Latest / Identity at the Center / #10 - South of the Border with Arturo Cordoba
Transcript
- 0:06Do you know who has access to what this is the identity at the
- 0:09center podcast if you're looking for identity and access
- 0:12management talk you've come to the right place and now on to
- 0:20the show. Welcome to another episode of
- 0:26the identity of the sender podcast.
- 0:28My name is Jeff Steadman. I'm on the road this week took
- 0:31the show south-of-the-border Jim mean with our friend Arturo
- 0:35Cordova who is a senior advisor on the cyber security team for
- 0:387x High Arturo. I like it.
- 0:41Hey, Jim, I didn't age files Monterrey Mexico treating you it
- 0:45is beautiful coming from Chicago.
- 0:48I never see anything more than just flat land and the mountains
- 0:51here are amazing. So I am drinking it up as much
- 0:54as I can. Is hot but that's okay.
- 0:57It is a dry heat as I think you know, some people might think is
- 1:01a little bit better. The humidity is not quite as
- 1:03high. Although there wasn't very cool
- 1:05lightning storm Tuesday night when we were when I was here
- 1:08when I got here. So that was kind of neat Archer.
- 1:10You're probably used to the weather right?
- 1:12It's yeah, I mean dude, you are lucky because this week they
- 1:15have the weather is start cooling down.
- 1:17Hmm. It was a few weeks back will be
- 1:19very high like 40 something in Social Security.
- 1:22That's my kryptonite and I can't I can't handle the heat.
- 1:26My jam Jim knows good. Oh, yeah, I know and I'm in
- 1:30Georgia and it's plenty hot here still but Jeff and you should be
- 1:34commended. It's Friday before Labor Day and
- 1:37you're still working on the road.
- 1:38That means you're going to be traveling home on Saturday,
- 1:41right? That's correct.
- 1:43And you're there with Arturo and he's rocking the October fall
- 1:49beard. I love it.
- 1:50He's getting Baseball playoff season.
- 1:54That's one of the things I About Arturo is that he's a fellow
- 1:58baseball. Junkie.
- 1:59Yeah. I am.
- 2:01I am actually this next week the local teams here in Mexico with
- 2:06the Mexican League. They start playoff next week.
- 2:09So my team made it to the playoffs.
- 2:10Oh, so you have to get your left leg going.
- 2:13Yeah. And so we're going to finish and
- 2:15I continue with the Emily V 0 B. Yeah, it's routine and the MLB
- 2:21and that's on top that - yeah. Yeah, and they've got company.
- 2:25Quite a team this year. So they'll be playing in
- 2:27October. Like you said before Jeff.
- 2:31We should have a separate podcast on that much value for
- 2:36that one. What's baseball?
- 2:43So Arturo, I'm glad you're able to have some time set aside some
- 2:45time to talk with us. Not Q for having me.
- 2:48We've been working with you for Less almost two years.
- 2:51I guess coming up pretty soon. Maybe we can talk a little about
- 2:54your background. And you know, how long have you
- 2:57been? Let's start with I am how long
- 2:59have you been in the I am space in the I am is face these
- 3:03actually some not clear enough because I am start like 11 or 12
- 3:10years ago. Ago in the security space
- 3:12information security Simon star like and for like a consultant
- 3:17information security consultant mostly for endpoint security
- 3:21things and and infrastructure like firewalls IPS things like
- 3:26that and eventually wants that we start involving more and more
- 3:31secure things. I start like taking projects
- 3:34related somehow with identity at the beginning without knowing
- 3:37that actually The Entity was I think like a And two thousand
- 3:43eleven and twelve and it's like what like six years back.
- 3:47So I start thinking like that all taking things like identity
- 3:51management and things like that. So I think that I didn't realize
- 3:58that I was doing things related with the identity.
- 4:02It wasn't until I don't you start reading papers, really no
- 4:05intimation exactly. And so at some point I just
- 4:09realized I have my identity. Professional right?
- 4:12What was the first project that you worked on that was that was
- 4:15specific to Identity. The first one was an
- 4:19implementation of fun identity manager.
- 4:22So we were deploying son identity and different
- 4:26countries. So that was my first project
- 4:30related with identity. And after that it was like more
- 4:35common on until we started like formalized in the department.
- 4:40Couple of years back and start doing things in a more formal
- 4:44way. And and also I think that the
- 4:46same time and probably we are going to discuss that but at the
- 4:49same time I just releasing that the entire Market is tried to
- 4:55formalize that practice as well like early days of I am and yeah
- 5:01related the book no of knowledge that things like Ida Pro is
- 5:05working on that. We should talk about I do pro
- 5:08Yeah. So basically that one a little
- 5:09bit that's relatively a new organization and I know that you
- 5:12recently just joined. I've been a member for a while.
