SensorFu Teaser III — Mikko Turns beacon into Beacon
This blog post is the third in the series about SensorFu’s product teaser campaign. In the first episode Kasper escaped from his confinement. In the second episode we were left with an illustration of the idea of using beacons to make sure the box stays sealed. This time Mikko gives the idea a name and shape on its way to the Beacon product.
The Transformation
In the illustration at SensorFu’s web page, Mikko turns the abstract hand-drawn beacon (see Figure 1: A) into a more slick version. The text in the web page changed only slightly: Beacon is now written with a capital B (Figure 1: B). Ladies and gentlemen, we have the name for the first SensorFu product!
Why Mikko?
If you are an infosec professional, you might have noticed that some issues are chronic. If you audit systems, you see similar issues all the time. Or if you research vulnerabilities, you run into the same types of vulnerabilities most of the time. And so on. Despair creeps in.
Mikko evaded the despair. He got inspired instead. He has done infosec audits, among all sorts of happy hobby hacking projects, for a decade. By now he should be a cynical bastard. Why he has beaten the odds? My theory is this: instead of complaining “why do I see similar issues year after year”, he started reasoning: “why do I see similar issues year after year”. See the difference?
Complaint:
Q: Why do I see similar issues year after year?
A: Because builders of systems don’t care.
Reasoning:
Q: Why do I see similar issues year after year?
A: Maybe because we waltz in with our tools, discover the issues, drop the bomb and move to the next target.
Q: But don’t we assist with the repairs?
A: Well… yes. But giving fish is one thing. Teaching how to fish is another.
Q: I see where you are going, but what we do is a craft. We can not just mind-melt with the customer and add our tools and expertise to their repertoire, can we?
A: We can’t. But we can do something. We can take a look at what parts of our work we can turn into products which help customers to set a new baseline.
Q: But there are tons of security tools people can deploy and use?
A: Yeah, security tools for the security pros. And that deployment part.. a tad too tricky. To move the needle, we need products designed ground-up for the people who run the systems.
You get the picture. Each of those questions, while valid, would give us the opportunity to give up and continue with the status quo. But Mikko and his colleagues wanted to move the needle. That is why.
The Next Episode
It seems the next episode will take us to a whole new dimension! Leaks from the SensorFu’s supply chain suggest SensorFu animations are actually 3D scenes. Sources familiar with the matter claim SensorFu needs 3D imagery to illustrate the next item. Analysts have speculated that this has something to do with what the other SensorFu employees are working on. We will know in about two weeks.
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