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Tune in every Tuesday for a brand new episode of Don't Eat Poop! A Food Safety Podcast. Join Francine L. Shaw, the savvy CEO of Savvy Food Safety, and Matthew Regusci, compliance connoisseur and founder of Fostering Compliance, as they serve up the latest in food safety with a side of laughter.
Explore the ins and outs of food systems, responsible food practices, and food safety regulations. Stay informed about food safety awareness and the not-so-occasional food recall. Delve deep into the complexities of the food supply chain with our dynamic duo, who blend expert insights with a pinch of food safety humor. Whether you're knee-deep in the food safety industry or just passionate about what's on your plate, this podcast promises a fresh take on staying safe while eating well.
Expect candid conversations, personal anecdotes, and occasional guest appearances that spice up the discussion. Shaw and Regusci bring their combined decades of experience to the table, making each episode as informative as it is entertaining. From industry trends to must-know food safety news and regulations, they've got your back (and your lunch).
In essence, Don't Eat Poop! A Food Safety Podcast is not just about imparting information; it's about fostering a culture of food safety. By shedding light on the intricacies of the food supply chain and the latest food safety news, it aims to promote awareness and encourage responsible food practices among consumers and industry professionals alike.
When it comes to food safety, knowledge is power, and a good laugh is the best seasoning. At the heart of every episode is one golden rule: Don't Eat Poop!
DEP FSC Kristin King Author of Securing What Feeds Us 1 (00:00)
Whenever there's an issue around food that happens with a cybersecurity incident, it is a food safety incident first and we have to treat it that way, right? We can't just treat it as a cybersecurity incident as an isolation moment. It's not just about the software at that point, it's about the food that's now expired in the refrigerators that has to be dumped.
DEP FSC Kristin King Author of Securing What Feeds Us 1 (00:19)
to me people don't think about the full system aspect of it. How can you protect something or create a risk management strategy around it if you do not understand why that monitoring was there in the first place? It wasn't there because they were monitoring for maintenance. That's also part of it. It was being monitored because of food safety. You have to make sure the temperature is kept to a certain level, otherwise that food goes bad and you can't eat it. So I I think that's where I get stressed out by my industry is that people don't realize the full extent of
DEP FSC Kristin King Author of Securing What Feeds Us 1 (00:48)
the actual food industry. they don't understand how that works. So to me, it is safer to say in the food industry and in agriculture, when something happens, it is a food safety incident until you tell me it is not. And then I will treat it as I need to as I go forward. And then that conversation needs to be had at the beginning before it even happens.
DEP FSC Kristin King Author of Securing What Feeds Us 1 (01:39)
Hello, hello, Francine. Hey Matt. We are at
DEP FSC Kristin King Author of Securing What Feeds Us 1 (01:43)
Food Safety Consortium and We have an amazing guest. Actually, Francine has talked about having Kristen King on for a very, very long time. And we get to talk to you about a lot of things. We're gonna talk to you a lot of things, but you just recently published a book. I did. So Kristen, talk about yourself and your and like why don't we start with like what is it you know that you've done in your career just briefly, but then what is
DEP FSC Kristin King Author of Securing What Feeds Us 1 (02:12)
your book about sure
DEP FSC Kristin King Author of Securing What Feeds Us 1 (02:14)
so I've worked in technology for 27 years I have done a little bit of everything I came up through IT mainly more on the support side so I have dealt with the worst problems and really uncomfortable situations I did drive geek mobiles around Washington DC for a little while so you worked for Best Buy I did and I worked my way all up to corporate and I eventually was on Secret Weapon. I was a secret weapon of Secret Weapon which was basically a a call center for
DEP FSC Kristin King Author of Securing What Feeds Us 1 (02:39)
agents they're in the field that were struggling. Was this before or after Mongolia? this was before. like Mongolia. the Best Buy is like
DEP FSC Kristin King Author of Securing What Feeds Us 1 (02:49)
Geeks the geeks. They really are. And the gentleman who ran it was like Willy Wonka, no joke. being in meetings with him was like, what is happening? We used to call him Crazy Uncle Bobby. he was amazing anyways, but I after I left there I went into a bunch of consulting, I did healthcare IT, which is not for me, but you know, I respect it, and a few other things. And then the market crashed in like 2009 for tech. So I said, forget it, I'm going back to school, I'm done with this, I need a break, anyways. Technology is
DEP FSC Kristin King Author of Securing What Feeds Us 1 (03:18)
really burning me out. I've been in it long enough. I decided to get a degree in environmental management because I thought it would have nothing to do with anything I did and I was just gonna pursue it because it was cool. Joke's on me. I work in operational technology now and I use and I use environmental management quite frequently.