- 5:17I also helped out with the board selection committee Jim.
- 5:20Are you a member of ID Pro? I'm not currently no Jim.
- 5:31The reason why I write there is because I was looking and
- 5:35actually a couple of years back I started looking for.
- 5:38Okay, what are the kind of certification that and identity?
- 5:40Personalized you should meet or should achieve so I started
- 5:44looking in I find out that there's not any or or if there
- 5:48are any is like report number is not something generalized like
- 5:52security Library CSP or TSM. Whichever is more like a product
- 5:56Focus, right? I'm a cyber-ark engineer or I'm
- 5:59a sales Point engine. Yeah, whatever birth specific to
- 6:02that Technologies, right? Yeah.
- 6:03Yeah, I do pro is something that we're probably gonna have a show
- 6:07specific to that at some point. Maybe we can get Debbie from
- 6:10that organization. And I come on and talk a little
- 6:11bit about it. But it's the beginnings of a
- 6:14very specific group to support other people who are working in
- 6:19the ID world and I think it's I think it's gonna be a good thing
- 6:23overall, but we could bring it back to I am and let's talk a
- 6:28little bit about what your view is from your perspective of.
- 6:35How does how does I am get viewed here in Mexico compared
- 6:40to what you See maybe in other countries or the u.s.
- 6:43They very good question. Well Casey, I don't know why but
- 6:50I still feel like identity like being part of security somehow.
- 6:56I'm still like like identity is being like like the child of
- 7:00security somehow or something that it depends security at
- 7:04least in most of the organization's right now in here
- 7:07in Mexico and when I'm serious like And happened the same for
- 7:13security at least from my point of view.
- 7:16Like if you think don't security like 10 years back at least here
- 7:20in Mexico. It was like something new and
- 7:22something that wasn't like, okay, you are a security
- 7:25professional. So are you are an IT guy who
- 7:28probably overseas or have more privacy rights with security,
- 7:32but you are an IT guy. So I think that in the past two
- 7:37years security has became like as Security professional with
- 7:42certification. We're more things related to
- 7:44that and I think that right now identities following the same
- 7:49path. So I just feel bad 50 more years
- 7:53after that but I believe that identity is going to follow a
- 7:57following the same path that security so for right now at
- 8:01least here in Mexico is like more I would say like haven't or
- 8:08is everything the increasing in the last few years for sure many
- 8:13of organizations related to the financial sector like Banks or
- 8:18insurance companies. They do have a lot of Regulation
- 8:21and that end so are the most mature right now and some other
- 8:27International companies like us like Ceramics they are doing
- 8:30more things related with security because of the same
- 8:32thing like the same drivers feel compliance, but I think that we
- 8:38are very early in the sense of adopting new technologies or
- 8:42actually that the companies have people really dedicated to to
- 8:49Identity specifically to identica.
- 8:51Yeah Arturo. So one of the interesting things
- 8:54I would think is have you had to go out and hire people with an I
- 9:00am background or have you tried to do that?
- 9:03And what was your experience with whether many people in the
- 9:06market who had the skills? Eels that you were looking for
- 9:09or did you feel like you'd have to bring somebody in to train
- 9:11them either on I am Basics or or product specific skills.
- 9:18Yeah my tell you we start looking for four more people
- 9:22since last year and actually guide it was a surprise like we
- 9:30we had a very hard time to find people.
- 9:32Actually we still do because it Again, it's like very specific
- 9:40even though trying to find people focus on security right
- 9:43now here in Mexico is not that easy.
- 9:46Unfortunately the most of the universities in here, they
- 9:52didn't have information security career until just a few years
- 9:57back and mean one of their most important universities here in
- 10:00Monterey. They didn't have a master degree
- 10:04from security until I think that this year is going to Start
- 10:07something like that. So I think that in a sense of
- 10:11the University's getting Preparing People for that.
- 10:14It is relatively new and so so yeah, it's pretty hard right now
- 10:21and I have been reading some papers about that or opinion on
- 10:26the internet that they tell you about.
- 10:29It is better to train somebody like somebody with certain
- 10:34skills, like people who is more Tibor because you know that also
- 10:39identity at least from my perspective is is like a yes.
- 10:43It is a cyber security mindset somehow would also is that
- 10:48creativity or that sense of be a problem solving guide rather
- 10:55than just a person who knows about technology, right?
- 10:59Yeah, and and and some of the articles about that they say
- 11:05that it was better like higher. Or somebody and trying to be as
- 11:10an IT person. I and identity person.
