Hacker Valley Studio

Today in the studio, we have Alexis Robertson, Director of Diversity and Inclusion at a large law firm and a recovering lawyer.  Alexis kicks in with a bit about herself, and shares “I am director of diversity inclusion at a large law firm but spent the first 10 years or so of my career dedicated to laws, going to law school and practicing as a lawyer for about seven and a half years before leaving legal practice closing in on six years ago, I grew up in the suburbs of Milwaukee, Wisconsin, spent most of my life in the Midwest, except for time spent in DC at American University for undergrad and then I went to the University of Michigan for law school. That's me in a nutshell.” Alexis shares throughout this episode how her health, exercise and food habits all became habit with some very big changes.  It isn’t about getting healthy; it is about a long journey of being healthy.  You will hear a little bit about her food choices and why she made them, the exercises she partakes in, and how she balances it all.     Key Takeaways:   1:27 Welcome 2:23 Alexis shares her background 3:25 Serendipity 5:33 Self-improvement journey 12:41 Healthy mentality with food 17:20 Next steps 21:12 Getting back on track 24:07 Fitness journey 28:16 Looking forward 31:13 Advice to others 33:17 Staying in touch with Alexis   Alexis on LinkedIn Alexis on Instagram The Path & The Practice Podcast Support Hacker Valley Studio on Patreon.  Follow Hacker Valley Studio on Twitter. Follow hosts Ron Eddings and Chris Cochran on Twitter. Learn more about our sponsor ByteChek.

22 Jun 202134min

In this episode, we talk to our special guest, Natasha Barnes. Natasha is the Associate Director and the CEO Action for Racial Equity Fellow of Protiviti. She is a certified mindfulness workplace facilitator and mindfulness-based stress reduction.  Natasha is part of a movement to answer the question of does corporate America have a role to play in advancing racial equity within our nation, and essentially improving our overall societal well-being.  Technology serves as a way to propel the conversation forward, and recognizing global interconnectedness. Listen in for all of Natasha’s insights!   Key Takeaways:   1:02 Welcome back 2:16 Natasha shares her background 3:11 Natasha’s journey through wellness 4:23 Mindfulness purpose 6:28 Instructing others  10:27 Corporate role  10:52 Four pillars 15:06 Her journey 17:24 Creating solutions 19:24 Progress 21:39 Equity through mindfulness and technology 26:48 Impact   Natasha on LinkedIn CEO Action for Diversity & Inclusion Support Hacker Valley Studio on Patreon.  Follow Hacker Valley Studio on Twitter. Follow hosts Ron Eddings and Chris Cochran on Twitter. Sponsored by ByteChek

15 Jun 202131min

In this episode, we've brought in a special guest, Kelsey Hightower.  Kelsey is Principal Engineer at Google, and also co-author of Kubernetes: Up and Running: Dive into the Future of Infrastructure.  To start the show, Kelsey shares he considers himself a self-taught engineer. He started his life out as a small business owner and then moved to a system administrator. Now, he is at Google. Kelsey’s fascination with cyber started post High School. Rather than go to college, he jumped into, tech support, consulting, dropping cat five cable, but about 2004ish he really digs into the world of open source and all the things that you can do with it as a user and as a contributor. When it comes to community and customers, Kelsey felt they were one in the same.  However, in the last five years or so, he has kind of changed that a little bit, thinking everyone is probably in your community. The willing the ones that are willing to pay you money, we call those customers. And then the conversation turns to comedy, and his journey through comedy management and performances.  Along with this comes discussion about acquiring skills.   Finally, Kelsey shares advice to listeners!   Key Takeaways:   1:00 Welcome back 2:18 Kelsey shares his background 3:31 Community and customers 4:40 Professional purpose 6:00 Retirement thoughts 10:31 Journey in comedy 14:35 Getting better 16:28 Propelling forward 20:12 Minimalism 22:18 Immersion journey 25:25 Don’t miss the moment 27:00 Exceeding expectations 37:56 It’s ok to start! 39:25 How to keep up to date with Kelsey Kelsey on Twitter Support Hacker Valley Studio on Patreon.  Follow Hacker Valley Studio on Twitter. Follow hosts Ron Eddings and Chris Cochran on Twitter. Sponsored by Attack IQ Attack IQ Academy

