This month we welcome guest and sponsor Julia Furst Morgado of Veeam for her spotlight topic "The Critical Nature of Incident Readiness and Response" and to chat about this month’s biggest cyber headlines with our panelists Marco Estrela, Patrick Naoum, and Bill Strub.

Topic 1: Patrick

Article title: Statement on People's Republic of China reconnaissance of Canadian systems

Source: https://www.cyber.gc.ca/en/news-events/statement-peoples-republic-china-reconnaissance-canadian-systems

Topic 3: Bill

Article title: Oracle customers confirm data stolen in alleged cloud breach is valid

Source: https://www.bleepingcomputer.com/news/security/oracle-customers-confirm-data-stolen-in-alleged-cloud-breach-is-valid/

Topic 4: Julia

Article title: FBI Says Backup Now—Advisory Warns Of Dangerous Ransomware Attacks

Source: https://www.forbes.com/sites/daveywinder/2025/02/22/new-fbi-warning-backup-today-as-dangerous-attacks-ongoing/

Expert panelists and host Marco Estrela bring you behind our shield to discuss current cybersecurity topics ripped from the headlines.

In this special episode, the team interviews one of Virtual Guardian's top SOC managers Tommy Koorevaar. Their discussion dives into what a day in the life of a SOC manager entails and common misconceptions about the inner workings of SOC teams. Our panelists also share their hot topics including how the new presidency in the US is affecting the cybersecurity landscape and how AI is increasing the effectiveness of social engineering attacks.

Sources:

Topic 1: Bill

Article title: What A New Presidency Means For Global Cybersecurity—And For SMEs

Source: https://www.forbes.com/councils/forbestechcouncil/2025/02/19/what-a-new-presidency-means-for-global-cybersecurity-and-for-smes/

Topic 2: Patrick

Article title: AI-Powered Social Engineering: Ancillary Tools and Techniques

Source: https://thehackernews.com/2025/02/ai-powered-social-engineering-ancillary.html

Happy New Year Behind the Shield listeners! This month we welcome back guest Tom Tovar, CEO and Co-Creator of our sponsor Appdome to reflect on the biggest cybersecurity headlines of 2024 and share predictions for 2025! Our guest is joined by host Marco Estrela and expert panelists Patrick Naoum, Bill Strub, and Jason Williams.

This month we're joined by Mike Melo, CISO of Ontario’s Life Labs, for a Q&A about his CISO role, what keeps him up at night and the pitfalls of trying to achieve cyber-resilience. If you’re interested in having a sneak peek into the daily life of a CISO, you won’t want to miss this interview.

Hot Topics segment includes: Utilities getting attacked (again!), is quantum computing threatening Bitcoin, vulnerable API headaches and we will see if collaboration is achievable in the face of rising cyberthreats.

Sources:

Topic 1: Jason #1

Article title: Vulnerable APIs and Bot Attacks Costing Businesses Up to $186 Billion Annually

Source: https://thehackernews.com/2024/10/vulnerable-apis-and-bot-attacks-costing.html

Topic 2: Bill #1

Article title: America's largest water utility hit by cyberattack at time of rising threats against U.S. infrastructure

Source: https://www.cnbc.com/amp/2024/10/08/american-water-largest-us-water-utility-cyberattack.html

Topic 3: Jason #2

Article title: Chinese researchers crack military-grade encryption: is bitcoin safe?

Source: https://cybernews.com/crypto/quantum-crack-military-grade-encryption-bitcoin-danger/

Topic 4: Bill #2

Article title: Escalating Cyber Threats Demand Stronger Global Defense and Cooperation

Source: https://blogs.microsoft.com/on-the-issues/2024/10/15/escalating-cyber-threats-demand-stronger-global-defense-and-cooperation/

This month we welcome guest and sponsor Lisa Jones-Huff of Elastic to chat about this month’s biggest cyber headlines with our panelists Marco Estrela, Patrick Naoum, Bill Strub and Jason Williams.

Hot Topics:

Topic 1: Jason

Article title: Microsoft summit plots end of kernel access for EDR security clients

Source: https://www.csoonline.com/article/3523753/microsoft-summit-plots-end-of-kernel-access-for-edr-security-clients.html

Topic 2: Patrick

Article title: Mastercard acquires Recorded Future: How will threat intelligence transform the payments industry?

Source: https://www.csoonline.com/article/3518765/mastercard-acquires-recorded-future-how-will-threat-intelligence-transform-the-payments-industry.html

Topic 3: Bill

Article title: TfL directs 30,000 employees to verify identities and reset passwords after data breach

Source: https://www.techmonitor.ai/news/:~:text=Transport%20for%20London%20(TfL)%20has%20directed%20all%20employees,measures%20to%20secure%20the%20organisation%E2%80%99s%20systems%20and%20data.

Topic 4: Lisa

Article title: N/A – Lisa wants to talk about “all the acquisitions and mergers in the SIEM|Analytics space, will the Platform Story drive more organizations to consider consolidating their spending and move away from purchasing best of breed solutions?”

Source: N/A

Extras: 3000 pagers kill several and injuring thousands in Lebanon; Spotlight from Lisa Jones-Huff on how AI is impacting the way cybersecurity analysts do their jobs

Back from our summer hiatus, we have a brand new episode of Behind the Shield! This month we’ve brought back one of our favorite special guests, Chris Vincent, to chat about this month’s biggest cyber headlines with our panelists Marco Estrela, Patrick Naoum, Bill Strub and Jason Williams.

Hot Topics: CrowdStrike’s global blue screen of death debacle, splitting the CISO role, Oracle’s NetSuite woes and, the largest password leak of all time?!?