- 11:14I hear that also one of the conference on identifiers this
- 11:20year. He was a girl from I don't
- 11:23remember the name of the company, but he was trained for
- 11:26to be and and identity professional in that company and
- 11:30they he was from help desk and I also thinking about that because
- 11:35help desk are the ones I have like more sense of the end user
- 11:41rather than people who is working on another project so I
- 11:44can test that that's my background has helped us.
- 11:48You know, I fell kind of into I knew I went to be insecurity and
- 11:51just kind of fell into I am as my way to get into security and
- 11:55I've been there ever since but you know going back to what
- 11:57you're saying about the hiring. I have a very similar take on
- 12:01that. You know what I'm what I'm
- 12:03looking to bring someone on technology.
- 12:07He skills are important, but I can typically trained technology
- 12:12what I can't train his personality, you know the drive
- 12:16to get things done those sorts of things and this goes back out
- 12:20even before to before my 80 days when I was in the service
- 12:23industry, you know, waiting tables managing restaurants
- 12:26those sorts of things, you know, give me give me a person with a
- 12:29good attitude and I can train them to do just about anything
- 12:33and I think that's something that's interesting here is
- 12:35opposed to when you're it. Difficult to find I am resources
- 12:39and Jimmy you seen those as well trying to find very specific
- 12:44skills that's is very difficult. It's even harder when it's such
- 12:48a competitive market like I am or you have even more limited
- 12:51talent pool. So you do have to invest in
- 12:53training folks and getting people to the skills that you
- 12:57want. But she also have to make an
- 13:00environment where they want to stay right and continue on that
- 13:03because you don't want your Investments walk out the door,
- 13:05you know, two years later or a year later because I died happy
- 13:07with the way things are going so is acting on companies to invest
- 13:12in their people make it an environment where they want to
- 13:16stay right in anyways is not easy because it's not like okay
- 13:20just took the train train for I don't know from certain
- 13:24Technologies. It's not clear the path for the
- 13:26training either so you have to figure out what is next.
- 13:29So if you need somebody who's going to be the overall, I am
- 13:32architect. It's you don't want to take
- 13:35somebody who doesn't have I am You don't want to have to train
- 13:39for too many different elements. I kind of agree with where
- 13:43you're going or you're both you guys are going skills, like
- 13:47intangibles like creativity and and having good customer service
- 13:51Focus. I think those are your
- 13:54must-haves but then if you're going to have somebody who's
- 13:56going to be your your you know in a large organization, you're
- 14:00number one. I am person.
- 14:03They need to have some some relevant background some It's
- 14:07skills kind of going into that position.
- 14:10Yeah, you really have to know what your Runway is, right?
- 14:12If you've got a long Runway, you might be able to invest more
- 14:15time, but most most organizations.
- 14:17Don't at least of the very beginning right?
- 14:19They need to get things going right now.
- 14:21You're starting at I am program what's too much turnover in your
- 14:26group ready to you have an I am team that consists of 10 people.
- 14:29You don't want to be losing five of those people every year if
- 14:32you're not going to have much continuity in your program.
- 14:34If you do I'd say one of the things that I've seen In terms
- 14:38of organizations that are successful in maintaining large.
- 14:42I am groups and having Heights highly skilled people are those
- 14:46that either have multiple locations where they can Source
- 14:50people from or they have a work from home culture and this is
- 14:54something that I wanted to put back to Arturo is, you know,
- 14:58especially with Mexican companies.
- 15:02The question would be, you know, do you feel like there's a
- 15:05culture where? Working from home would be
- 15:08acceptable or having full-time remote employees or what's it
- 15:13like it is the culture more driven towards everybody needs
- 15:16to be in the same place. Well right now or start shifting
- 15:20to more open to remote office or having this room Open Spaces
- 15:26into the buildings of the companies and it's something
- 15:31relatively new and most of the times this is Raven because of
- 15:38The problem with transportation in big cities like here in
- 15:40Monterey. So we are facing right now is
- 15:43wait. I know people moving from one
- 15:45place to another like one hour or more than an hour like two
- 15:48hours drive to from home to the office.
- 15:51So it's not you cannot maintain that lifestyle.
- 15:55So so start changing that most of the consultancy companies do
- 16:00it and it's finally susceptible and for some other companies
- 16:05they are thin the Is like having smaller surfaces or reducing the
- 16:11times for moving from one tip for one location to another but
- 16:16I think that that Mexico is moving into that cultural
- 16:19probably a little bit behind you guys, but they are doing some
- 16:22changes on that end and also in general the culture because of
- 16:26the new generation, you know, like like Millennials right now.