DEP FSC Kristin King Author of Securing What Feeds Us 1 (03:33)
I did that for five years and in the middle of that I got an opportunity to work through some different zoos. So I volunteered at the National Zoo in the commissary, I fed all the animals technically. That's my first real outside of working as a waitress and barista and things like that earlier my career. the first time I really got food safety on a whole other level because it was animal food safety, which was like kind of different but same. how to cut, had to do everything.
DEP FSC Kristin King Author of Securing What Feeds Us 1 (03:55)
You definitely don't want an elephant or a giraffe getting norovirus of some kind in their version of it. Well, you think about all the lettuce going outside both ways, that's not good. No. You don't look I have two I have two Newfoundlands that weigh more than I do.
261022 DEP FSC Kristin King Author of Securing What Feeds Us 1 (04:11)
If they vomit or get diarrhea, it is not good. No, not at all. I mean even my two two-year-old cats, I wouldn't want any of that happening. But so it's interesting because obviously it's lots of greens and lots of things and they eat human-grade food. It the trucks roll up just like they would into any restaurant. So understanding like i it was just really fascinating to me. And also I made gorilla salad is what we called it. It was basically just a bunch of greens, chop them up and the gorillas graze over it for the day.
DEP FSC Kristin King Author of Securing What Feeds Us 1 (04:39)
So fast forward a few years later, I ended up being a research associate at the Louisville Zoo working with the Bachelor Troop of Gorillas that was there at the time when they were combined. They're now separated. So
DEP FSC Kristin King Author of Securing What Feeds Us 1 (04:49)
the gorilla salad knowledge came in really handy because I got to watch them eat gorilla salad every day, so sort of like this weird like full circle moment. but I did gorilla research for a little over a year and it was really fascinating because I learned more about people watching gorillas than I did about gorillas. Which is like because people are weird. People are weird.
DEP FSC Kristin King Author of Securing What Feeds Us 1 (05:07)
People are weird. I could tell you gorilla stories all day long, but it really informed my cybersecurity career moving forward. so I finished school and yay, everything I graduated and all the things.
DEP FSC Kristin King Author of Securing What Feeds Us 1 (05:17)
And at this point I'm an adult learner and I'm like, la la la no, I gotta pay student loans, so I gotta go back to work. So I ended up working for at the time the world's largest bakery ingredients and finished products company, which has now been chopped up as we all know, the habits of food production. And I absolutely fell in love with food production. I love the people, I love the whole process. But the problem was is that I didn't realize at the time how everything was so interconnected because I was really my first time standing in it and getting to understand how
DEP FSC Kristin King Author of Securing What Feeds Us 1 (05:45)
cybersecurity connects with food safety and how it connects with so many different aspects of the job. I moved through different roles when I was there. When I left I was the acting chief information security officer, experienced my first corporate breach. Zero stars, do not recommend. but I got you got like hats. Yeah.
DEP FSC Kristin King Author of Securing What Feeds Us 1 (06:03)
Yeah, we got JDS style happen. No, not that bad. It was it was more of people's identity got taken. but it was on like it was like Good Friday when we realized it happened. It was that whole scam where people are having their W twos filed, and their taxes filed and people were stealing their their tax returns. So it was one division of the company that we had. It was just really messy and gross and made everybody feel really uncomfortable. Ultimately, it was okay, it was a great learning experience. Like I went through it and
DEP FSC Kristin King Author of Securing What Feeds Us 1 (06:30)
The company survived it's it's funny because when I go to have drinks with my old corporate lawyer, we actually joke about it and it just like all the craziness of working in food production in general. And I left there and I went to work for this really small global company called Sony. And I I worked through all their factories and wrote their first factory controls, which was such an amazing experience that I got to travel the world and
DEP FSC Kristin King Author of Securing What Feeds Us 1 (06:54)
experience different cultures and how that worked. And everybody's like, Well, that's not food.
DEP FSC Kristin King Author of Securing What Feeds Us 1 (06:58)
But it's still manufacturing. It's still the same thing. Product comes in one way, gets mixed up and goes out a different way. So it really continued my knowledge down that path. And then I did what everybody does and I went into consulting again. And I worked through CPGs and a bunch of different other food companies, cosmetics.
