The Cyber Security Matters Podcast

In this episode of the Cyber Security Matters podcast, hosts Tom Wilding and Matt Rose are joined by Geoffrey Mattson, CEO, and Mark van Oppen, Chief Revenue Officer at SecureAuth, to explore how the rise of AI agents is changing cybersecurity and why identity is becoming increasingly important in controlling what those agents can do.

The conversation looks at the shift from traditional identity and authentication towards real-time authorisation, where organisations need to understand not only who or what is accessing a system, but what they are permitted to do at any given moment.

Geoffrey and Mark discuss the challenges created by autonomous and increasingly capable AI agents, including over-privileged access, unpredictable behaviour, shadow AI infrastructure and the growing importance of visibility, policy and behavioural analytics.

Key topics:
● Why AI agents represent a fundamentally different security challenge
● The move from identity verification to real-time action authorisation
● How organisations can begin taking inventory of their AI agents, infrastructure and MCP servers
● The risks of over-privileged agents and “friendly fire” from AI systems
● Why visibility alone isn't enough when securing AI
● Applying Zero Trust principles to workforce, customer and agent identities
● The importance of connecting technical cybersecurity capabilities to real business outcomes
● What cybersecurity organisations should look for when building strong sales and technical teams
● Why the rapid emergence of AI is forcing the cybersecurity industry to rethink traditional approaches

About our guests:
Geoffrey Mattson is CEO of SecureAuth and an experienced cybersecurity and technology leader, with previous leadership roles including CEO of Xage Security and co-founder and leader of MistNet.ai. His career has included work with organisations including Juniper Networks, Huawei, Nortel and Bell Labs.

Mark van Oppen is Chief Revenue Officer at SecureAuth, leading the company's global sales and marketing efforts. He has held senior commercial and technology roles at companies including IBM, Heptio, VMware and FusionAuth.

This episode of Cyber Security Matters is brought to you by neuco.

In this episode of Cyber Security Matters, hosts Harry Baldwin and Matt Rose speak with Yuval Itzchakov, Co-Founder and CTO of A Security, about how artificial intelligence is reshaping cyber security. Yuval explains how AI is increasing the speed and scale of cyber attacks, why security teams need to look beyond individual vulnerabilities, and how exploitable attack paths and attacker kill chains are changing the future of cyber defence.

Yuval also shares his journey from Unit 8200 and offensive security into commercial cyber security, including his six years at Hunters and the lessons he learnt while building and scaling security teams. The discussion covers what he looks for when hiring engineers, why curiosity, communication and adaptability matter, and how AI is changing the way security professionals and technical teams work.

From AI-powered offensive security to automated remediation, the conversation explores how organisations can rethink vulnerability management and respond more effectively as attacks move at machine speed.

Key topics covered
● Yuval's journey from Unit 8200 into cybersecurity and technology leadership
● Moving from highly technical roles into business and company leadership
● Lessons from scaling Hunters and building A Security
● What Yuval looks for when hiring security professionals
● How AI is changing the way engineers and security professionals work
● The rise of AI-powered offensive security
● Why attackers can use AI to increase the speed and scale of attacks
● The difference between individual vulnerabilities and exploitable attack paths
● Why attacker kill chains should become a greater focus for security teams
● Shortening the time between discovering and remediating exploitable weaknesses
● The future of automated remediation and keeping humans in the loop

About Yuval Itzchakov
Yuval Itzchakov is Co-Founder and CTO of A Security, an autonomous offensive security and remediation company. Before founding A Security, Yuval spent six years at Hunters, progressing from one of the company’s first engineers to CTO. He began his career in Unit 8200, where he built extensive experience across technology, security and technical leadership.

At A Security, Yuval focuses on building technology that tests organisations in the way real attackers do, identifying exploitable attack paths and helping organisations remediate them.

This episode of Cyber Security Matters is brought to you by neuco, a global specialist recruitment and executive search business supporting companies across Media & Sports Technology, Satellite, Space & Defence and Cyber Security. You can also follow neuco on LinkedIn for sector insights, hiring updates and podcast content.

In this episode of Cyber Security Matters, hosts Harry Baldwin and Matt Rose are joined by Quincy Castro, Chief Information Security Officer at Chainguard.

Quincy shares his unconventional journey into cybersecurity, from studying economics and political science to working at the NSA, leading security at GE Transportation, Wabtec and Redis, and eventually joining Chainguard.

The conversation explores how AI and open source software are reshaping cybersecurity, why people and culture are more important than security budgets, and how the rise of citizen developers is introducing new software supply chain risks. Quincy also discusses the evolving relationship between CISOs and boards, why vulnerability patching has become a strategic business concern, and his prediction that the CISO role could look completely different in five years.

Key Topics Covered
• Quincy's unconventional career journey, from economics and political science to the NSA and cybersecurity leadership
• What offensive security experience teaches defenders about understanding attackers
• Choosing the right CISO opportunity and building security teams that challenge conventional thinking
• Why people, culture and leadership matter more than cybersecurity budgets
• The challenges facing cybersecurity startups and the growing cyber poverty gap
• How Chainguard is approaching open source security and software supply chain risks
• The rise of AI coding tools, citizen developers and new security vulnerabilities
• Open source attacks, including the axios compromise and Shai-Hulud worm
• How AI can combine low-severity vulnerabilities into more significant security threats
• Why vulnerability management and patching are becoming board-level priorities
• The future of the CISO role, regulatory liability and the EU Cyber Resilience Act
• Career advice for aspiring cybersecurity professionals

About Quincy Castro
Quincy Castro is Chief Information Security Officer at Chainguard, a company focused on securing open source software and strengthening software supply chains.