- 16:29They are getting to be companies like these or all companies like
- 16:3310x that more like a hundred years old and so the company
- 16:37Need to make this transformation and actually be very open and
- 16:42very attractive for this new talent because otherwise the new
- 16:45Talent will go for the ones that have the more fun stuff into the
- 16:51office or or more flexible in terms of of the discovery of the
- 16:56time and things like that. So I think that if the companies
- 16:58are not willing to transform they will eventually die or they
- 17:01eventually get in trouble to get people more because otherwise
- 17:05they don't have anything else on that.
- 17:07What are some of the challenges that you see as usual as we're
- 17:10working on that? I am program here at stomachs.
- 17:13What are some of the challenges that you see just starting that
- 17:16up and getting it going that you've run into over the last
- 17:18few years the most challenging in general and what identity?
- 17:22Yeah just about starting up the program.
- 17:24I do that. The first thing is that how you
- 17:26communicate that identities. Actually, I think I mean and
- 17:31it's important. Yes.
- 17:32Yeah. So what are you talking about
- 17:33some are you talking about security ID data or most of the
- 17:37the time it really helps like using like friend topics.
- 17:41Like I don't know like security most of the times compliance for
- 17:45sure will help but it has been like a process like a processing
- 17:53where you need to actually communicate along with the
- 17:56conversation around security because at least we are part of
- 18:00the security team here. So it is like the conversation
- 18:04driving in the security side, but also Saying that they miss
- 18:09something new and something that is not only about security but
- 18:12also about compliance. It is also about user experience
- 18:15is about also about the all the other benefits that you have
- 18:20with along with those and in passing the message like okay,
- 18:25this is this something unethical and how a program as a whole
- 18:32will help you on that. What are some of the I guess you
- 18:37use Cases at the business comes to you for our from an IM
- 18:40perspective. You see any differences between,
- 18:44you know this region of the world compared to maybe what
- 18:47you've heard from Congress has that we've been to like you Pro
- 18:50or edu Pro height identify verse or Gartner or black hat at a
- 18:56very similar use cases morning off-boarding or there are other
- 18:59things that might be. Yeah.
- 19:00I think that the Arts can malaria and do something that
- 19:03really was the warlike make me. Happy because I am not a lot of
- 19:09these so so weird. Yeah, because because at the
- 19:11beginning I was still saying that probably these use cases
- 19:15are very particular for us as a region but in Hora Sasa has
- 19:20company because we have location in more than 35 countries.
- 19:24So I thought that it was based on on the type of company
- 19:29probably but I realized knowing more peers really a in the
- 19:33security security and identity space that the challenge are the
- 19:36same and and they are struggling with MFA deployment.
- 19:39They are struggling with the automation of certain
- 19:42Technologies. So they are I don't know having
- 19:46a bad time with one particular event or things like that.
- 19:48Right? So in the are the same so I
- 19:51actually sometimes this kind of conference.
- 19:53I like like a shoulder to cry right along with your peers.
- 19:57Yeah, and it's it's fun, but that same time it's like hey was
- 20:01so we are not alone that road and and we can share experience
- 20:05and share tips. That hey, but yeah most of the
- 20:08cases and for instance based on region and things like that.
- 20:12We just recently finished World Wide deployment for for
- 20:16multi-factor authentication and and we had certain challenge for
- 20:20different countries and regions because not all the people like
- 20:24like for example in Mexico or in the u.s.
- 20:27They are willing to use their phone even that this personal
- 20:30phone for doing MFA right but in some other countries they are
- 20:33not so they are saying like why I'm should I use my personal
- 20:36phone for a country? Elated to work as an
- 20:38expectation. And if you're making users from
- 20:40where you really should be paying for it or I dragged you
- 20:43that yeah in some other countries, even they have like a
- 20:45very very strict work until you have so you'll have to lead with
- 20:50that as well. So it is different from country
- 20:54to another right. Do you notice any difference
- 20:56from an expectation of things like SLA or how long it takes to
- 21:01get the things done? You know, what's maybe take
- 21:04like, I'm boarding. For example, you know, I think
- 21:06you know everyone would love to Of the automated and it works
- 21:08just automatically but the reality is some companies they
- 21:11take two days to work on on that or a week or two weeks.
- 21:14Do you notice any difference with being a global company
- 21:16where you know in the US the expectation is that this work
- 21:20will be done in two days, but in you know, let's say Germany the
- 21:23expectation is that it's one day.