DEP FSC Kristin King Author of Securing What Feeds Us 1 (07:17)
Which was really interesting actually. And pharma for a minute and then a little bit of energy because of just my environmental background with like algae regulators and things like that. And then I finished that up and I was kinda like, Well, why aren't we working in food? Like why aren't we doing this? 'Cause this is like right around the JBS stuff. And people were like, there's no money in food, there's nothing secret in in or in food, there's nothing to protect in food, there's not enough tech in food. There's So this is during the JBS thing? This was just after. So this is what I was like
DEP FSC Kristin King Author of Securing What Feeds Us 1 (07:46)
30% of American meat just went down. We couldn't even price. We couldn't even price meat for a full day. Yeah. Because there wasn't enough in the market to do it. And they paid, they paid 11 million in ransomware to get their. Biden was like, we gotta get meat. Like mob. Yeah. So it's just really funny. And actually, to this day, if I'm talking to cybersecurity professionals, they're like, wait, what's JBS? And I'm like,
DEP FSC Kristin King Author of Securing What Feeds Us 1 (08:13)
Just somebody's gonna take the wheel because I can't. small little Brazilian companies. That basically you probably had a hamburger from them about ten minutes ago. it's just it's so fascinating. So there's not a lot of people there's a lot of critical infrastructure. We've got sixteen of them, right? We didn't actually add food and agriculture to the the critical infrastructure association in the United States until twenty twenty.
DEP FSC Kristin King Author of Securing What Feeds Us 1 (08:37)
So I was like, what? So I had all these questions and nobody had any good answers for me, so I said, Fine, I'll do it myself. So I started my firm, Ans and Sage, started the podcast, Bites and Bites, and then the book came out of all of that because Wiley reached out and said, We want you to write this book. And I was like, Are you crazy? Are you trying to scam me? Like what are we doing? It was real. My book is out. Are you trying to scan me? This is the psychology of a of a cyber security person that's like the one of the biggest publishers
DEP FSC Kristin King Author of Securing What Feeds Us 1 (09:07)
in the world is comes to you to write a book and you're like, what's the scam? Actually it's funny, my my my editor was like, I get that all the time. Don't feel at all. I'm like, well I it's a cold email, right? So you get nervous. but the the book took fifteen months to write, to research and do everything. nobody had ever put all this information together. It was kind of like piecemealed across academia and a bit of like professional stuff and everything else. And it was really
DEP FSC Kristin King Author of Securing What Feeds Us 1 (09:32)
an honor to write it. I'm very grateful to write it. But I am one of the only people that deals with operational technology, industrial control systems or industrial cybersecurity in food and agriculture. And so I'm like a little lonely person. So if anybody wants to come hang out, I'm come on in. but yeah, the book is really amazing. I'm so grateful for the response.
DEP FSC Kristin King Author of Securing What Feeds Us 1 (09:50)
Every time I sat down to write it, it was like an emotional experience. It was like somebody once described writing a book as taking a rusty potato peeler over bare skin and that's basically what your emotions strip down. And I realize it's a business book, but it's about food and it's about the people who work with food. So it's intimately emotional to me, in so many ways. And also I had lost my grandfathers while I was writing it, so it became this love story to them 'cause they're the ones that introduced me to
DEP FSC Kristin King Author of Securing What Feeds Us 1 (10:18)
gardens and beekeeping and chickens and all these other things and it really became this labor of love to write it in the best way possible. And I realize it's also a cybersecurity book so don't everybody get upset about it but it's full of fun knowledge and my snarkiness so I I heard
DEP FSC Kristin King Author of Securing What Feeds Us 1 (10:36)
Great.
DEP FSC Kristin King Author of Securing What Feeds Us 1 (10:40)
hysterical. I I was listening to it and I heard the first like
DEP FSC Kristin King Author of Securing What Feeds Us 1 (10:47)
When you made the comment about being from the Northeast Resting Bitch. I don't know if it was a resting bitch based comment what it was. I think it was probably I'm I mean 'cause grew up in New England, which is a Noah Kane lyric. Yeah. the resting yeah, I'm constantly resting bitch. It was like I heard that comment and I'm from Pennsylvania.
DEP FSC Kristin King Author of Securing What Feeds Us 1 (11:11)
Whatever.
