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Beers with Talos Podcast

Cisco Talos

Threats, Beers, and No Silver Bullets. Listen to Talos security experts as they bring their hot takes on current security topics and Talos research to the table. Along the way, Mitch, Matt 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.

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21 episodes
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Avg 53 min
English

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October 23 · 1 hr 6 min
The Guy Who Invented Pain (plus first reactions to PHP2Shell)
David Bianco built the Pyramid of Pain, so we offered him some more. David joins the crew for a conversation how AI changes about his famous model, how EvidenceForge creates simulated incidents for research and training, and why his red-team entrance exam didn’t go to plan. First, we discuss the newly disclosed PHP vulnerabilities and the potential impact there (we recorded this on day 1 of the disclosure, hence expediting the release of this episode from its normal release schedule). Later, Da
October 15 · 48 min
You've Got to Lurk Before you Smirk
How do you get under a cybercriminal’s skin? Sometimes you expose their operations. Sometimes you make every step through a network painfully slow. And sometimes, if you’re Azim, you join a dark web forum where they’re insulting you, and help them do it. Azim and Nick join Hazel and Dave this week to discuss the fine art of frustrating adversaries, from ransomware-group paranoia to deception that wastes their time and gives defenders a chance to spot their activity. For more on this topic, check
September 30 · 1 hr 16 min
Your AI Malware Experiments Are Showing
Adversaries are experimenting with AI-integrated malware, and today's guest, Talos researcher Ryan Fetterman has been looking at their working notes. He joins us to talk about CAIRN, his new open-source research toolkit for tracking that experimentation, and what he’s finding, including a C2 an implant that delegates its decisions to AI models, and malware that tries to persuade AI analysis tools to leave it alone. Putting AI in malware is one thing. Establishing whether any of it actually
September 17 · 1 hr 11 min
Martin Lee Would Like Everyone to Go Outside
Twenty-four hours before recording this episode, Martin Lee stopped being a Talos employee. Naturally, we made him come on the podcast anyway. Martin talks about abandoning his early career aspirations of researching human viruses and curing cancer, so he could play on the internet. He also talks about how running very long distances in crazy conditions helps him to stop himself thinking about it. He has some words of wisdom for aspiring practitioners, and why the rest of us should occasionally
September 2 · 1 hr 13 min
Eight People Walk Into a Dark Web Forum. They’re All Azim
What does it take to become someone a cybercriminal will trust? Talos' Azim Khodjibaev takes us inside the psychology of direct adversary engagement. At one point, he was maintaining eight different personas, some of which were talking to each other. He explains how discipline and patience help keep his cover intact, and what can provoke threat actors into revealing information. His work has occasionally made Azim part of the story. Ransomware operators have threatened him, and one even p
August 19 · 1 hr 4 min
For the Record, No Comment
Kaitlin Acharya joins the Beers with Talos crew to take us inside the world of threat intelligence: what happens when Talos spots something that could become a major threat, how her team tracks changes in threat actor behavior, and how intelligence moves from an investigation into detection content. She also faces some tougher questions involving tennis, Derry Girls and an evil genie. We also attempt to extract some information about Kaitlin’s former life at a certain intelligence agency. Result
August 5 · 1 hr 2 min
"I Pay You $200 a Month!" - When Threat Actors Argue With AI
Cybercriminals are increasingly relying on AI, but in doing so, they're creating an entirely new source of threat intelligence. This week, Talos researcher Arnaud Zobec joins Hazel, Bill, Joe and Dave to discuss what happens when attackers leave behind AI prompt logs, agent configurations and other unexpected artifacts. From jailbreak attempts to agentic workflows and accidental infrastructure leaks, the team discusses what these artifacts reveal about attacker behavior, and where/how AI is
July 22 · 53 min
Keeping Up With the Cybercriminals
In this episode of Beers with Talos, Hazel, Bill, Dave and Joe are joined by Kendall McKay to dive into the soap opera of modern cybercrime. From rival gangs launching smear campaigns against one another to reputation systems, trusted intermediaries and dark web "customer reviews". Turns out, every ransomware operation is one passive-aggressive group chat message away from falling apart. Kendall chats to us about how AI is changing the economics of cybercrime, why it's helping ine
July 8 · 54 min
Space Pirates, Living Off Trusted Services, & Bill Declares Food War
In this episode of Beers with Talos, Hazel, Bill, Dave and Joe are joined by Talos Security Research Engineer James Nutland to discuss Living Off Trusted Services (LOTS) - a growing technique where attackers use platforms such as GitHub, Google Drive, Microsoft services and Telegram for command and control, malware delivery and data exfiltration. We explore why this trend is growing, how it differs from Living Off the Land (LOTL)....and Lord of the Rings (LOTR)....why trusted services create new
June 24 · 47 min
AI Is Finding Bugs Faster. Now What?
