There’s a lot of enthusiasm at this week’s RSA Conference, but there’s a lot of concern too.

That’s because there’s an expanding attack surface, leading some to suggest that there’s a “digital tsunami” being experienced.

“We have got all of us on the good side of this, and we’re trying to figure out how to use AI, how to leverage gen AI, how to do all these amazing things that we know it’s possible to do,” said Shelly Kramer (pictured, left), managing director and principal analyst at theCUBE Research. “Then we’ve got threat actors on the opposite end of the equation, the bad guys, if you were, and they’re quickly learning how to use and leverage these tools.”

Shelly Kramer and David Linthicum discuss talent shortages in cybersecurity.

Kramer joined David Linthicum (right), principal analyst at theCUBE Research, during an exclusive broadcast on theCUBE, SiliconANGLE Media’s livestreaming studio, at the RSA Conference. They discussed the evolving landscape of cybersecurity and the critical need for innovative approaches to address emerging threats and talent shortages. (* Disclosure below.) 

Cybersecurity talent shortages are urgent problem

A big subject of conversation at this week’s conference has to do with talent gaps. Conversations at the conference have indicated that talent gaps are the primary risk the enterprise is facing, according to Linthicum.

“People don’t want to hear that because it sounds like a boring answer to the risk question, but the reality is that we’re making mistakes with misconfigurations, which can link back to poor talent and poor training,” he said. “Just not having the right individuals in those roles who are able to configure the security correctly. We’ve had security that works for a long period of time, if it’s used properly.”

But right now, there aren’t enough security architects, security engineers or enough high-grade talent around to keep things safe. Right now, it appears that there are 10 open requisitions chasing one qualified candidate, Linthicum pointed out.

“That’s scary, because that means they’re not going to be able to find the talent that they need. They are aggressively training internally,” Linthicum said. “But we’re going to have to ramp up the education systems. We’re going to have to ramp up the individual training systems. We’re going to have to ramp up the way in which we train people in an on-demand way to get the skills needed to make that happen.”

Here’s the complete video interview, part of SiliconANGLE’s and theCUBE Research’s coverage of the RSA Conference:

(* Disclosure: TheCUBE is a paid media partner for the RSA Conference. Neither RSA Conference, the sponsor of theCUBE’s event coverage, nor other sponsors have editorial control over content on theCUBE or SiliconANGLE.)

Photo: SiliconANGLE