DEP FSC Kristin King Author of Securing What Feeds Us 1 (11:11)
the way you said it. I literally cracked up in my car and I'm thinking this woman and I could be friends. Cause just the the tone, the way you said it, it was just like it was j it was just hysterical. It was hysterical. So anyway, it was it was a great podcast. They're so much fun. I it's it's probably one of my favorite podcasts I've done today 'cause I was so relaxed as I know them. Yeah. And also when we did it was like a Sunday afternoon when we recorded, so everybody was really calm and chill
DEP FSC Kristin King Author of Securing What Feeds Us 1 (11:41)
and you know this. Sometimes when you get on podcasting schedules you're not really in the right frame of mind to do it or you have to kinda like get yourself ready to go. Well, and some of them are so regimented. yeah. You know what I mean? I I don't like doing
DEP FSC Kristin King Author of Securing What Feeds Us 1 (11:57)
So to speak. Because a lot of times it's th the the the questions are just so like can we just talk? You know, and I I
DEP FSC Kristin King Author of Securing What Feeds Us 1 (12:08)
Yeah. We're rifting. Yeah. You know? And sometimes it's almost like you feel like they want to catch you saying something wrong. Yeah, true story. I've been on those or it's like pulling teeth 'cause you're not connecting with the host or whoever you're with and then it's awkward and you're like, I just I wanna go, guys. Someone wants to interview with us or whatever and like, cool, this this
DEP FSC Kristin King Author of Securing What Feeds Us 1 (12:35)
I think he'd be perfect for the show. And then they will like then they'll say they'll send Francine and I an email and then be like, okay, so
DEP FSC Kristin King Author of Securing What Feeds Us 1 (12:43)
Can we schedule this date a couple weeks ahead of time so we can go through the agenda and go through and we're like, no. This is not how this works. We will meet you like 10 minutes beforehand to make sure there's some software works. We'll have a brief conversation about what is it you want to kind of talk about, and then we just start talking. And they're like, wait, what? Like how are we? We're this is us getting to know you, you getting to know us, and you getting to know our audience. like this is not a
DEP FSC Kristin King Author of Securing What Feeds Us 1 (13:12)
Let's let's go through the five points of your presentation podcast. No, that's that's so painful, or when you have to you know actually do the question and then call the answer moment. And I really try to rift off of whatever's people talk about. That's why I start my show with what's your favorite food and your favorite food memory, because it gets people to go, okay, I'm in a different place now. And they're smiling because they're remembering their favorite food memory. So then we could talk about whatever after that. It makes it so much.
DEP FSC Kristin King Author of Securing What Feeds Us 1 (13:42)
Much easier. I'm so grateful I did that structure. Yeah, okay, so I want to kind of get into your book and like what it is that you do like on your podcast and what is it you're trying to do for the industry, because I always I find it fascinating that there is not a person in the world that does not wake up thinking about what it is that they're going to eat or drink or supplement that they're going to take or whatever it is, whatever consumable it is, what it is they're gonna put on.
DEP FSC Kristin King Author of Securing What Feeds Us 1 (14:12)
their body when they shower and all this to another consumable and yet when you're talking about cybersecurity and you're talking about technology all these major companies are like there's nothing in like what are we gonna wh why why do food it's there's no margin blah blah blah blah yeah but it touches every single person, every single animal, every single day of their whole entire life. And I it
DEP FSC Kristin King Author of Securing What Feeds Us 1 (14:41)
just annoys me about how much we're like this redheaded stepchild in this in the world. Yeah. so you're redheaded so I think so Yeah this is your be on goodness. So it's it's so funny to me. I think it was five years ago was the first time I came to this conference when it we were having it w in Jersey. Yeah, Jersey. And I was asked to go 'cause I would think I was speaking on a panel.
DEP FSC Kristin King Author of Securing What Feeds Us 1 (15:09)
And I was like, okay, I'm gonna go to this food safety conference and I didn't know anybody. And I was really nervous because I was like, I I hadn't been around this level of like awesome food safety people before. So when I showed up you guys were all so welcoming and
DEP FSC Kristin King Author of Securing What Feeds Us 1 (15:27)
so caring and so thoughtful and I wasn't pitching anything and I wasn't doing anything. I was really just there to listen and get to know people. And it really started me down this path of cybersecurity is part of food safety.
DEP FSC Kristin King Author of Securing What Feeds Us 1 (15:37)
Food safety is part of cybersecurity. If you work in food production, agriculture, anything, that's where it starts. And I I kept hearing the same frustrations that I was dealing with on my side of the house in just in the different way in the food aspects, right? So now the technology touches every aspect of food, whether that's distribution or packaging or creation or harvesting or even the damn seeds. Yeah.
