Risk & Cybersecurity

May 20, 202310 min

You Only Get 3 Metrics - Which Ones Would You Pick?

Just over a year ago I put out this blog post on the 10 fundamental (but really hard) security metrics. Since then I’ve discussed this...

May 7, 202313 min

The Illusion of Choice : A Review

In the last post we talked about the challenges and opportunities of using individual and organizational incentives to ensure effective...

Apr 22, 20238 min

People and Security Incentives

Force 6 : People, organizations and AI respond to incentives and inherent biases but not always the ones we think are rational. //...

Apr 7, 20238 min

Handling Complexity

Force 5 : Complex Systems break in Unpredictable Ways // Central Idea: While component level simplicity is vital, seeking to eliminate...

Mar 25, 20237 min

Fighting Security Entropy

Force 4 : Entropy is King // Central Idea: Adopting a control reliability engineering mindset by continuous control monitoring is...

Mar 12, 20239 min

Attack Surface Management

Force 3 : Services want to be on // Central Idea: Take architectural steps to inherently reduce your attack surface - don’t just rely...

Feb 25, 20238 min

Software Security is More than Vulnerabilities

Force 2 : Code wants to be wrong // Central Idea: Shift from a pure focus on only reducing security vulnerabilities towards increasing...

Feb 11, 20238 min

Data Security and Data Governance

Force 1: Information wants to be free // Central Idea: Shift from perimeter based surveillance and tactical blocking to data governance...

Jan 28, 20232 min

The 6 Fundamental Forces of Information Security Risk

I first posted this as a Twitter thread in 2019. These forces still seem very much current - perhaps even more so. It is interesting to...

Jan 14, 202312 min

Ceremonial Security and Cargo Cults

There is a lot of conventional security that is based on established ceremonies and an unquestioning faith that if we keep doing these...

Dec 31, 20227 min

Simple Ways to Communicate Successes

It’s that time of year when you’ve inevitably written notes to your organization and leadership about all your team’s achievements over...

Dec 17, 20223 min

Dangerous Embedded Assumptions

There is a notion I keep coming back to thanks to this article from a few years ago. The essence is that there are things that have...