Critical Assets Podcast

Patrick Miller sits down with Scott Kannry, co-founder and CEO of Axio, to work through cyber risk quantification as a security decision tool for OT and critical infrastructure. Scott came up in the insurance industry at Aon in the early days of cyber coverage. He founded Axio with Dave White to close the gap between a technical security program and a number a CFO and a board can act on.
The conversation stays practical. Why you start on the impact side instead of arguing about probability. How NERC CIP already thinks in consequence. Why the events that matter most are rare, huge, and short on data. How to compare controls, insurance, and compliance spend on the same dollar scale. What AI and quantum do to the "it will never happen" excuse. And a new D&O option for CISOs built on top of consistent quantification.
Full show notes, links, and the episode transcript are on the Ampyx Cyber episode page at ampyxcyber.com/podcast.

Topics covered:
The founding of Axio and the insurance-meets-frameworks origin
A short history of cyber insurance, from data breach to business interruption to cyber-physical
The four loss categories Axio uses, first and third party, financial and tangible
Coverage gaps for industrial facilities and the danger of assumed coverage
Impact-first quantification versus probability-first modeling
NERC CIP and consequence-only risk rating
Fiduciary duty, duty of care, and defensible decisions
Security decision support versus vanity security metrics
The art and science of pricing control ROI
AI and quantum, and why low-probability high-impact events deserve attention now
A D&O insurance option for CISOs tied to consistent quantification

The Attack Surface You Eat: Cyber Risk in Food and Agriculture
Kristin King joins Patrick Miller to make the case that food cybersecurity is not food security, and that food and agriculture is one of the most under-defended corners of critical infrastructure. From precision agriculture and processing plants to aquaculture, zoos, and aquariums, they trace where the OT and ICS risk actually lives, why the regulatory floor is so thin, and how the threat range runs from opportunistic ransomware to nation-state targeting and agroterrorism.
Guest: Kristin King, founder and CEO of AnzenSage, CEO and co-founder of AnzenOT, host of the Bites & Bytes Podcast, and author of Securing What Feeds Us: Cybersecurity in Food and Agriculture (Wiley).
Full show notes and every source referenced in this episode: https://ampyxcyber.com/podcast/the-attack-surface-you-eat-cyber-risk-in-food-and-agriculture
Guest links AnzenSage: https://www.anzensage.com/ Bites & Bytes Podcast: https://www.bitesandbytespodcast.com/about Kristin King on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/kingmkristin Securing What Feeds Us (Wiley): https://securingwhatfeedsus.com/

Patrick Miller reconvenes with Joy Ditto (Joy Ditto Consulting) and Earl Shockley (INPOWERD) for a tour of the past two months in critical infrastructure policy. The episode opens on the administration's new National Cybersecurity Strategy and its six pillars, with focus on the openly offensive "shape adversary behavior" posture and the asymmetric risk it creates for asset owners likely to absorb retaliation.
The panel then digs into the pressures reshaping the bulk electric system: data center designation, cloud-hosted control centers running NERC standards while the underlying compute is unregulated, and the physics of computational loads that behave nothing like traditional load. Earl walks through the recent NERC Level 3 alert on large load connections, an unusually serious signal that industry processes are behind.
The discussion also covers April infrastructure executive orders that release funding but ignore cybersecurity, hyperscalers displacing utilities as the top buyers of bulk electrical equipment, the multi-agency zero trust in OT guidance, and CISA's leadership uncertainty after Sean Plankey withdrew his nomination. On the AI front, the group unpacks what Anthropic's Mythos and the Glasswing response mean for vulnerability discovery at scale, and why no OT vendors are on the Glasswing list.
Closing thoughts include Joy's note on satellite cybersecurity and a rare bipartisan Senate trip to China, Earl's emphasis that computational load is now an enterprise governance issue rather than a technical one, and Patrick's plea to stop making the adversary's job easy.
Topics covered
The new National Cybersecurity Strategy and its six pillars
Offensive cyber posture and the asymmetric risk to asset owners
Data center designation as critical infrastructure
Cloud control centers and the NERC 100-series standards
Computational load, grid stability, and loss of system inertia
NERC Level 3 alert on large load connections
April infrastructure executive orders and the missing cyber language
Supply chain shifts and hyperscalers as the top equipment buyers
Zero trust principles for OT environments
CISA Fortify guidance and CISA's current leadership status
Anthropic's Mythos, the Glasswing response, and the OT vendor gap
Satellite cybersecurity and bipartisan engagement on China policy
Basic hygiene: get exposed devices off the internet

Welcome to the Policy Pulse Panel, a new monthly series within the Critical Assets Podcast. Hosted by Patrick Miller (Ampyx Cyber), Earl Shockley (CEO, Inpowerd), and Joy Ditto (CEO, Joy Ditto Consulting), this recurring panel dives into the most significant policy shifts and regulatory developments impacting critical infrastructure, operational technology (OT), and industrial cybersecurity. Each month, we unpack emerging legislation, agency actions, and standards updates - connecting the dots between policy and the practical realities faced by asset owners, utilities, vendors, and government partners. If you're trying to stay ahead of your auditors and your legislators, this is your monthly must-listen.

https://ampyxcyber.com/podcast/policy-pulse-regulatory-roundtable-nerc-cip-cybersecurity-strategy-ai-electric-sector

In this episode, Patrick Miller speaks with Kylie McClanahan, CTO at Bastazo, about the practical (and often messy) realities of patch and vulnerability management in operational technology (OT) environments. Kylie shares grounded insights into patching challenges, the gaps between IT and OT remediation cycles, and the real-world implications of relying too heavily on scoring systems like CVSS.
The conversation covers CISA’s Known Exploited Vulnerabilities (KEV) catalog, exploring how it’s being used (and possibly misused) in prioritization workflows, and where the disconnects lie between policy directives and operational feasibility. Kylie also critiques the current state of vendor responsiveness, machine-readable vulnerability disclosure (CSAF), and the importance of asset and exposure awareness.
This episode is essential listening for practitioners wrestling with patching fatigue, program prioritization, and the tradeoffs between theoretical vulnerability data and applied security outcomes in critical infrastructure environments.

Links:
CISA KEV: https://www.cisa.gov/known-exploited-vulnerabilities
CISA vulnrichment: https://github.com/cisagov/vulnrichment
Vulnrichment, Year One: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=g5pSVMnWD7k
CISA SSVC: https://www.cisa.gov/stakeholder-specific-vulnerability-categorization-ssvc
Carnegie Mellon SSVC: https://certcc.github.io/SSVC/
CSAF: https://www.csaf.io/
VulnCheck KEV: https://vulncheck.com/kev
Kylie McLanahan on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/kyliemcclanahan/
Bastazo: https://bastazo.com