8 Jun 202140min

In this episode, have James Hadley, CEO of Immersive Labs, and we talk about the best ways to learn in cybersecurity.  James starts the show with his background and what he is doing today, which is Immersive Labs.  But, he spent a lot of time in different organizations prior to that.   When it came to education, James found he had quite a poor memory, so he would always learn better through doing things rather than reading about things. Things would go in one ear and out the other. In addition to learning styles, they all discuss measuring education.  When it comes to measuring academics, for James it is all about the outcomes you want people to achieve.  They all agree that storytelling is incredibly powerful.  James shares a few of his own drawing back on his incredible journey.  And, of course, they round out the show with how to stay in touch and up to date with James.   Key Takeaways: 1:02 Welcome back 2:24 James’ background 5:06 Education experience 5:46 Changes 7:18 Measuring education 9:14 Balancing in testing 11:40 Biggest a’ha 13:14 Feedback 15:54 Learner vs. learner 17:37 Skill behind catching the bad guys 19:20 Applying knowledge 21:53 Geeks in the basement 23:47 The best job in cyber 26:30 Advice 27:58 How to stay in touch with James   Links: James on Immersive Labs James on LinkedIn Support Hacker Valley Studio on Patreon.  Follow Hacker Valley Studio on Twitter. Follow hosts Ron Eddings and Chris Cochran on Twitter. Learn more about our sponsor ByteChek.

2 Jun 202129min

In this episode, we brought back fan-favorite, John Strand.  He is owner of Black Hills Information Security, a SANS instructor, and a mentor to many in the industry.  Johns starts the show sharing a little bit about his background and what he is doing today. Ron and Chris dive a little bit deeper into John’s earlier life asking what his personal superpower, personal or professional, and when did that power really came about in his life? John shares his experiences with failure, which he feels are key to where he is at today.  How everyone needs to get comfortable with struggles, failures and hardships.  On top of that, one needs to be able to laugh at themself.     Key Takeaways   1:02 Back with fan favorite John Strand 2:21 John shares his background 3:38 John’s superpower 5:51 Going through the grind to learn 8:30 Partnerships 11:44 Getting a head start 14:58 The entertainment factor 16:36 Journey through being an instructor 19:35 Pay what you can concept 25:53 Education systems 29:18 Advice from John   Links: John Strand blog. John Strand on Twitter. Support Hacker Valley Studio on Patreon.  Follow Hacker Valley Studio on Twitter. Follow hosts Ron Eddings and Chris Cochran on Twitter. Learn more about our sponsor ByteChek.

25 Mai 202131min

This is the finale of Know Thyself. What an incredible journey, we feel like this entire experience flew by so fast, we got to talk to so many incredible people about knowing yourself, knowing your team, knowing your tech stack, knowing your environment, and even knowing your story. Make your organization better make your security posture better, strive for impact, what are the most high leverage things that you can do today to make everybody's lives easier, or more safe, and then yield the feedback, there might be some things that you might be missing, you might need to ask questions, ask for feedback, get some information from your stakeholders, what what are you thinking about that I might not be thinking about? asking these different things is how you know thyself. And this is how you get to know the people that are around you, your peers, your stakeholders, the more knowledge you have got started with that Sun Tzu quote, in the very beginning of the podcast, if you know yourself and you know your enemy, you need not fear the results of 100 battles. So if you really understand yourself, and you have good threat intelligence, understanding the externals, you have good vulnerability management that understands the externals and the internals, if you mash all that information together, I think you'll be able to do great things with your cybersecurity program.   Key Takeaways 0:02 Introduction to the show 0:49 Our Sponsor, Axonius  2:09 Welcome back 2:31 Reflecting on Know Thyself 3:17 Recap This Seasons Guest 3:22 Marcus Carey 4:17 John Strand 5:05 Aaron Reinhart & Jamie Dixon 5:54 Chaos Engineering 7:12 Lenny Zeltser, asset inventory 7:54 Kevin Allison, Storytelling is a soft skill 10:19 John Strand 12:13 Can we do better? 13:54 What kind of leader are you? 14:26 Do you have unsupported devices? 17:34 Ask yourself these questions 13:33 Go back to the EASY Framework 21:50 Learning 23:29 Exploration 24:00 Immersion 27:28 Reach Hacker Valley   Learn more about Hacker Valley Studio Support Hacker Valley Studio on Patreon Follow Hacker Valley Studio on Twitter Follow Ron Eddings on Twitter Follow Chris Cochran on Twitter Supported by Axonius

