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ZeroSum

ZeroSum

Aaron Mog 4 Episodes Aug 18, 2026

ZeroSum is a cybersecurity podcast that discusses the state of the industry honestly, rejecting typical threat-of-the-week news. It uses game theory to examine how the cyber market often leaves practitioners losing while VC gambles win. The show features guests from various perspectives, including vendors, investors, workers, and CISOs.

Episodes

I'm Not AGI Pilled. I'm Human Pilled - with Casey Ellis
I'm Not AGI Pilled. I'm Human Pilled - with Casey Ellis Aug 18, 2026 01:03:30 "You know who will be hiring juniors again? Bad guys."Casey Ellis founded Bugcrowd and launched the first bug bounty programs on it back in 2012, pioneering crowdsourced security as a service. He co-founded disclose.io, sits on the Black Hat and DEF CON Policy review boards, and now runs Tall Poppy Group, angel investing and advising the next generation of security startups.Fresh off a week at Bla
Top 5 BlackHat Takes - with Aaron Mog
Top 5 BlackHat Takes - with Aaron Mog Aug 12, 2026 00:25:20 I've been going to BlackHat since 2001. This year, the scariest thing on the floor was a booth almost nobody was crowding.Fresh off plane from Vegas, this is a solo ZeroSum episode — no guest, just my top 5 takes from the week. The throughline: the industry is running on hype and extraction, while the one real capability shift sat in plain sight.We get into build vs. buy flipping, the "ask me abou
Malware Moves in 27 Seconds. Humans Can't Keep Up - with Graham Westbrook
Malware Moves in 27 Seconds. Humans Can't Keep Up - with Graham Westbrook Aug 4, 2026 01:01:27 Malware used to take 18 minutes to move through your network. Now it takes 27 seconds. Humans can't respond fast enough anymore.Graham Westbrook is VP of International Markets at SimSpace — the "AI Proving Grounds" for cybersecurity — with a background spanning DoD/DISA, CrowdStrike, Flashpoint, and a postgrad in AI from Oxford. Aaron sits down with him for a genuinely global, big-picture conversa
AI Is Better at Hacking Than He Is, and He's Not Worried - with Scott Behrens
AI Is Better at Hacking Than He Is, and He's Not Worried - with Scott Behrens Jul 29, 2026 00:58:12 He's an L8 Principal Engineer at Netflix — the kind of technical leader the company puts on the problems that decide whether it wins or loses. And he just watched AI out-hack him.Scott Behrens is an L8 Principal Security Engineer at Netflix, where over 11 years he's watched the security team grow from a handful of people to over a hundred. Today he's the technical lead for Netflix's Live product s
Why Security Always Failed and What Finally Changes That - with Justin Somaini
Why Security Always Failed and What Finally Changes That - with Justin Somaini Jul 27, 2026 00:59:33 For 30 years, the security industry could never fully win. Justin Somaini explains what finally changes that.Justin Somaini is one of the people who helped define the modern CISO role — former CISO of Symantec, Yahoo, SAP, and Box, and now a Partner at YL Ventures. In this episode, Aaron sits down with him for a genuinely optimistic conversation about why security has always fallen short, and why
The Haystack Got Bigger. The Needles Didn't - with Ed Bellis
The Haystack Got Bigger. The Needles Didn't - with Ed Bellis Jul 22, 2026 00:50:30 The haystack got bigger. The needles didn't. Ed Bellis on why the vulnerability problem stopped being human-scale.Ed built Kenna Security, sold it to Cisco, and is now back with Empirical Security, building custom AI models that predict which vulnerabilities will actually get exploited in your environment — not just which ones score high on a generic global list. He joins Aaron for a candid conver
We Don't Need to Throw Out Security, We Need to Update It. - with Diana Kelley
We Don't Need to Throw Out Security, We Need to Update It. - with Diana Kelley Jul 14, 2026 01:00:16 "We don't need to throw out what we've been doing all of our careers. We just need to be AI-aware in how we apply it."Diana Kelley — CISO at Noma Security, formerly CISO at Protect AI, and a 25+ year veteran of Microsoft, IBM, and Symantec — joins Aaron for a grounded conversation on what actually changes, and what doesn't, when AI enters security.We cover why trust boundaries and identity are sti
Is Anybody Safe? Adaptability in the Age of AI Disruption - with Mark Carney
Is Anybody Safe? Adaptability in the Age of AI Disruption - with Mark Carney Jul 7, 2026 01:00:20 Is any security company safe from AI disruption? Evolve Security CEO Mark Carney's answer: no and that's the wrong question anyway.Aaron talks with Mark Carney, CEO of Evolve Security and one of the OG figures in security services, about where the industry sits at a genuine inflection point. Mark breaks down why tech-enabled services are hotter than ever while human-only services are a dying breed
The Scariest Story a CISO Has Ever Told the Board - with Jason Loomis
The Scariest Story a CISO Has Ever Told the Board - with Jason Loomis Jul 7, 2026 00:58:57 "This is the scariest story I've ever had to tell my board."CISO Jason Loomis on what AI is really doing to security teams.Aaron sits down with Jason Loomis for a raw, funny, unfiltered conversation about AI's impact on security teams, careers, and the humans caught in the middle. Jason lays out his "farm team" problem: the tier-one SOC, GRC, and help desk roles that grow new talent are being auto
The Cyber Industry Is Moving Fast but Chasing the Wrong Things - with Cris Neckar
The Cyber Industry Is Moving Fast but Chasing the Wrong Things - with Cris Neckar Jul 7, 2026 00:59:38 The cyber industry is moving faster than ever and Cris Neckar thinks it's chasing the wrong things.In the debut episode of Zero Sum, host Aaron Mog sits down with Cris Neckar, security researcher turned entrepreneur turned VC at Two Bears Capital in Whitefish, Montana. Cris traces his unusual path from hardcore offensive work to venture capital, and explains why the biggest roadblocks in security
Breaking In, Standing Out, and Becoming a "Data Shepherd" — with Wade Wells
Breaking In, Standing Out, and Becoming a "Data Shepherd" — with Wade Wells Jul 7, 2026 00:53:02 Entry-level security jobs are vanishing so how does anyone break in now? Detection engineer and educator Wade Wells has thoughts.Detection engineer, educator, and B-Sides San Diego organizer Wade Wells joins Aaron for a practical, honest look at entering and surviving in security today. Wade, who teaches cybersecurity students across all levels, admits the field moves so fast he can no longer conf

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