DEP FSC Kristin King Author of Securing What Feeds Us 1 (16:06)
We're now all part of that world. And the fact that the cybersecurity community hasn't caught up to that fact, and I'll give you a great example. It's a recent example. the French refrigerator hack. Okay. So I've got a lot of thoughts and feelings and I haven't completely put them out on the internet yet, so here it is. Anytime there is a cybersecurity incident within food,
DEP FSC Kristin King Author of Securing What Feeds Us 1 (16:27)
It is automatically a food safety incident until someone tells me otherwise. And it needs to be treated that way first. The cybersecurity community literally was so gross they were salivating all over this hack.
DEP FSC Kristin King Author of Securing What Feeds Us 1 (16:42)
And we've had many hacks and many security incidences in the food industry. There are plenty. In fact, there's over 400 that are publicly said for the last seven years around the world. Wait, I want we'll say that again. You said over last seven years, there's been over four hundred all around the world. That are publicly stated. However, there are plenty that are not publicly stated because they're not required by
DEP FSC Kristin King Author of Securing What Feeds Us 1 (17:07)
violation guidelines or law to to publicly
DEP FSC Kristin King Author of Securing What Feeds Us 1 (17:17)
They're people that they have to get. Monumentally more than that. So on the podcast that you did with
DEP FSC Kristin King Author of Securing What Feeds Us 1 (17:35)
You said you tried this. Yes. Yes. See, I've been digital soon. I appreciate that. I really appreciate that. I do. you're fine. In my mind, I'm envisioning this map. It is a map. It is. It is. So I actually on my book website and my my editor was like, Kristen, I don't
DEP FSC Kristin King Author of Securing What Feeds Us 1 (17:55)
Normally people just have a page for their book. She's like, You have a whole branded website with companion reading and an atlas and like all kinds of stuff. And I'm like, Yeah, because this is a big subject. And people get very intimidated by big subjects. So I wanted to break it down in ways that are visual. So I created an atlas that tracks from 2020 to now. Of all the publicly recorded incidences around the world. It is color-coded, there are little maps, it's done by sector, and I actually just added a drone layover so people could see where.
DEP FSC Kristin King Author of Securing What Feeds Us 1 (18:24)
drone attacks are happening as well. Can I say, and I if if if you mind me saying this, just let me know take it back out. The conversation that we've
DEP FSC Kristin King Author of Securing What Feeds Us 1 (18:36)
About our personalities.
DEP FSC Kristin King Author of Securing What Feeds Us 1 (18:38)
That's what makes you good at that because you think in colors and that makes the way that you explain this not colors per se, but the detail. The detail of the way that you think and being able to color code things, wanting to color code them and make it easy for other people to understand, because that's how you would understand it. Correct. Yeah, and I I'm a systems thinker too, I think in a sphere, and most people think in lines or linear. and I've I've always been told I'm more of a disruptor because where there's silos inside.
DEP FSC Kristin King Author of Securing What Feeds Us 1 (19:08)
of an organization, I just go straight across. I don't really respect probably the authority of the the silos because I don't to me like I don't have time for that. Like what is this? No, because and and I think Pathogens don't care. They jump. Why not us?
DEP FSC Kristin King Author of Securing What Feeds Us 1 (19:27)
Yep. because my mind just it's like what
DEP FSC Kristin King Author of Securing What Feeds Us 1 (19:29)
Let's just start back here and trace it in reverse. I actually tell people when I go on site or anywhere for the most part that I work in risk or cyber
DEP FSC Kristin King Author of Securing What Feeds Us 1 (19:38)
physical risk because when I say cybersecurity, they automatically picture like the guy in the hoodie in mom's basement. And that's not how it is anymore. It's like the 15-year-old girl who's probably blonde in a coffee shop somewhere across the world. Did hot pockets like lose share when that moved?
DEP FSC Kristin King Author of Securing What Feeds Us 1 (19:55)
the kid in the basement no longer is any hot pockets while hacking is that I feel like Hot Pockets kinda lost a little bit anyways because I think a lot of people were like, That's ultra processed. So but it's interesting because it's stereotype wise, I don't want people to see cybersecurity that way because to me we're fighting the same fight as food safety. We're we're viewed as a cost center and we're an opportunity center, just as much as food safety is. And
DEP FSC Kristin King Author of Securing What Feeds Us 1 (20:22)
If you're gonna run a food business and your food safety is not up to par, which includes your cybersecurity, then what are you doing? I have so many questions for you, but I don't know if I want the answers because I already know them anyways. So you said, okay, so cybersecurity is a food safety, every cyber hack is a food safety issue. I I think I know where you're going with this in concept, but for our listeners, like can you explain that in a little bit more detail?
