Cybersecurity and Food Systems

Simplifying Cyber

Cyber attacks don’t just knock systems offline—they can empty shelves, disrupt feeding schedules, endanger animals, and muddy price signals across the food supply.

We sat down with Kristen (Demoranville) King, CEO of Anzen Sage and host of Bites and Bytes Podcast, to unpack how modern agriculture runs on a mesh of OT, data, and logistics that adversaries increasingly target. From GPS-guided tractors to sensor-packed dairy parlors, the farm has become an edge-compute environment where ransomware and misconfigurations have real-world consequences you feel at the store and at the table.
Kristen traces her journey from IT into plant floors and incident response, revealing why security wasn’t designed into most food and ag systems and what that means for resilience. We explore the most common attacks—phishing, ransomware, and DDoS—and why they hit harder here than in other sectors. She shares a clear-eyed look at co-op breaches, invoice scams that exploit older operators, and thorny questions about who owns farm-generated data. We also step into underreported territory: radical activism and agroterrorism tactics like doxxing, deepfakes, and drone footage that act like insider threats and can devastate small producers.
You’ll hear practical, low-cost steps that make a difference fast: fold digital checks into safety routines, change default passwords, map critical assets, plan for backup and recovery, and vet vendors with a security-by-design lens. Kristen previews her upcoming Wiley book, "Securing What Feeds Us," which blends systems thinking, OT realities, and grounded business guidance to help leaders connect incidents to food safety and supply outcomes. If you care about cybersecurity, food safety, or just want your groceries to show up reliably, this conversation connects the dots.

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פרקים

1. Meet Kristen And Her Mission (00:00:00)

2. From Podcasting To Book Writing (00:01:25)

3. Why Food And Ag Security Matters (00:02:34)

4. The Farm-To-Fork Attack Surface (00:04:20)

5. Ransomware’s Real-World Consequences (00:06:05)

6. Distrust, Stereotypes, And Human Factors (00:08:32)

7. Kristen’s Path From OT To CISO (00:10:38)

8. Factory Security Lessons At Scale (00:13:05)

9. What Incidents Hit Food And Ag (00:15:10)

10. Dairy, Connectivity, And Downtime (00:17:05)

11. Small Farms And The Cost Of Breach (00:19:05)

12. Espionage, Scams, And Data Ownership (00:21:00)

13. Radical Activism And Agroterrorism (00:23:05)

14. Practical Vetting And Insider Risk (00:25:10)

15. Low-Hanging Fruit For Resilience (00:26:30)

16. Why Ag Tech Must Build Securely (00:28:00)

17. Time, Training, And Simple Controls (00:29:30)

18. Nothing Is Off Limits Anymore (00:31:00)

19. Inside The Bites And Bites Show (00:32:10)

20. Curiosity, Food Safety, And Tech (00:34:05)