- 21:25Do you notice any differentiation and that not
- 21:27really, I mean usually that process that we were able to use
- 21:32cases from one country to another I think quite the same
- 21:36and Probably is because we are very globalized were so if you
- 21:40go into LinkedIn and you see like people saying, oh, I'm just
- 21:44going to this company. If you show the photo from the
- 21:47Welcome Keith with all the previous and all the things
- 21:50there. So I think that HR is the kind
- 21:53of experience that they are trying to deliver to their
- 21:55customers which are the employees and so I think that in
- 21:58terms of expectation there's you're trying to expect the same
- 22:02and in recent Years also HR department are Leaving this
- 22:07transformation with different tools from their side.
- 22:10So they are looking for things. So how we can on board people in
- 22:13the fastest way. So other concern not for HR, but
- 22:17for security is okay. What about the vorlon?
- 22:20Probably HR is not really concerned about the wording
- 22:23because they are just saying bye-bye and v as long as they
- 22:27could from the payroll system, but for security standpoint, we
- 22:31try to look for. Okay, we need to make sure that
- 22:33the wording also works at the At the right time, right?
- 22:38Right. What about language support?
- 22:40Do you find that because of being a global company that
- 22:44there may be language challenges or have you settled on a certain
- 22:47language is sort of like the default and that's a really good
- 22:50point. Actually, we usually struggle
- 22:52with that and most of the cases we ended up making of our own
- 22:57translations, even though that the system for instant the sun
- 23:01migration at the time we had to translate a lot of things from
- 23:05the out of the box with So we usually work with the local it
- 23:10or HR department in to make that translation.
- 23:13So even that the product come up with French language, the French
- 23:18guy will look and say this doesn't make any sense.
- 23:20So they make the change from the translation from the own
- 23:24language of the and and I think that in Spanish happened the
- 23:27same and also we have Spanish from Spain from Latin America
- 23:30from Argentina. So we have that variation as
- 23:33well in some languages 40th. This is another challenge as
- 23:38well and happen right now the same with Cloud Technologies and
- 23:42it's more difficult. They could be stationed there if
- 23:45I die. So do you find a lot of
- 23:47Technologies are more English focused at this point or they
- 23:50doing a pretty good job of having native better native
- 23:55support for yeah. We just did are getting better.
- 23:58I'm they're not the same like 10 years ago, but they're getting
- 24:01better. I think that they are not
- 24:03reaching a point yet in where they have like strong language.
- 24:07Yeah, and also the other thing is that the worst getting more
- 24:11globalized. So it is true that the most of
- 24:14the princes administrators employees can handle in
- 24:19different languages at least in global companies.
- 24:22But also there is true is that we have a lot of local Workforce
- 24:26which has focused on the their own language like in friend in
- 24:30front and friends. They would be French and that it
- 24:33happened the same here in Mexico, right?
- 24:35So, yeah, it's something that is needed.
- 24:37It and companies had doing better right now.
- 24:39But still I think we can when you're working on different
- 24:44projects. Do you see a lot of kind of
- 24:47language things come up, you know sitting here thinking I was
- 24:50thinking back to the workshops that we held with Arturo and the
- 24:54folks there and I thought everybody spoke excellent
- 24:58English. I mean better than I was
- 25:01expecting going into the meetings, but one of the things
- 25:04that we have to remember is that almost every large Creation has
- 25:08factories or folks in the field. And that's where you know
- 25:14leaking back to everybody everybody speaks English at
- 25:17least as a second language breaks down, right and you got
- 25:20the point where you have to make your systems available in
- 25:24multiple languages, I definitely remember the days, you know a
- 25:28decade ago with systems like sun or Oracle and it wasn't specific
- 25:33to this systems, but it was just you know, we need To make all of
- 25:37our Solutions available in multiple languages and most of
- 25:41them had language packs yet. They didn't have you know
- 25:44translations for customizations that you put into the system.
- 25:47So if you added some language you have to add in whatever
- 25:52number of languages you wanted to support make those language
- 25:55files available. I haven't run into it as much
- 25:59these days. I think a lot of Enterprise
- 26:03deployments companies make the decision to make their Was
- 26:07available in English only and usually I think the biggest
- 26:11driver of that decision is cost quite frankly.
- 26:16I think the other thing is that there are more Technologies now
- 26:20that are browser-based that will do some automatic translations
- 26:24and sure they probably come out funky.
- 26:26I always point back to I wanted to take my wife and I wanted to
- 26:32go on a vacation to Iceland for going There for our honeymoon.
- 26:38This was 20 years ago and found an Iceland tourism site.