DEP FSC Kristin King Author of Securing What Feeds Us 1 (20:45)
Sure, so we can use the French refrigerator incident. And this is still an ongoing investigation as of today, so I wanna make sure that's clear that I don't normally talk about stuff until we've gotten through the end of it. But the refrigerators were hacked because they found a vulnerability and the outdated software. These were end of life units, they were going out, right? But as we all know in the food industry
DEP FSC Kristin King Author of Securing What Feeds Us 1 (21:06)
If it's still running and okay, we're gonna keep it going until it dies, right? So I'm not mad at the fact that they had quote legacy equipment and outdated software. that doesn't bother me. but what I I do have a problem with is that we only focused on the hack that the hack happened and we only want to talk about how they got in and all this stuff. Nobody is talking about the secondary effects of where why aren't there manual checks on those thermometers that were there? There were people around it stalking it.
DEP FSC Kristin King Author of Securing What Feeds Us 1 (21:33)
Why didn't anybody notice how hot it was getting? If you're in a freezer area and it's hot, as a human being, wouldn't your like little bells go off and like alarms and be like, hello, like something's not right here? You can't tell me a hundred plus grocery stores didn't notice something was wrong. So that's trigger number one for me as in terms of a physical security, physical safety issue. Secondly,
DEP FSC Kristin King Author of Securing What Feeds Us 1 (21:58)
Whenever
DEP FSC Kristin King Author of Securing What Feeds Us 1 (21:59)
there's an issue around food that happens with a cybersecurity incident, it is a food safety incident first and we have to treat it that way, right? We can't just treat it as a cybersecurity incident as an isolation moment. It's not just about the software at that point, it's about the food that's now expired in the refrigerators that has to be dumped.
DEP FSC Kristin King Author of Securing What Feeds Us 1 (22:17)
to me people don't think about the full system aspect of it. How can you protect something or create a risk management strategy around it if you do not understand why that monitoring was there in the first place? It wasn't there because they were monitoring for maintenance. That's also part of it. It was being monitored because of food safety. You have to make sure the temperature is kept to a certain level, otherwise that food goes bad and you can't eat it. So I I think that's where I get stressed out by my industry is that people don't realize the full extent of
DEP FSC Kristin King Author of Securing What Feeds Us 1 (22:46)
the actual food industry. they don't understand how that works. So to me, it is safer to say in the food industry and in agriculture, when something happens, it is a food safety incident until you tell me it is not. And then I will treat it as I need to as I go forward. And then that conversation needs to be had at the beginning before it even happens. So that's what frustrates me about it. Correct. So okay, so the
DEP FSC Kristin King Author of Securing What Feeds Us 1 (23:14)
We were hacked. Okay. What was hacked? What what is going on with with all the other options? What's your incident plan? Right. So like if the coolers were hacked, what's going on with this with the food?
DEP FSC Kristin King Author of Securing What Feeds Us 1 (23:26)
Why wasn't this tracked beforehand? why didn't we know until two days later that the cool were getting warm?
DEP FSC Kristin King Author of Securing What Feeds Us 1 (23:32)
what do we now do with all this product? Blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah. I think that the the fact that cybersecurity was so focused on just the hack, like how they got in and not what they did to it, right? The fact that they were able to manipulate it. And a lot of cybersecurity professionals were focused on, well, why is there a heater in a refrigerator?
DEP FSC Kristin King Author of Securing What Feeds Us 1 (23:53)
Do you not know how to call HVAC work? Well, I just what? And then you'll tell me you're an IoT expert on HVAC systems and you don't even understand. I'm telling you, the amount of like eye rolling in the last couple weeks for me and how tired I am from this conversation and I haven't even weighed in totally all the way through and I know people are waiting for me to do it and I kind of just did it right here. But I'm so disappointed that they've missed the boat. They missed the boat.
261022 DEP FSC Kristin King Author of Securing What Feeds Us 1 (24:21)
Also, dumping all that food becomes a bit of an environmental problem because where is it going? You can't just dump like I always use the example of milk. You can't just dump that into the water stream. It's a contaminant. So how do they dump all that food out? What do they do with it? I have so many questions. And I don't necessarily again want the answers to them.
DEP FSC Kristin King Author of Securing What Feeds Us 1 (24:39)
But this is how I wrote the book. I followed my I followed my nose, if you will, and I I went through incidences and I explained how it affected not only cybersecurity and the technology, but the people in it and who was affected by it and the food safety aspects. And how are we supposed to create proper risk management in a holistic way, a systems way to protect our food system? Because seriously, if you just poke the Jenga peg of our global food supply chain just to Chad, it falls over. Well, one hundred percent.