18 Mai 202128min

In this masterclass of HVB season 2 we brought in a master story teller in Kevin Allison. The biggest thing is to get a person to understand, don't just summarize, don't just walk us through a Wikipedia like where you're just giving us a broad overview. And you're explaining; it’s important to remember sensory details that will help us see almost like movie scenes, what was happening between people. That is what brings the story alive. So that's a good case right there where the bones of the story were incredible. Like that's just on paper and an incredible overview of a story, but it's not going to work unless you can fill in all those sensory details that bring it alive and make it emotional for us. Storytelling is a soft skill that offers the ability to contextualize cybersecurity in a manner that any organization can understand to allow their business to stay safe.   Key Takeaways:   0:00 Previously on the show 2:37 Kevin introduction 3:20 Episode begins 3:39 Where Kevin is today 7:58 Kevin’s origin story 12:04 Cybersecurity is performing 17:08 Storytelling for business 21:00 Engineering a story 26:12 Authentic storytelling 34:54 Speaking isn’t perfect 41:02 Where to find Kevin   The Story Studio RISK!: True Stories People Never Thought They’d Dare To Share RISK! Podcast Twitter Facebook Instagram Risk Show Podcast Learn more about Hacker Valley Studio Support Hacker Valley Studio on Patreon Follow Hacker Valley Studio on Twitter Follow Ron Eddings on Twitter Follow Chris Cochran on Twitter Sponsored by Axonius

18 Mai 202142min

If want to get into computer security, you're going to learn to love it, you're going to have to be successful, because a lot of computer security isn't just about bits and bytes, it's really about effectively communicating what needs to be done to the right people. In this episode wet have the incredible John Strand. Organizations need to become more proactive, and see where those weak spots are to protect themselves from something like ransomware. You need to run a pen test because you can have somebody literally launch those attacks, and identify those weaknesses in those vulnerabilities before the bad people do. What's the gap that we can all learn from? It's passwords. By and large for most users, passphrases are the way to go. And, multi-factor authentication is actually a very sound strategy. If you look at one key tenant of computer security, complexity is the enemy of computer security. And security is constantly trying to catch up and protect against yesterday's attacks. So, the future is more connected, it's more complicated. And the problem is, we still have people that use weak passwords, we still have people that click on links from strangers. And ultimately, when we're looking at that future, you're going to see the exact same problems that we've always had complicated on a much, much, much, much, much larger scale. As things get more and more pushed to the cloud. There'll be no shelter here, the front line is everywhere. World of computer security.    Key Takeaways: 0:00 Previously on the show 2:02 John introduction 2:44 Episode begins 2:47 What John is doing today 3:45 John’s core tenets 5:51 How pen testing is “Blue” 6:17 Why understanding fundamentals matters 8:55 Ransomware 10:41 Organizations need to be prepared 11:58 Password gap 13:37 Password philosophy 17:07 Multi-factor authentication 21:40 What to do today 24:24 New problems 26:44 Learn your own network 28:26 Where to find John   John Strand on Twitter John Strand on LinkedIn Black Hills Information Security Learn more about Hacker Valley Studio Support Hacker Valley Studio on Patreon Follow Hacker Valley Studio on Twitter Follow Ron Eddings on Twitter Follow Chris Cochran on Twitter Sponsored by Axonius

18 Mai 202129min