Before joining Chainguard, Quincy spent four years as CISO at Redis and previously led cybersecurity at Wabtec Corporation and GE Transportation. Earlier in his career, he held roles at the NSA, General Electric and within the US federal government.

Alongside his leadership experience, Quincy advises and invests in early-stage startups and has taught cybersecurity and national security at Marquette University. He holds an MBA from the University of Chicago Booth School of Business, an MA from Marquette University and a BA in Economics from the University of Washington.

This episode is brought to you by neuco, a global specialist recruitment and executive search partner supporting organisations across Cyber Security, Satellite & NewSpace, Connectivity, and Media & Sports Technology.

In this episode of Cyber Security Matters, hosts Harry Baldwin and Matt Rose are joined by Alfredo Hickman, Chief Information Security Officer at Kai.

Alfredo discusses his journey from a 1990s fascination with early internet technology, through infantry service in the US Marine Corps, national security roles, and nearly eight years building the security organisation at Obsidian Security, to his current role at Kai. The conversation explores why AI is fundamentally reshaping the balance between attackers and defenders, what needs to happen before organisations can hand more autonomy to AI in security operations, and whether the industry is heading toward a genuinely new security operating model rather than another generation of point solutions.

Alfredo also shares his thinking on what separates the best cybersecurity professionals, the mentors who shaped his career, and the achievement he is most proud of.

Key Topics Covered
Alfredo's path into cybersecurity through 1990s internet and hardware culture
Serving as a Marine Corps infantry sergeant in counterterrorism after 9/11
The mentors who shaped his career, including his mother and Dmitri Alperovitch
Rising from individual contributor to CISO in one continuous run at Obsidian Security
Why he joined Kai to help build autonomous defence for security teams
What separates the best cybersecurity professionals from the rest
How AI is changing the role and required skill set of security professionals
Kai's mission to give defenders an asymmetric advantage through autonomous defence
The structural imbalance between AI-augmented attackers and resource-constrained defenders
What's needed - governance, guardrails, and a "trust fabric" - before AI can safely take autonomous security actions
Emerging AI governance standards, including ISO/IEC 42001 and Cloud Security Alliance guidance
Whether the future of security is a new operating model or another generation of point solutions
His five-year prediction that at least 60% of manual security work will be automated
The career achievement he describes as his proudest moment
His advice for people entering cybersecurity: get comfortable being uncomfortable

About Alfredo Hickman
Alfredo Hickman is Chief Information Security Officer at Kai, an agentic AI cybersecurity platform built to help defenders execute security work at machine speed. Founded by Galina Antova (co-founder of Claroty) and Dr Damiano Bolzoni (co-founder of SecurityMatters), Kai emerged from stealth with $125 million in funding to build autonomous defence capabilities for enterprise security teams.

Before joining Kai, Alfredo spent close to eight years at Obsidian Security, rising from an individual contributor to Chief Information Security Officer and building the company's security organisation from its earliest days. Earlier in his career, he led security product engineering at Rackspace Managed Security, and held roles at the Center for Strategic and International Studies and the US Department of Defence. Alfredo's path into technology began in the early-to-mid 1990s, teaching himself to code and reverse-engineer software. That early interest was interrupted, and ultimately redirected, by his decision to enlist in the US Marine Corps as an infantry sergeant following the September 11th attacks, where he was later exposed to cyber operations in a national security and counterterrorism context.

His work today sits at the intersection of cybersecurity leadership and AI governance, with a focus on helping organisations safely realise the benefits of autonomous, AI-driven defence.

This episode is brought to you by neuco.

In this episode of Cyber Security Matters, hosts Harry Baldwin and Matt Rose are joined by Gal Ordo, Co-founder and Chief Product Officer at Native. Gal shares his journey from studying mathematics and developing early expertise in cybersecurity to leading product at AWS Security Hub and later founding Native. 
 
The conversation explores why cloud security needs to move beyond simply detecting risk and towards secure-by-design environments. Gal explains how Native approaches cloud security across multiple cloud providers, and why AI is changing both the threat landscape and the role of security engineers. He also shares his views on product management, building early-stage teams, leadership, and the professional achievement he is most proud of. 

Key Topics Covered 
Cloud security moving from detection to prevention 

The shift towards secure-by-design cloud environments 

Why multi-cloud consistency matters across AWS, Azure, Google Cloud and Oracle Cloud 

Native’s approach to cloud security controls 

The challenge of turning security outcomes into practical cloud controls 

How AI is changing the cloud threat landscape 

Securing AI agents through deterministic controls 

Why AI can support security engineering without replacing human expertise 

The changing relationship between product management and engineering 

Building lean product teams at an early-stage start-up 

Hiring and developing strong security engineering talent 

Gal’s “disagree and commit” approach to leadership 

His transition from AWS to founding Native 

The professional achievement he describes as his proudest moment 

His advice for people entering cybersecurity: treat security as a puzzle to solve 

About Gal Ordo 
Gal Ordo is Co-founder and Chief Product Officer at Native, a cloud security company focused on helping organisations build secure-by-design cloud environments. Native describes itself as a cloud security control plane that turns security outcomes into enforceable controls across AWS, Azure, Google Cloud and OCI. 
 
Before founding Native, Gal was a product leader for AWS Security Hub, where he worked closely with large enterprise customers and gained first-hand insight into the challenges organisations face when securing increasingly complex cloud environments. This experience helped shape the founding idea behind Native: that organisations need to move beyond identifying cloud risks after the fact and instead embed security outcomes directly into their cloud architecture. 
 
Gal began his career in cybersecurity before pursuing an MBA in the US. His work today sits at the intersection of cloud security and product development, with a focus on helping organisations translate security objectives into practical, enforceable controls within their cloud environments. 
 
This episode is brought to you by neuco.