DEP FSC Kristin King Author of Securing What Feeds Us 1 (25:07)
it's it's gross and it's not just it's so much tech. We rely on so much tech now and nobody's had this conversation and it's so stressful to me sometimes.
DEP FSC Kristin King Author of Securing What Feeds Us 1 (25:25)
If you don't need to have it on the internet, don't put it on the internet. That actually would solve a lot of problems right away. Yeah, okay. the second thing is to that to that point, very much in a comparison, do you really need this tech? Do you need it? Like the IoT type of stuff. Yeah. So I always say this to farmers. Do you really need this?
DEP FSC Kristin King Author of Securing What Feeds Us 1 (25:47)
I'm I'm not saying it's not cool, I'm not a tech hater, as I love tech, I think it's amazing. Yes. I think it's great. My house has tech, all the things. but do you need it? And are you prepared to deal with the risks that come from it? And the usually the answer is no. Or the vendor will handle it. And I'll say, the vendor is not gonna handle that. You don't have a security contract with your vendor. That's your responsibility. None of that's been made with security in mind by design. So it's now your problem. So I think
DEP FSC Kristin King Author of Securing What Feeds Us 1 (26:15)
It's so frustrating 'cause it's like we put all this new stuff in, it's supposed to automate, and so it'll be amazing and a lot of it's done for safety purposes, automated cutting lines and things like that. But what happens when those get hacked and get turned down? You still have to put human beings in there. Right, the the whole JBS thing. Correct. So I've been in multiple like me packing pipes, JBS pipes, and they're all automated, from the from the dispatching of the cow all the way through. From the doors walking in, right?
DEP FSC Kristin King Author of Securing What Feeds Us 1 (26:51)
yes, yes. Okay, I I shouldn't be so happy about what I'm Well I mean this is how we react to tragedy, unfortunately.
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systems go haywire and we react inappropriately. so yes, remember? Yes. They I'm sure there was you know there is policy. I mean how do you insure insurance policy but like for that particular like that quickly that I I didn't say no insurance policy period. Anyway.
DEP FSC Kristin King Author of Securing What Feeds Us 1 (27:19)
but for that specific type of incident, you what I'm saying? Well it's kinda like when there was some hacks that happened. I talk about actually insurance in the book, when some different incidents happened and it turns out it was a nation state that did it, so Russia. Russia's an Augustie, we'll just call them out. insurance would refuse to pay out the claim because it was an act of war.
DEP FSC Kristin King Author of Securing What Feeds Us 1 (27:42)
And they went to court for it because there was no precedent for it. Was this JBS with the No, no, no. Yes, but it wasn't that wasn't it. but it was another one and I can't remember it off the top of my head. It is in the book, I apologize. You write a book that's fo you know, eight hundred pages shoved into four hundred pages and you forget a lot of it. But what's interesting is that acts of war are covered underneath insurance, but a lot of people don't realize that. So they just assume that insurance will pay their claim, but if it ends up being a nation state actor
DEP FSC Kristin King Author of Securing What Feeds Us 1 (28:12)
So North Korea, any of North Korea, Russia have hacker states, China, et cetera, that are that are doing this. Even us. Whatever. Yeah, I mean it's true. I mean, they're all doing it. Yes. Yeah. There I mean, every every country every developed nation worth their salt has a ability to have counterintelligence with hacking. Yes. Right.
DEP FSC Kristin King Author of Securing What Feeds Us 1 (28:38)
so your book, you kinda took this as like an investigative reporter. Yes. mixed with my own experience and any of the interviews that I've ever done on the podcast or just my conversations over the years working in food and agriculture as well as any academics that have talked about this in any capacity. Which is exactly what an investigative reporter would do. Correct. So you you took this like as like a an
DEP FSC Kristin King Author of Securing What Feeds Us 1 (29:00)
an investigative reporter into a whole bunch of different scenarios but you took it one step further than an investigative reporter and then added your own analysis and you know what to do kind of type yes so I I didn't have it all be like this is a story and this is a doom and gloom. I actually went through like what are we gonna do about it. And I made sure I ended the book on hope because I d I can't stand living in fear. Like the fear mongering is not a tactic that works well in my world. It doesn't motivate
DEP FSC Kristin King Author of Securing What Feeds Us 1 (29:27)
people except for like one second, right? And also I don't feel like hijacking anybody else is a mid c because we're constantly hijacked with disinformation and misinformation, which I do talk about too, 'cause it's a problem in our industry, or industries I should say. And it's so frustrating to me that
DEP FSC Kristin King Author of Securing What Feeds Us 1 (29:43)
We haven't gone through that whole process of all the different risks that are associated with tech being in our environments. And again, a lot of it comes down to the human factor because technology is gonna tech, right? It's not gonna do an it's gonna do what you tell it to do. It's what we do, people and process around it that messes it up. So there's so many interesting thoughts around that. I have so many ideas for my next books, which is kind of wild to say out loud that I'm already thinking about my second book, and I've this book's only
DEP FSC Kristin King Author of Securing What Feeds Us 1 (30:10)
been out for a month. Right. So let's talk about being a woman in the industry. I'm happy to talk about that. In a male dominated industry. And I have been in this industry for a really long time. And you know, we'd like to think that it gets easier. You can say that out loud.