- 26:43And there's a it was obviously translated from whatever the the
- 26:48local languages into English and it said, you know, don't forget
- 26:51to bring your your swimming costumes and I thought that
- 26:55would areas where I was like, I don't know how to swim because
- 26:57you but actually, you know, as we were talking about all this I
- 27:02was thinking also about you know, I know that Arts are is
- 27:07that some stage in his privileged access management
- 27:11deployment privileged access management deployments in my
- 27:15experience often run into a lot of resistance, you know from,
- 27:21you know primarily from the folks that do system
- 27:24administration what they're used to, you know, knowing accounts
- 27:28on the servers and that's kind of a seat see theme in their
- 27:32mind in terms of they can always get into their systems now you
- 27:35want to put Something in between and you want to look over their
- 27:39shoulder. So I'm wondering are Tara what
- 27:41has been your experience so far in rolling out privileged access
- 27:45management has there been much in the way of resistance will do
- 27:48well and in terms of for is heaston, I think that for sure
- 27:52Pam he's one of them but I think that in general it any change
- 27:56that may impact the end user they will require this kind of
- 28:02management of the change and it's interesting because In I
- 28:07haven't worked with or I have you working with different
- 28:11partners here related with either time implementation or
- 28:15single sign-on implementation with Microsoft Technology for
- 28:18instance and a lot of companies right now, even though they are
- 28:23companies focus on technology or identity security.
- 28:27They are either working with a parent company or like a smaller
- 28:33company or a sister company that that is dedicated to
- 28:38organizational change management.
- 28:40So I think that in the last few years also the technology
- 28:44companies in this case related with any kind of deployment that
- 28:48involves the end user. There are they are adding this
- 28:53important piece of organizational change management
- 28:55is something that also here the company has been working in the
- 29:00past four years now and and having this department in charge
- 29:04of that, but it's something that I don't know likes it.
- 29:07Years ago at this here in Mexico.
- 29:08You don't see that kind of change management.
- 29:11So right now I think that companies are releasing that is
- 29:14important and it's something that need to be added.
- 29:17And and yeah, actually this way that we were reviewing about the
- 29:21we aren't still in the planning phase for Pam and and we need to
- 29:27include into the deployment and into the whole project that is
- 29:31because since the beginning we knew that is going to be
- 29:33important to to manage the change in a better way.
- 29:37Why so what what what comes to my mind in that when we were
- 29:41reviewing that is like, okay, that's interesting because the
- 29:44companies are including this but usually they have Focus team or
- 29:49an even a focused company on in only change management.
- 29:52So to be ideally it is important and probably with had the help
- 29:57of these companies is where you are getting into more strategies
- 30:02around. How do you convince your
- 30:03atmosphere of how you sell internally to your administrator
- 30:06or The idea or not idea about the benefits because their
- 30:11benefits are for sure, but it's not always as easy for everybody
- 30:16to get all the benefits. So this is where change
- 30:19management comes into play and they really help you to
- 30:23understand what it what is the benefit on this.
- 30:25It happened the same with MFA. So we what is the benefit of
- 30:28this? I don't get it.
- 30:29So just Haiti bother me with this except bottom that I'm
- 30:34gonna cheat for that, but it's a lot Lot of benefit with behind
- 30:38that so it's important that organizational change management
- 30:41takes place and say okay. This is important because of
- 30:44this and that the security department works with them to
- 30:48pass messages through that's your million-dollar idea for the
- 30:52just want to change management company.
- 30:57Yeah. No, no what I mean is it's
- 30:59really spot-on. I mean, I think it was something
- 31:01that was much more overlooked in the past, but it's a key
- 31:05component of being successful. Is thinking through what is the
- 31:09impact of this technology or process that we're going to
- 31:13create change for people? And you know, how are we going
- 31:19to make sure that we minimize the impact of the negative
- 31:23impact of the change so I know we're running up on time, but I
- 31:29did want to touch on one more Topic at least which is gdpr and
- 31:34Global privacy. A Shinzo overall Arturo and kind
- 31:39of how are they impacting you so far in terms of your job and and
- 31:44having to make accommodations for global global privacy
- 31:48regulations, at least here apparently company.
- 31:50These kind of topics are handling by medical plans
- 31:55apartment. But yeah, definitely we were
- 31:59involved on some of the changes that were needed for that see
- 32:06more on the compliance. Yeah, at least we're here.
- 32:08Yep, right. All right.
- 32:11I got one last question and it's really more around the work that
- 32:16the studying that you did for your Masters around blockchain.
- 32:20So can you tell me a little bit or maybe talk a little about the
- 32:24dissertation you did regarding blockchain and identity
- 32:27management. Yes.
- 32:30Well, I did my master's degree in 2015 15 to 16 I did.
- 32:37Master degree on cybersecurity and University of Southampton in
- 32:41the UK and I went there just to I need like I need a break after
- 32:46eight years try to work and I went there.
