Ep. 222 Securing Federal Systems: How API Management Transforms Digital Security
Release Date: 03/13/2025
Ep. 232 Unlocking SBIR: A Powerful Tool for Boosting Federal Tech Efficiency
Federal Tech Podcast: for innovators, entrepreneurs, and CEOs who want to increase reach and improve brand awareness
Connect to John Gilroy on LinkedIn Want to listen to other episodes? In traditional commercial selling, a company seeks to understand its business problems and then presents a solution that would save time and money. Understanding federal requirements has a few more barriers than scheduling a meeting with the CIO. The federal government has security requirements and considerations few commercial companies can even consider. There are no effortless ways to understand system requirements for a company trying to break into the federal marketplace. This has been...
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Ep. 231 The Role of Quantum Computing in a More Efficient Federal Government
Federal Tech Podcast: for innovators, entrepreneurs, and CEOs who want to increase reach and improve brand awareness
Connect to John Gilroy on LinkedIn Want to listen to other episodes? Most people are so overwhelmed with the dazzle of Artificial Intelligence that they dismiss the power of quantum computing. Reality is the optimized solution for solving some federal problems involving artificial intelligence; other issues need to consider quantum. Today, Murray Thom puts the ability of quantum computing in a better perspective. For example, when it comes to aerospace maintenance, there are so many variables that classical computing is challenged to provide an answer. We all know...
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Ep. 230 How Senzing Strengthens Federal Cybersecurity with Smarter Entity Resolution
Federal Tech Podcast: for innovators, entrepreneurs, and CEOs who want to increase reach and improve brand awareness
Connect to John Gilroy on LinkedIn Want to listen to other episodes? It is a challenge for most technology companies to give a three-word summary of what they do, especially with the complexity implied with the phrase “entity resolution.” The CEO of Senzing, Jeff Jonas, gives a three-word summary of the complex issues they manage -- “bad guy hunting.” OK, what does this mean to federal tech leaders? Today, we sit down with Will Layton to learn how a topic like “entity resolution” can improve federal cybersecurity. During the interview, he gives an...
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Ep. 229 How Identity Proofing Can Help Federal Agencies Combat Fraud and Cut Waste
Federal Tech Podcast: for innovators, entrepreneurs, and CEOs who want to increase reach and improve brand awareness
Connect to John Gilroy on LinkedIn Want to listen to other episodes? For many, IDEMIA is a relatively unknown company that was recently awarded a 10-year Blanket Purchase Agreement from GSA. The focus is on next-generation identity proofing for login.gov. At first glance, you might say “IDEMIA” is an overnight success. Upon further examination, you will discover that IDEMIA has served federal agencies for over 60 years. During the interview, Donnie Scott gives listeners a complete rundown on the variations on identity, identity proofing, identity management, and identity...
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Ep. 228 How Agentic AI Can Revolutionize Federal IT Efficiency
Federal Tech Podcast: for innovators, entrepreneurs, and CEOs who want to increase reach and improve brand awareness
Connect to John Gilroy on LinkedIn Want to listen to other episodes? Walking around the Salesforce World Tour DC can make you dizzy with use cases. Let’s step back and look at underlying principles. To boil down the massive information overflow, we sat down with Nasi Jazayeri from Salesforce to focus on improving efficiency by taking advantage of Salesforce agents. Automation. Federal employees will obviously be asked to do more with less. One way to accomplish this task is to structure a system where tedious decisions do not have to be made by humans....
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Ep. 228 Building Trust in Agents: How Salesforce Powers Secure AI
Federal Tech Podcast: for innovators, entrepreneurs, and CEOs who want to increase reach and improve brand awareness
Connect to John Gilroy on LinkedIn Want to listen to other episodes? Federal leaders are walking a tightrope. They want to leverage the promise of AI; however, they are responsible for making federal data secure. Beyond that, these AI “experiments” should not negatively impact the larger systems and must have a detached view of practical applications. During today’s conversation, Paul Tatum gives his view on accomplishing this balance. He illustrates the idea of experimenting with AI through, of all things, avocados. For example, he acts as if he must document the process...
