On the 26th episode of Enterprise AI Defenders, hosts Evan Reiser and Mike Britton, both executives at Abnormal Security, talk with Kirsten Davies, former Chief Information Security Officer at The Estée Lauder Companies and Unilever and founder of The Institute for Cyber. Kirsten's storied career has given her a front-row seat to understanding the complexities of securing global organizations. In this conversation, Kirsten shares insights on the scale of enterprise cyber operations, the hidden challenges of AI-powered security innovation, and how human risk is still the biggest concern in the age of AI.

Quick hits from Kirsten:

On how AI is redefining attacker capabilities: “The sophistication of whaling, spear phishing—AI is being used very smartly, and it’s bypassing a lot of those traditional filters that we had back in the day. Now it feels like all of the email-based attacks are super sophisticated, very targeted, and they have really major repercussions on the back end.”

On the need to rethink digital identity defense: “Think of how many service accounts there are now. They exploded in numbers—larger than people. The number of service and machine identities we have is astronomical… This is where the opportunity is on the defense side, where you don’t even have people involved anymore.”

On why people are still the frontline: “It still goes back to relationships with people… good old-fashioned communication capability… It's still about building awareness. The human element of risk—that will never go away. That’s one of the reasons I started The Institute—so everyday citizens can have safer experiences while they traverse the digital universe.”

Book Recommendation: Imagine Heaven by John Burke

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Enterprise AI Defenders is a show where top security executives share how moves to the cloud have created an evolved threat landscape that requires new tools to protect against cybercrime. Find more great lessons from tech leaders and enterprise software experts at https://www.enterprisesoftware.blog/

Enterprise AI Defenders is produced by Josh Meer.