- 32:50Let's go update and in this cyber security space in general,
- 32:53so it was pretty cool because you you unplug everything from
- 32:57your regular life and you go back to the to the classroom and
- 33:02you simply Express. Yeah, and you you could phrase
- 33:05actually it was like A lot of work because you have like in
- 33:10the UK is just one year for your master degree is different than
- 33:13the other countries that usually have two years for that and it
- 33:18was very good in terms of going back to cybersecurity and grasp
- 33:22a lot of topics. So one of the topics that really
- 33:25crossed my mind that end was the blockchain technology and at
- 33:29that time there was a lot of hip on everything related to
- 33:33blockchain and Bitcoin and things like that and and And so
- 33:37I decided to hit that topic blockchain and I added the
- 33:42identity because at that time I were working on identity as
- 33:45well. So I was talking with my with
- 33:50the professor that I will working on that tradition and
- 33:54she said she was only an Italian Professor.
- 33:56He said okay, let's combine both of them.
- 33:59Let's take identity to the state blockchain and let's do have
- 34:02some research about what is the market doing and where?
- 34:07How things are going in that and so one it was basically we
- 34:12didn't build something in terms of building a product or
- 34:16something. It was more like a resource or
- 34:19wear these as well as working blockchain apply.
- 34:21Where would it make sense to use for my identity perspective.
- 34:24Is that the kind of yeah, it was taking a general.
- 34:26So General Bloch thing what it is how it work and and then also
- 34:31taking the identity par. So how you can apply a
- 34:34blockchain, you know that blockchain.
- 34:36Elegy, they have like different use cases and different
- 34:41implementation ways to implement.
- 34:44So one of the things was okay. What about identity in one of
- 34:47the main topics for that was OK, what are the issues with the
- 34:51identity systems right now, right and one of the particular
- 34:56issue that I've found is that you have everything in a single
- 34:58location. So most of the hacks related to
- 35:01for instance the certificate Authority thing in where they
- 35:04have all the keys in one place. So they attack Get into that
- 35:08systems and install can just all in all the whole T's, right so
- 35:12you're screwed not that time. So and there's so it's how we
- 35:16can separate that and how we can take advantage of the distribute
- 35:20layering where you perhaps can have like distributed all that
- 35:25information and at some point why not the the end user or the
- 35:30user can keep all that sensitive information.
- 35:33So if somebody breaks into the main, Main location there's not
- 35:38any key. There's nothing like that for is
- 35:41taking blockchain as a distributed ledger to have that
- 35:47bread different systems and don't have everything in a
- 35:50single location. And one of the proposal was also
- 35:55to use thorough knowledge proof, which is another type of
- 36:01implementation cryptography implementation to don't share
- 36:06all the information. Even with this case with the
- 36:09service provider. So imagine that you are an
- 36:12identity provider and you need to prove something to the
- 36:17service provider. So in that proof how you can
- 36:20actually prove whatever they are asking for something without
- 36:23revealing the whole information that you have.
- 36:26So using this kind of cryptography you are able to
- 36:29somehow make that proof without actually rebuilding the whole
- 36:32information. So it's it's more in a privacy
- 36:34standpoint where you say, okay. What if there are there is any
- 36:38way in where you can actually prove imagine everything in your
- 36:42your personal life that you need to prove to somebody that you
- 36:46are more than 20 years old for buying a beer or you are I know
- 36:52your title or your certification every proves that you need to
- 36:56made you can made it the proof without revealing any extra
- 37:00water this information. So it's like a lot of Concepts
- 37:04around that is our for for privacy and Or getting back to
- 37:08privacy to to the actual user and this is also a very
- 37:14interesting topic because right now as you may know a lot of
- 37:18facts related to privacy right over to to who are doing
- 37:24companies like Google or Facebook in terms of privacy,
- 37:26there are not they are exploding that part rather than keep it
- 37:30private. So are a lot of conversation
- 37:33around that is also to how we can take back that privacy of
- 37:37how we can take back control our own things and have that privacy
- 37:42and these are protocols that help you and that unfortunately
- 37:45at least at that time three years back, they weren't any
- 37:52more efficient protocols for that.
- 37:55So the implementation of that were just just in the lab or
- 37:58only with some research doing IBM was working on that at the
- 38:02time. So yes, I think those are very
- 38:06good. Elegy and a lot of good things
- 38:09going around that so hopefully in the near future if the
- 38:13research are continue working on that or if more people willing
- 38:16to research on that, we will have interesting implementation
- 38:19either around blockchain or protocols like Heroes proof.
