Topic: Information Security

Seminar Topics

[1 CPE] Why Modern Enterprises Invest in REAL Security

  Presented by Mac Avancena, Field CISO • Check Point Software

Cybersecurity isn’t failing because of technology. It’s failing because we’re talking about it the wrong way.

In today’s boardroom, cyber risk is financial risk. Yet most organizations still treat security as a cost center rather than a performance driver. The result? Overspend, complexity, and risk continue to compound.

In this session, Mac Avancena challenges that model, showing how leading enterprises are rewriting the narrative. By aligning security to business outcomes, simplifying fragmented environments, and leading with data, they’re transforming cybersecurity from overhead into a competitive advantage.

This isn’t about more tools or better alerts. It’s about changing the conversation—so security drives growth, resilience, and measurable ROI.

If you can’t tie security to business performance, you’re not securing the business—you’re slowing it down.

[1 CPE] Cybersecurity and Compliance For 2026

  Presented by Structured

This session examines how organizations can align cybersecurity, privacy, and compliance programs with the realities of 2026. The presentation reviews current threat trends, executive accountability requirements, and the expanding impact of artificial intelligence on risk management. It then connects federal, state, and industry obligations, including NIST CSF 2.0, HIPAA, CJIS, PCI DSS 4.0, CMMC, and emerging privacy laws to practical security program design. Attendees will leave with a clear framework for building a complete security program that integrates governance, segmentation, risk management, Zero Trust principles, and penetration testing to reduce risk and support regulatory readiness.

[1 CPE] From Assessment to Implementation: Inside a Live CMMC Journey

  Presented by Matt Palguta, Cybersecurity Director • Bering Straits Native Corporation

The Department of War’s CMMC program has lifted off for Stage One. This session will feature updates on the program from a CMMC Lead Assessor who will be wrapping up his own program assessment just before the conference with Bering Straits. Listen in on lessons learned from assessing and guiding other organizations while building a CMMC program. The final rule brought clarity and some new wrinkles. Not all of your OS crypto modules have yet to pass FIPS Validation… Hmm, is that an Enduring Exception or an Operational Plan of Action? What are those? There will be time for questions at the end, and Matt will be available to answer additional questions after the session as well.

Matt Palguta has 20+ years of cybersecurity experience in government contracting and manufacturing. As Cybersecurity Director for Bering Straits Native Corporation, he has built their CMMC compliance program to be certified and support future compliance needs beyond CUI data. Matt’s experience includes building a security operations center for the FAA and managing global cybersecurity operations for Cummins Diesel. He teaches as an adjunct professor of cybersecurity with Ivy Tech. Matt is also the founder and CEO of Alyeska Cybersecurity LLC, a CMMC and industrial control system consultancy.

[1 CPE] Data Resilience in the Age of Attack: Protect What Matters

  Presented by Landra Pierce, Product Strategy Technologist • Veeam

Cyberattacks are no longer a distant threat; they are a reality every IT team must be prepared for. When an attack occurs, your data becomes both the primary target and the key to recovery. Many organizations still rely on backup strategies that are designed for hardware failures or accidental deletions, rather than today’s threats, like ransomware, insider risk, and automated attacks. This disconnect creates vulnerabilities, especially when backups become an overlooked entry point in your security strategy. In this session, we will address these challenges to help you better protect your organization.

This session is ideal for IT professionals who want greater confidence in safeguarding their data and peace of mind. We will examine the most common oversights that leave organizations, including those in government, education, healthcare, and other sectors, exposed to cyberthreats. You’ll discover how teams are advancing beyond basic backup to adopt a cyber-ready approach, including topics like immutability, threat awareness, rapid recovery, and intelligent automation.

Our focus will be practical and grounded in real-world scenarios, and what truly works when pressure is high and time is limited. Because when every minute counts and trust is at stake, data resilience means more than surviving an attack. It’s about protecting what matters most and emerging even stronger.

[1 CPE] Securing AI Adoption: Protecting Data, Applications, and APIs in the Era of Generative AI

  Presented by Steven Gautier, Principal Solutions Architect • Thales

Organizations across every industry are rapidly adopting Generative AI, machine learning, and AI-powered applications to improve efficiency, automate processes, and unlock new insights from their data. However, these technologies also introduce new security challenges.

AI systems rely heavily on enterprise data, APIs, and interconnected applications, creating potential risks such as sensitive data exposure, prompt injection attacks, API abuse, and unauthorized access to AI models.

  • In this session, we will explore the security architecture required to safely deploy AI technologies within modern enterprise environments.
  • Attendees will learn practical strategies for protecting the data that powers AI models, the APIs that deliver AI services, and the applications that integrate AI into business workflows.
  • The session will also cover emerging AI-specific threats, governance considerations, and best practices organizations can use to maintain security, compliance, and trust while accelerating AI adoption.
  • Participants will leave with a clear framework for securely enabling AI innovation across cloud, hybrid, and on-premises environments.

