Listen to Talos security experts as they bring their hot takes on current security topics and Talos research to the table. Along the way Lurene, Matt, and Mitch and a rotating chair of special guests will talk about anything (and we mean anything) that's on their minds, from the latest YouTube trends to Olympic curling etiquette. New episodes every other Thursday.

  • Beers With Talos

    Black Hat 2024 preview

    It's been a while huh? Apologies for our absence, but the team are back with a run through of everything we've got going on at Black Hat - from our 10 year birthday celebrations, the interesting lightning talks in our booth, and Joe Marshall's "Backdoors and Breaches" game. Come and visit us at Cisco Booth 1732 and Splunk Booth 1940.

    Before that, Matt encourages Mitch and Lurene to join him in the joy of Tekkno Train by Electric Callboy (Choo Choo!) and Mitch explains why his son has developed a huge potty mouth, with no sense of irony. Lurene also reveals insights into creating a university curriculum for cyber weapons development.

    Stick around for an illumunating discussion on how AI could affect a Furby. Just don't google "Long Furbie". You just googled it didn't you? Ah man, we warned you...

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    Run Time: 00:38:20

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    Stories from the Power Grid

    Power grid security expert Joe Marshall joins the crew today to talk all things, well, power grid security. But not before he gets an impromptu pop quiz from Matt in the roundtable.

    Joe then tells some stories from his days working in electric utility,  deploying new systems and his experiences with pentesting teams ("Wow, y'all need to stop!"). Plus, the team ask Joe about  the risks with both aging infrastructure versus newer, smarter based infrastructure. And what happens when threat actors target critical infrastructure?


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    Run Time: 00:39:02

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  • Beers With Talos

    The old people episode

    Matt, Mitch and Lurene discuss if the internet is better or worse today than it was 20 years ago.  This leads them to discuss their various career paths, with Lurene talking about how she got into vulnerability exploitation and how Matt got into threat intelligence. And why neither of those paths would be recommended today. Lurene and Matt then clash about threat research and and the importance of approaching things from a "how do I be a problem" perspective.

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    Run Time: 00:48:52

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  • Beers With Talos

    The Reverberations of Volt Typhoon

    You will no doubt have seen the advisories published over the last few weeks concerning Volt Typhoon's malicious activities. In this episode, JJ Cummings joins the crew to discuss the background to this threat actor, their impact on the threat landscape, and the covertly strategic (and specific) nature of their operations. The team also discusses their recommendations for defenders, particularly for critical infrastructure organizations.

    The CISA statement on Volt Typhoon can be found here https://www.cisa.gov/news-events/cybersecurity-advisories/aa24-038a

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    Run Time: 00:43:30

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  • Beers With Talos

    The Reddit Security Diaries

    Matt, Mitch and Lurene sit down to discuss “random stuff from Reddit” (don’t be put off – they’re all genuinely interesting security questions!). Topics range from password managers and how password security guidance has become outdated, how to ‘self-learn’ in cybersecurity, and thoughtful approaches towards security incidents.

     Before that, the team comes up with a prank to pull on their co-workers and bring some joy and chaos to Webex meetings. And Lurene reflects on what advice she would give high schoolers today.

     As Matt says at the end of the episode, we want to hear from you! Get in touch at beerswithtalos@cisco.com

    Here's the video 'Hi Ren' that Matt mentions at the outset https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s_nc1IVoMxc

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    Run Time: 01:00:56

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  • Beers With Talos

    Talos Speed Dating (the episode we never set out to make but did anyway)

    Mitch, Matt and Lurene were almost about to be in the same physical space at the same time to record an episode, and then Lurene couldn't make it...so we made this instead! Mitch is joined by Azim Khodjibaev from the Talos Threat Intelligence and Interdiction team to rapid-fire interview a bunch of Talos employees who happened to be around the Maryland office. Hear from teammates from all walks of life and areas of expertise about what they've loved working on in 2023 and how they feel their work has changed the broader security landscape. 

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    Run Time: 01:08:28

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    The TurkeyLurkey Man wants YOU to read the Talos 2023 Year in Review report

    We recorded this episode AFTER Thanksgiving, so you'll need to forgive us for the amount of Thanksgiving talk that doesn't actually apply until Thanksgiving 2024. It all evens out in the end because the annual "Ranksgiving" from special guest David Liebenberg results in the creation of TurkeyLurkey Man. Then, TurkeyLurkey Man helps the rest of the gang recap the top malware and attacker trends from 2023. If you'd like to read more, download the full Talos Year in Review report here. We also discussed the recent CNN article and Talos blog post on our work to protect Ukraine's power grid. 

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    Run Time: 01:03:20

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  • Beers With Talos

    Chicken Soup and Contact Centers

    It's that time of the quarter again when we sit down to look at what we learned over the past three months. Caitlin Huey from the Talos Threat Interdiction Team joins the show for this special look at the latest Talos Incident Response Quarterly Trends report. Caitlin's team helps compile these reports and digs through mountains of data to find out what defenders can learn from what Talos IR is seeing live in the field. If you want to learn more about this report, you can read it on our blog, or watch the Talos IR On Air video here.

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    Run Time: 00:48:17

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  • Beers With Talos

    Who is Jacques Wagon?

    This episode of Beers with Talos has a very special guest: Our old friend Nigel Houghton. He's one of the OG BWTers and is back with two-plus years' worth of hot takes to get off his chest. Nigel starts out by delivering his long-awaited update on his beloved Mighty Red. But he, Mitch, Matt and Lurene do eventually get to cybersecurity talk, including things like:

    • The challenge of keeping mountains of cybersecurity data and sharing it with partners.
    • The importance of context around that data when it is shared.
    • How better context leads to better detection methods.
    • Weird Elon Musk guys. 
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    Run Time: 01:00:44

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  • Beers With Talos

    "I'm going to breach you off." "Not if I breach you off first!"

    We know we're like two weeks late to the Barbie party, but the whole Beers with Talos crew has seen it now so we had to talk about it. Expect a lot of "Barbie" talk up at the top. After that, though, we dive into how to set up deception systems and establish your environment to make it harder for an intruder to get in. The goal here is to make it so that attackers have to waste time and resources trying to get in but ultimately come away empty-handed. We talk about why this is important for the systems we build and why the security community doesn't talk enough about this approach. 

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    Run Time: 00:56:47

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