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Ep. 225 How Cloudflare is Transforming Federal Security Through Interconnected Networks
Federal Tech Podcast: for innovators, entrepreneurs, and CEOs who want to increase reach and improve brand awareness
Connect to John Gilroy on LinkedIn Want to listen to other episodes? Most people know Cloudflare from federal or commercial experience. They have been around since 2009, and some will estimate that around 20% of all websites use Cloudflare for web security services. The listener's question is simple: can one apply this commercial success to improving federal network security? During today’s interview, Anish Patel from Cloudflare answered that question by directing his comments to Zero Trust, User experience, and automation. Zero Trust is a federal initiative that...
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Ep. 225 Why Identity is the First Pillar of Federal Security in the Digital Age
Federal Tech Podcast: for innovators, entrepreneurs, and CEOs who want to increase reach and improve brand awareness
Connect to John Gilroy on LinkedIn Want to listen to other episodes? Once the transition to the cloud became dominant, the importance of identity was placed ahead of permission to access apps and data. When data centers were down the hall, one could have physical access to a room and sign-on permission. The hybrid cloud, private clouds, and an interest in “alternative clouds” make identity the keystone of modern computing. Companies like Okta, Ping, and SailPoint work with identity and access management but rely on services that can provide a federated identity service. ...
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Ep. 224 Federal Cloud Cybersecurity: Key Differences Every Tech Leader Must Know
Federal Tech Podcast: for innovators, entrepreneurs, and CEOs who want to increase reach and improve brand awareness
Connect to John Gilroy on LinkedIn Want to listen to other episodes? Many people deceive themselves when moving systems to the cloud, thinking the same precautions used for an on-premises system can be used in the cloud. Neil Carpenter from Orca Security dispels that notion right out of the box. He details that when a system is moved to the cloud, it operates under a shared responsibility model. While the Cloud Service Provider may be able to serve a solid infrastructure, that does not mean the applications and data are protected as well. Further, the popularity of...
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Ep. 223 Shifting Left in Federal IT: A Smarter Approach to Digital Transformation
Federal Tech Podcast: for innovators, entrepreneurs, and CEOs who want to increase reach and improve brand awareness
Connect to John Gilroy on LinkedIn Want to listen to other episodes? Today, we sit down with Karthik Natarajan, Solutions Engineering Manager, U.S. Public Sector, for SNYK. SNYK has garnered a formidable reputation in the commercial sector by helping to identify and fix vulnerabilities in code, open-source dependencies, and container images. Karthik Natarajan acknowledges that no code can be 100% secure; however, one way to improve by a magnitude is to incorporate the “Shift Left” approach. This phrase has been around for twenty years but has recently gained momentum. ...
info_outlineThe federal government is transforming from on-premises and private cloud systems to a hybrid cloud.
What most listeners do not realize is that the linchpin to this transition is the Application Program Interface (API). It has been hiding under the radar for so many years that malicious actors use this perspective to attack the API.
Info Security Magazine reports that 99% of organizations struggle with API security. Where to start? First, get an inventory of how many APIs you are dealing with.
Stephen Ringo emphasizes the need for discovery tools to identify rogue and shadow APIs, noting that passive discovery methods are preferred to avoid network disruptions.
He also points out that API security is often overlooked, even in cloud-native solutions, and that misuse, rather than malformation, is the primary threat. Ringo advocates initiative-taking measures to secure APIs and prevent data breaches.
- Three main ways to protect APIs:
- Educate and raise awareness about API security risks among federal CIOs and IT leaders.
- Discover and inventory all APIs, including rogue or shadow APIs, within the organization.
- Evaluate API security capabilities of cloud providers and ensure proper security controls are in place.