[1 CPE] Proving Cyber Resilience: Measuring Outcomes, Not Effort

  Presented by Tony Taylor, Sales Engineer • Horizon3.ai

Most security programs measure effort — not outcomes. Organizations patch thousands of vulnerabilities, deploy dozens of tools, and run annual tabletop exercises… but when an attacker shows up, none of that matters.

What matters is whether they can prove their defenses actually work.

In this talk, Horizon3.ai shares how leading organizations are using autonomous pentesting to see their environment through the attacker’s eyes — continuously, safely, and at scale. By shifting from assumptions to proof, they’ve learned to:

  • Prioritize what’s exploitable. Focus limited resources on the weaknesses that truly put the business at risk that are known to be abused by threat actors.
  • Quickly fix what matters. Close the loop from find → fix → verify and reduce your exploitable attack surface.
  • Reduce attacker dwell time. Use pentest results to precisely deploy honeyTokens to detect compromise early, and to continuously prove your EDR and SIEM are tuned and working as intended.

Cyber resilience isn’t about being perfect — it’s about getting better over time. And the only perspective that truly matters is the attacker’s.

[1 CPE] From Cyber Risk to Resilience: Turning Insight Into Action

  Presented by Chad Alessi, Managing Director, Cybersecurity • CTG

Many organizations generate cybersecurity assessments and compliance reports, but struggle to translate them into actions that meaningfully reduce operational risk. This session explores practical strategies for turning cybersecurity insights into decision frameworks that support operational continuity and executive risk management. Drawing on experiences from critical infrastructure and healthcare environments, the talk highlights how organizations can move from compliance-driven security to true cyber resilience.

[1 CPE] State of the Union: Annual Information Security Report

  Presented by Oscar Minks, President • FRSecure

The result of over 100 incident cases handled by the FRSecure response team in the last two years, President Oscar Minks will dive into the latest threats and response techniques you need to know—and what you can do to minimize the risk and impact of similar events. The breakdown will cover Business Email Compromise, Ransomware, and Internal Compromise. You can’t afford to miss it!

[1 CPE] Speaking the Language of Risk

  Presented by Tom Ruoff, Principal Consultant • ImageSource

Organizations face rapidly evolving cyber threats, yet many still view technology as a cost center rather than a strategic partner. This presentation reframes the conversation by translating technical risks into business and financial terms leaders understand. Attendees will learn how to identify Business Essential Functions (BEFs), quantify operational and financial impacts, and apply practical risk‑estimation methods. By establishing a common language of risk, leaders can align priorities, invest where it matters most, and meaningfully reduce enterprise exposure. The session equips both executives and IT teams with tools to build consensus and drive smarter, outcome‑based cybersecurity decisions.

Tom Ruoff serves as Principal Consultant for ImageSource, Inc. providing cybersecurity consulting services (risk assessments, threat hunting, pen testing, breach remediation, security architectures, policies, business impact assessment) to commercial clients including Native American Tribes and Tribal Casinos, he is also a founder and current CEO of Zorse Cyber. Tom retired from the Dept of Homeland Security (DHS), Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA) in June 2023, as Chief, Methodology Branch, supervising vulnerability assessments for elections, power generation/distribution, and pipelines, and Federal Government IT systems. Before DHS, Tom was the Director of Systems Division at Northrop Grumman, developing cross domain solutions (CDS) for National Security Agency (NSA) and Central Intelligence Agency (CIA). Air Force veteran with tours at NSA, CIA element of the National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency, and Defense Intelligence Agency He is a Level III Federally Certified Program Manager, PMP, CISSP, CMMI Associate, MS/BS degrees in physics and electrical engineering.

[1 CPE] Observations from the Front Lines: The People Behind the Threats and Trends

  Presented by Peter Ingebrigtsen, Sr Technical Marketing Manager • Arctic Wolf

Cybersecurity threats don’t emerge in isolation—they are observed, analyzed, and stopped by real people working on the front lines every day. This session pulls back the curtain on modern security operations, focusing on the human-driven research that powers effective threat detection, incident response, and adaptive security strategies.

Drawing on Arctic Wolf Labs research, SOC analyst expertise, and real-world incident data, this talk examines how today’s attacks are identified, contextualized, and disrupted in live environments. Attendees will gain insight into the patterns behind the most persistent threats, how adversaries continually adapt, and why defenders must evolve just as quickly. Rather than focusing solely on tools or alerts, this session highlights the people, processes, and intelligence that transform raw telemetry into actionable defense – illustrating how to turn frontline observations into scalable protection for organizations of all sizes.