The Defender's Journal

Welcome to Episode 37 of The Defender’s Journal! This week, Bashar Abouseido joins us - President of Cybersecurity at TENEX.AI and former long-serving CISO at Charles Schwab, where cyber decisions carried consequences beyond systems and into markets, trust and business continuity… In this episode, we explore why the traditional security model of adding more analysts, more tools and more process ha...

Welcome to Episode 36 of The Defender’s Journal! This week, Kevin Fielder joins us - CISO at NatWest Boxed, operating at the intersection of embedded finance, cloud-native banking and real-world security trade-offs... In this episode, we explore what it takes to secure a banking platform that sits behind major consumer brands, why “yes, but safely” beats defaulting to no, and how AI is changing th...

Welcome to another special crossover episode of The Defender’s and Disruptor’s Journal! This week, Lee Rossey joins us - CTO and Co-Founder of SimSpace, a company helping organisations prove whether their teams, tools and AI agents can perform under real-world pressure. In this episode, we explore why cyber readiness can no longer rely on assumptions, vendor claims or controlled lab results. Lee b...

Welcome to another special crossover episode of The Defender’s and Disruptor’s Journal! This week, Matt Moynahan joins us - CEO of GetReal and a leader focused on one of the most urgent questions in security: what happens when identity itself can be fabricated in real time? In this episode, we explore why traditional security stacks were never designed for a world of synthetic media, deepfake dete...

Welcome to another special crossover episode of The Defender’s and Disruptors’ Journal. This week, Rick Caccia joins us - CEO of WitnessAI and former CMO at companies including Palo Alto Networks and Google Cloud. Having spent three decades shaping how major technology markets are understood, Rick is now building in one of the fastest-moving spaces of all: safe enterprise AI adoption. In this epis...

Welcome to Episode 35 of The Defender’s Journal! This week, Omkhar Arasaratnam joins us - a Distinguished Engineer at LinkedIn whose career has taken him from factory work and DJ’ing to leading cyber and engineering functions across IBM, Deutsche Bank, Credit Suisse, JPMorgan and Google. In this episode, we explore why careers are rarely ladders, the difference between advisors and operators, and...

Welcome to another special crossover episode of The Defender’s and Disruptors’ Journal. Today’s guest is Damon Kachur , CEO of SecureG - a leader who has spent over two decades building the invisible infrastructure that digital trust depends on, from issuing billions of device identities to securing the networks behind telecom, IoT and critical systems. In this episode, we explore what it really m...

Welcome to Episode 34 of The Defender’s Journal! This week, George Totev joins us - a CISO who has spent over 20 years operating at the intersection of regulation, product and real-world risk, building and scaling security and compliance functions across organisations like Goldman Sachs, Visa and Atlassian... In this episode, we explore how security leaders should think about trade-offs at scale -...

Welcome to another crossover episode of The Defender’s Journal. Today’s guest is Abhi Sharma , co-founder and CEO of Relyance AI - a company rethinking how organisations secure data in the age of AI. Rather than treating data as something static, his team is building an AI-native approach to privacy, governance and security that focuses on the movement of data itself. In this episode, we explore h...

Welcome to Episode 33 of The Defender’s Journal. This week, Sandeep Poonen joins us. From establishing VMware’s cloud security and enterprise cyber risk functions from the ground up to leading global compliance, fraud risk platforms and board-level cyber strategy, his career spans scale, regulation and high-stakes accountability... In this episode, we explore what was forged early in his journey -...

Welcome to Episode 32 of The Defender’s Journal. Jacob DePriest returns to the show - previously Deputy CISO at GitHub, and now holding a rare dual mandate as CISO and CIO at 1Password, operating at the fault line between security, infrastructure, and business strategy. In this conversation, Jacob unpacks what truly changes when you move from a deputy role into full ownership, why “customer zero”...

Welcome to a special crossover episode between ‘The Defender’s Journal’ and our new sister series focussed on ‘The Disruptors’ where we shift the lens from what needs defending to what we’re building next... Our guest is Harry Wetherald - a founder with one foot in venture capital, the other in technical scale. As co-founder and CEO of Maze, he’s raised over $30 million and is reimagining vulnerab...

