Crucial Tech

Two weeks ago I did in interview with Claude, ChatGPT and Grok about what could possibly cause the collapse of the AI industry. Little did I know that within the next two weeks there would be a convergence of events that might create that collapse. So this is part two of that podcast.And this podcast is the final one of season 11. We will be back after the RSA Conference with Season 12.

On January 1, California's Delete Request and Opt-out Platform (DROP) went live and almost 200,000 California residents have already signed up. We talked with Captain Compliance CISO, Alex Proctor about the importance of this platform and the impact on the data industry.More next week on Cyber Protection Magazine but to get you up and running, here's the link to the platform, and here's the link...

I read news stories every day, several times a day. When it comes to AI I hear that the industry is booming/it's crashing/it's a miracle/it's a nightmare. Everyone has an opinion and it isn't nuanced. It is also all speculation. I wondered who could give me a balanced view of whether AI will survive or thrive in it's current form. Then I was listening to one of my favorite podcasters, Mark...

At the beginning of 2025, vibe coding (using LLMs to create computer code) was all the rage. By June, the bloom had fallen off the rose. Studies showed professional coders were losing skill, and falsely believing they were made more productive using it rather than doing it themselves. This failure of AI to produce efficiency made the fad of vibe coding crash faster than any other AI-related...

Last week, the Cybersecurity Infrastructure Security Act of 2015 faded away without Congressional action (and because of some pretty stupid reasons from Senate Homeland Security Committee chair Rand Paul). But like Dumbledore's Phoenix could arise from the ashes in a new form. Who knows and who cares? Well, we talked to Gigamon's CSO Chaim Mazal this week about the act, and whether it's demise is...

As the Superbowl and Olympics approach, ticket scammers are getting ready to separate fools from their money.Maybe that is harsh but it takes a pretty clueless person to fall for most phishing scams today. I talked with Anomali CISO about how emotional decisions are at the core of most online fraud and what can be done about it.

Last week we discussed the trend toward decentralization of technology, and we discuss that more next week in Cyber Protection Magazine. But while it may be a global trend, it doesn't mean everywhere.This week we met with Lisa Pent, CEO of ThePentEdge.com, a consulting organization that works with small to mid market banks and credit unions where consolidation is still very much standard. We also...

We kick off 2026 with a prediction episode where we call decentralization and sovereign cloud efforts as the trend for this year and for a few years. Co-editor Patrick Boch and I see the failures of Cloudflare, AWS, Microsoft and other cloud suppliers, along with growing deglobalization are reversing the efforts to consolidate the cybersecurity industry.

Last week I attended the most honest tech conference I can remember. The ironic thing was that it wasn’t a tech conference at all. If was the California Press Foundation (CPF) annual conference.The CPF traces its history back to 1878 when it was formed originally as the California Press Association to represent the journalism industry in the state. It morphed and partnered with different...

Every year at this time I start getting pitches from PR folks offering client's predictions for the coming year. Lots of publications put out their annual predictions articles in December with their own, plus a few selected from these pitches.At Cyber Protection Magazine we do it a bit different. Our predictions don't come out until January so we can give equal review to the stuff that comes in...