automation used for preventative security, continued evolution and impact of ransomware (Did you know the average dwell time is 28 days?!), increasing adoption of people/process/technology approaches, industry consolidation, state and local cybergrants coming online and the opportunities those open up, Zero Trust pros and cons, attack surface management and what's been learned about cyberwarfare from the Ukraine conflict.

Eric Trexler, Senior Vice President, US Public Sector, Palo Alto Networks

Eric joined Palo Alto Networks in September of 2022 and oversees the US Public Sector business.

Most recently, Eric Trexler was the Vice President of Sales, Global Governments and Critical Infrastructure at Forcepoint. Eric was responsible for Global Go To Market operations to include all components of sales, sales enablement, and field and product marketing. While at Forcepoint, Eric's team doubled the size of the business over a five year period to nearly $400M in annual sales and strategically moved a large part of the business to the Public Cloud.

Eric has nearly 30 years of experience in technology across the public and private sectors, including Department of Defense, Civilian, and Intelligence communities, along with International governments. Eric has combined his sales savvy and technical skills with practical knowledge of leadership fundamentals to solve global cybersecurity issues for his customers and the business.

Prior to Forcepoint, Eric was the executive director for Civilian and National Security Programs at McAfee (formerly Intel Security). Earlier in his career, Eric worked at [Salesforce.com](http://Salesforce.com "‌"), EMC, and Sybase. He spent four years as an Airborne Ranger with the U.S. Army specializing in communications. Eric holds a Master's Degree in Business Administration and a Bachelor's of Science in Marketing from the University of Maryland at College Park.

He was the co-host of the award winning "To The Point Cybersecurity" podcast with over 200 weekly episodes covering various cybersecurity topics, and he regularly writes bylines for cybersecurity and national periodicals.

For links and resources discussed in this episode, please visit our show notes at https://www.forcepoint.com/govpodcast/e216