- 38:23Can I see it being more affable to more like the consumer space?
- 38:28I'm still struggling to find a good application for where it
- 38:31makes sense to use blockchain inside the Enterprise.
- 38:35I mean, there's probably some up there and I would certainly
- 38:38welcome anyone who has thoughts are on that because you know,
- 38:41I'm curious what those might be that would be practical today
- 38:44for botching use, but I certainly see a more external
- 38:48facing right? It's more government focused its
- 38:51School medical records. Those are the things where you
- 38:54do need to have an expectation of privacy and you want to take
- 38:57the concept of you know, the zero knowledge is really kind of
- 39:01the least the concept of least privilege right?
- 39:04Maybe think about it from a data attribute.
- 39:06So how do I prove that? I am 21 years old or 18 years
- 39:10old. Do I need to show my full idea?
- 39:12We're talking about this at lunch right where it has my
- 39:15address and my name and everything else in addition to
- 39:17my to my age or can I have just a system that says it's binary?
- 39:22Yes. No, is this person 18 or older?
- 39:26Yes. Does it matter if I'm 50 40 30
- 39:28or you know new 18 probably not that case and I can see use
- 39:33cases like that where you need to demonstrate.
- 39:36Certain things right with that that that that knowledge right
- 39:41with that mean blockchain is something that we can talk like
- 39:44he's talking forever chapter will probably have to leave it
- 39:48at all yet have a separate one. So I think that's probably a
- 39:50good place to leave it with the the utter confusion that
- 39:52blockchain tends to invoke amongst people.
- 39:56I feel like I've had I've sat through and listen to the so
- 39:59many blotching things that I probably know it and I still
- 40:02feel like I don't know I think yeah, it's a little
- 40:04conversation. Yeah.
- 40:05Colleagues here that he he's in charge of the complaints
- 40:10department and he say that the a blockchain is only for financial
- 40:14things in related to yeah to have a coin and something in
- 40:19particular like that Bitcoin is like that and yeah, actually
- 40:23he's true because it is a way that was created.
- 40:28But but they are finding some different implementation ways to
- 40:33do it and that doesn't mean that you cannot do it for for
- 40:36something else is the same concept but applied in a
- 40:38different way. It'll get ya it'll adapt and
- 40:40move to something or it'll spark something new and it's just
- 40:43that's just the way that technology and Innovation Works
- 40:45in general. No and in something that really
- 40:48surprised me was that there are studying or in researching more
- 40:52about Bitcoin is that all the Technologies involved in the
- 40:56concept of Bitcoin and blockchain where the real ones I
- 41:01mean distribute system already exists a lot of Concepts all of
- 41:04them already exist. Years back was until somebody
- 41:08put all the pieces together and say is the idea frame.
- 41:10So this is something that is really I mean real surprise me
- 41:14and at the same time really give me a lot of Hope for the future
- 41:17because how many application or how many technology that we
- 41:20already have could ended up in some kind of idea like that.
- 41:24So and I interesting as a professional podcaster because
- 41:28I'm going to call myself now that goes back to the creativity
- 41:31that you were talking about earlier, right?
- 41:33It's it took the creativity of someone to say Hey, what if we
- 41:36combine these pieces in this specific order and the specific
- 41:38way and all of a sudden you had this brand-new space that I mean
- 41:43you put blockchain in your in your name and you know people
- 41:46were throwing money at you left it right now and then the other
- 41:49will be serious about about they degrade or yeah who is created a
- 41:53right, but you're not come out too.
- 41:54So yeah, exactly. It's very personal.
- 41:56Yeah, who knows now? We're getting into the
- 41:59Illuminati and the problem is solved.
- 42:05Go for it Jimmy everything you want to close out with know you
- 42:11guys killed it there. All right.
- 42:14Well, I certainly appreciate the timer turbo.
- 42:16It's always good to see you. It's always good to see the
- 42:18mountains of Monterey and look forward to coming back soon.
- 42:21Appreciate the time you spent with us and we're going to go
- 42:24ahead and leave it there for folks who are listening.
- 42:26Hope you enjoyed this and if you like what you heard like
- 42:29subscribe put out a five star rating or eight.
- 42:33Tell your friends. Tell your Jim's dad, if it
- 42:36wasn't the last week's episode, you know, we're always looking
- 42:40to have different ideas come our way and if there are things that
- 42:42you want to send to us, you can get a hold of us at questions at
- 42:46identity at the center.com and we'll talk to you on the next
- 42:50one. Thanks.
- 42:51All you guys the way you've been listening to the identity at the
- 42:57center podcast to access all episodes visit identity at the
- 43:01center.com.