Cyber security, over the last few years, became a popular subject and many companies came onboard on the new and exciting trend.
Many of these newcomers base their selling pitches on fear and the evidence of recent or significant cyber-attacks that damage reputation, image, and profits. The greatest the fear the better the possibility of landing lucrative projects, not always the most effective from a security point of view, but with well-defined objectives of visibility and profitability.
Although automated systems are a good complement to a proper security assessment, they are not capable of exploring vulnerabilities that may require lateral movement and privileged escalation techniques, among many others, that are often used by cybercriminals.
Cyber security is not about running a bunch of automated tests and plugging up the identified vulnerabilities. Cyber security, like most things in life, is about knowing what you are doing and applying available resources to the most effective mitigation and countermeasures on a regular or continuous base.
Cyber security is about people that can use the tools and understand the results and take the problem to the next level, the level where criminals operate. It is about understanding where the risk is, evaluating it and applying the proper measures to mitigate that risk, spending the necessary budget in the right places and the right amounts. Cyber security is also doing things right from the start, be it in software development or network infrastructure deployment.
This week we will be launching the first part of a two episodes podcast called “Discussing Cyber security with Microsoft”. The first episode discusses some of cyber security basic concepts, like SOC, SIEM, SOAR, and why they’re increasingly important in today’s corporate environment. We’ll then go through some of today’s cyber security threats and why they’re getting harder to stop. At the end of the podcast, Microsoft will share its vision and solutions to cyber security, focusing on governance, Azure Policy, Azure Defender and Sentinel.
For this podcast we will be counting with Gabriele Freitas as Moderator and Rui Carvalho, Pedro Amorim Sousa and Javier Soriano as speakers.
Gabriele Freitas, Innovation and Technology Leader at InnoWave, has a solid background of 10 years as a full-stack Software Developer/Solution Architect/Senior DevOps Engineer. Gabriele is responsible for overseeing the best patterns and practices during the Software Development lifecycle at all InnoWave solutions, with the clear goal to innovate, incorporating always emerging technologies and methodologies, and with a strong preference for all that is cloud.
Rui Carvalho is the head of the division and focuses largely on research and analysis. Rui has 25 years’ experience in team leading and management. He developed a career based on IT networks that quickly evolved into a specialized security and innovation manager. Rui has wide experience in several sectors, including telecommunications and banking, security of payment transactions and terminals, electronic fraud detection, investigation and prevention.
Pedro Sousa is a specialist in defense against cybersecurity threats. Pedro has more than 20 years of experience in engineering and cybersecurity. In 2015, after 15 years as a security engineer creating solutions in financial companies, he decided to focus entirely on cybersecurity, working with telecommunications and consulting companies to design and implement processes that detect, investigate and respond to cybersecurity threats and incidents.
Javier Soriano is a Senior Program Manager, Azure Sentinel at Microsoft. With 10 years of experience in enterprise software and hardware solutions, Javier has a successful background on customer facing and internal roles. He has worked in multiple IT areas, like Storage, Virtualization, Orchestration/Automation and Security. His current tole is Senior Program Manager within the Cloud + AI Security engineering team at Microsoft, helping customers and partners run their security operations on Azure.
In part 2 we’ll deep dive into Microsoft’s cyber security arsenal and how it helps address specific threats to a corporate environment.
Stay tuned!