AI is accelerating vulnerability discovery, so what impact is that having on defenders? In this episode of Beers with Talos, Hazel, Bill, Joe, and Dave are joined by Nick Biasini to unpack what attackers are doing with AI-assisted vulnerability discovery, why local models rather than frontier models may be a more attractive route for them, and the vendors who are now drowning in a flood of bug reports (many of them junk) as AI sifts through decades of technical debt with nothing but time and pat
April 30 · 46 min
25 Years of Uninterrupted Persistence
Hazel, Dave and Joe plot to celebrate Bill's 25 years at Talos with stories and a good old fashioned roast. The team also covers the latest security headlines, including AI-assisted vulnerability research, and why attackers still can’t resist abusing trusted systems (or Roblox). They also break down the latest Cisco Talos Incident Response Quarterly Trends report, including:Phishing’s return as the top initial access vectorAI-generated credential harvesting pages built in minutesCrimson Col
March 23 · 55 min
Gravy, Glutes, and the Talos Year in Review
Hazel, Bill, Joe and Dave break down (sometimes in the literal sense) the 2025 Talos Year in Review which is available now at blog.talosintelligence.com/2025yearinreview The team, supported as always by the Turkey Lurkey Man, dives into the biggest cybersecurity trends of the year, including: · The rapid weaponization of vulnerabilities · Why identity abuse showed up everywhere · Ransomware trends · A rise in APT investigations · What defenders should prioritize h
March 10 · 57 min
It's the B+ Team: Matt Olney returns
It's the one, the only, it's Matt Olney! We are delighted to have Matt back to talk with the crew about about the most random things, including TikTok diagnosing us with ADHD, inspiring vtubers, K-Pop Demon Hunters, ransomware in hospitals (the serious bit), attacker use of AI, why 1999-era tricks are still undefeated, and an entirely reasonable number of desserts. We recorded this episode on 20 February - please see the Talos blog for the latest on the developing situation in the Midd
Dec 4, 2025 · 46 min
Ranksgiving Returns: The Appetizer Uprising
Guess who’s back? Hazel, Bill and Joe welcome back fresh-from-parental-leave Dave Liebenberg, who has returned with a new baby, and some truly chaotic Thanksgiving opinions. We kick things off with the security headlines. Joe gets spicy about a recent “AI-orchestrated cyber campaign” report. Dave brings us the poetic news that AI models can apparently be jailbroken with a well-placed limerick. Hazel challenges the others to a guessing game about just how much cyberattacks cost the UK, and B
Oct 16, 2025 · 45 min
Two Marshalls, One Podcast
Talos' Vice President Christopher Marshall (the “real Marshall,” much to Joe’s displeasure) joins Hazel, Bill, and Joe for a very real conversation about leading people when the world won’t stop moving. We start with Marshall’s days in the Navy’s nuclear program and the art of translating deeply technical work for non-technical leaders. We then get into how he joined Talos (“you WILL do this for me”), why being right beats being first, and how to keep a team steady and mission focussed when
Sep 11, 2025 · 44 min
How to Ruin an APT's Day, with Sara McBroom
This week, the B-Team gets an upgrade as we’re joined by Sara McBroom from Talos’ nation-state threat intelligence and interdiction team. Sara shares her journey from a liberal arts major to tracking some of the world’s most advanced adversaries. Along the way, she talks about moving from the U.S federal service to Talos, mentoring, leading with empathy, and why making bad actors miserable is a pretty good day’s work. Before diving into Sara’s story, we hit the security headlines (ouch) and also
Jul 31, 2025 · 51 min
So You Wanna Be an Incident Commander? Meet Alex Ryan
We welcome new Talos teammate and incident commander Alex Ryan to the pod this week. Bill, Joe and Hazel chat with Alex about what it really takes to lead through the chaos of a cybersecurity incident, from coordinating stressed-out teams, fielding exec questions, and making sure people eat. Much to Bill's dismay, we have something resembling a "format" for this episode, and we start by breaking down the week's security news, including:The SharePoint zero-day exploit (“ToolSh
Jun 27, 2025 · 31 min
Terms and conceptions may apply
Welcome back to the podcast where the structure is theoretical and the only certainty is uncertainty. In this episode, the crew reassembles after a totally intentional and not-at-all accidental hiatus (blame is assigned, forgiveness is not). We cover:AI-assisted IVF (spoiler: it's mostly robots and headlines)The dawning of Mind-games-as-a-service in ransomware operationsConference dogs that may have been the real security MVPsA possible underground war against dairyAnd the billionaires quie
Mar 31, 2025 · 43 min
Year in Review 2024
Joe, Hazel, Bill and Dave break down Talos' Year in Review 2024 and discuss how and why cybercriminals have been leaning so heavily on attacks that are routed in stealth in simplicity. The team also provide insights into some of the topics of the report, including the top-targeted vulnerabilities of the year, network-based attacks, adversary toolsets, identity attacks, multi-factor authentication (MFA) abuse, ransomware and AI-based attacks. For the full report, head to blog.talosintellige
Feb 27, 2025 · 43 min
The truth about Tasmanian devils, and getting into cybersecurity
Bill springs a surprise topic on the team in this episode - how did you get into cybersecurity, and what skills have you brought with you throughout your career? What ensues is a rather lovely, vulnerable conversation that we hope will be helpful for anyone currently thinking about their next career move. Before that Dave has some surprising facts about Tasmanian devils, what they didn't cover (or deliberately hid?) in Looney Tunes, and why the scientific name for Tasmanian devils is a hotl

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