Welcome to another hard-hitting spin-off of The Defender’s Journal. Today’s guest is Ryan Lindley - CEO of Aegis Cyber and one of the industry’s clearest thinkers when it comes to security leadership. From crashing school networks as a teen hacker to rebuilding billion-dollar organisations post-breach, Ryan brings sharp insight, zero fluff, and hard-earned lessons to this conversation. In this epi...

Welcome to Episode 31 of The Defender’s Journal. This week, we’re joined by Matt Presson - a product-driven, context-obsessed security leader currently serving as CISO (Americas) at Bullish. From code reviews at FedEx to building global security functions across EY, B1, and now a regulated digital asset firm, Matt has seen cybersecurity from every angle. We explore the three defining questions beh...

Welcome to Episode 30 of The Defender’s Journal.  This week, we sit down with Cezary Piekarski - a global cybersecurity leader with decades of experience across the financial sector, national advisory roles, and the highest levels of organisational leadership! In this conversation, Cezary unpacks the three steepest climbs in his leadership journey = from managing a team for the first time, to lead...

Welcome to another thought-provoking episode of The Defender’s Journal. This week, we sit down with Assaf Keren - a global security leader whose career spans Qualtrics, PayPal, and advisory roles with central banks, regulators, and startups.  In this episode, we dive into the reality of building an AI-first workforce - and whether it’s actually achievable, why “friction” in security is inevitable...

Welcome to a special spin-off episode of The Defender’s Journal. This week, we sit down with Meg Anderson - a longtime security executive whose career spans nearly 40 years in one of the most tightly regulated environments in the industry... We explore what longevity really takes, how leadership evolves over decades, and what she might need to unlearn if she swapped it all tomorrow for a disruptiv...

Welcome to a bonus episode of The Defender’s Journal. This week, we welcome back Ted Harrington - ethical hacker, author, and co-founder of IoT Village - to explore the mindset behind his new book "The Inner Hacker". We dig into what hacker thinking really means (even in a world of audits, regulation, and surface-level compliance). Ted shares how to spot opportunities others miss and exp...

Welcome to another standout episode of The Defender’s Journal. This week, we sit down with Doug Innocenti - a security leader whose journey spans call-centre telecoms, banking giants, and now crypto-native fintech. As CISO at MoonPay, Doug is shaping security in one of the fastest-moving markets on earth, balancing scale, trust, and innovation. In this episode, we dive into the challenge of leadin...

Welcome to another powerfully honest episode of The Defender’s Journal! This week, Aimee Cardwell joins us. From building mobile tech at Expedia to securing healthcare infrastructure at UnitedHealth, her career spans engineering, innovation, and CISO-level leadership.  In this episode, we talk about leading through billion-dollar transformations, how to move from operator to strategist, and what i...

Welcome to another refreshing spin-off episode of The Defender’s Journal! This week, Alexandra Forsyth joins us. But how does a consulting-heavy career become a launchpad for CISO leadership - and what needs to change for more people to follow that path? In this episode, we explore the real roots of the cybersecurity skills gap, what a better on-ramp into security could look like, and why building...

Welcome to another inspiring episode of The Defender’s Journal! This week, Kaeli Smith joins us. But how does a former graphic design student go from nearly joining the CIA to leading a 30+ person cyber risk team? In this episode, we explore the mindset shift that pulled Kaeli into tech, how she’s translated risk for executives, and what it really takes to lead in an industry where not everyone ex...

Welcome to another insight-packed episode of The Defender’s Journal! This week, Chad Pierce takes the mic. But how does a cybersecurity leader link GRC directly to $1B in revenue - while keeping 700+ global buildings running behind the scenes? In this episode, we unpack the leadership mindset that turns security into an accelerator, the invisible systems powering WeWork’s global footprint, and why...

Welcome to another gripping episode of The Defender’s Journal! This week, Nate Dunning joins us on the mic. But how does a small-town farm kid end up leading global security operations across continents? In this episode, we unpack what it’s like to handle a live DDoS attack from an airport terminal, the challenges of building a SOC across time zones, and why hiring unconventional talent might be t...

Welcome to another intriguing episode of The Defender's Journal! This week, John Terrill steps up to the mic. But how does a 15-year-old hacker end up running security at Fox News and pioneering endpoint tools before the rest of the world caught on? In this episode, we dive into the question from a CTO that left him genuinely stumped, why your operating system might be your biggest crypto ris...