INTERFACE Phoenix
June 24th, 2021

  Presented by INTERFACE Advisory Council

After years of being at the periphery of society, ransomware and cyber threats are now taking center stage as they begin to impact the lives of the broader population. As increased attention begins to turn toward protecting against these attacks, it becomes obvious that throwing new advanced solutions at each aspect of the problem can only take us so far. It is necessary to circle back to foundational elements of our security posture and combine the old with new for elevated levels of protection.

Speakers:
Mike Manrod • Chief Information Security Officer, Grand Canyon Education
Christian Taillon • Threat Response Engineer, Grand Canyon Education

Mike Manrod presently serves as the Chief Information Security Officer for Grand Canyon Education, responsible for leading the security team and formulating the vision and strategy for protecting students, staff, and information assets across the enterprise. Previous experiences include serving as a threat prevention expert for Check Point and working as a consultant and analyst for other organizations.

He is also a co-author/contributor for the joint book project, Understanding New Security Threats published by Routledge in 2019, along with multiple articles/whitepapers. When not working, he spends time playing video games with his kids, practicing martial arts, and doing anything outdoors.

Christian Taillon contributes to Grand Canyon Education's IT Security team as an Engineer. His efforts focus primarily on improving the Security Operations team's capability to efficiently detect and effectively respond to threats through work primarily relating to Splunk, EDR, and an evolving Threat Intelligence program. He enjoys contributing to the larger community via various Threat Intelligence Content Development efforts and open-source projects. He leads the Global Watch Center operations at ACTRA and contributes to SPORTS-ISAO under the Cyber Resilience Institute as a Solutions Architect. When away from the keyboard, he enjoys camping, kayak, and hiking with his wife.