DEP FSC Kristin King Author of Securing What Feeds Us 1 (30:28)
No, it it doesn't get easier. I think you just you grow a thicker skin and you can tolerate more. And we talk about this a lot, especially in the the critical infrastructure side, because it's extremely male dominated. there's about twenty percent of women in cybersecurity globally. There's like seven percent in maybe seven maybe we might have be closer to ten now in critical infrastructure, cybersecurity. And it's lonely. So we all find each other and we connect.
DEP FSC Kristin King Author of Securing What Feeds Us 1 (30:56)
But the problem I have is how do I tell the the younger generation that wants to come up and through and they see us and they're like, I love your job, you're so cool and you're so amazing and all these things and I always thank them, like, I really appreciate that. I love that I give that vibe off, that's great.
DEP FSC Kristin King Author of Securing What Feeds Us 1 (31:12)
How do we tell them that this is gonna hurt? This is gonna be rough. You're gonna go back to your hotel room and cry. You're gonna take a different route to your hotel room. You're going to take a different set of stairs. You're not gonna ride the elevator up by yourself. You're gonna be buddy system all the time. You're going to be looking over your shoulder because you've got a lot of things you're gonna be washing your drink. Like you've got fifty other things you gotta worry about and your job. Right. You know, and and I realize that's part of being a woman, but when you're isolated and alone in a male dominated field, it's hard. It's really hard.
DEP FSC Kristin King Author of Securing What Feeds Us 1 (31:41)
I I was just telling Matt about a story where you know I had to present, for a situation at City Hall. I said and then when it was over I had to walk through the dark parking lot by my unacceptable and you know fortunately the police station was downstairs. Make them think about that.
DEP FSC Kristin King Author of Securing What Feeds Us 1 (32:00)
they didn't think about that. No, a great example actually, what my husband was at a gig last night. he was at the damned concert in DC last night and he was like, you know, I'm holding a spot for a guy and he's gonna buy me a drink and I was like, Okay, well girl math, you're dead. And I and I said, Can you please watch the guy order your drink? And if he brings an open container over to look at him and he's like, I'll be fine. I'm like
DEP FSC Kristin King Author of Securing What Feeds Us 1 (32:24)
I don't care what you think. We live in a weird world now. you don't know what's gonna happen. Thankfully he got home safe and everything was fine, but in girl math and our girl brains, no way. I'm sorry, you can order a drink with me next to you and the bartender can hand it to me and then my hand's gonna go right over it. Well and then
DEP FSC Kristin King Author of Securing What Feeds Us 1 (32:44)
That's correct. No, because the bartender could very well be in on this and you may not still be alive. There's so many questions. You know? And I can't the world we live in. I mean you've done this, you've backtracked and gone a different direction off the elevator when you get off with another gentleman that's on there with you. Story. Mexico City. Okay. Several years ago. I don't
DEP FSC Kristin King Author of Securing What Feeds Us 1 (33:12)
speak fluent Spanish enough to get by in a tough situation. I was down there by myself. You've no you've no stories you've ever heard. checking in. Gentleman standing next to me s speaks bilingual. Checking in and the ladies trying to tell me what room number I'm in. This guy's listening to this conversation. follows me up the elevator.
DEP FSC Kristin King Author of Securing What Feeds Us 1 (33:37)
gets off the elevator with me, follows me to the room. Because he translated what she was trying to tell me. This guy I I
DEP FSC Kristin King Author of Securing What Feeds Us 1 (33:52)
I'm I can't tell you how terrified I was on this trip, this entire trip. I was down there helping a company set up their food safety plan. Yeah. And he follows me to my room. I I end up not going in the room, I go back to the elevator. Yep.
DEP FSC Kristin King Author of Securing What Feeds Us 1 (34:08)
come back to the room by myself, middle of the night, he's knocking on my sliding glass door. I don't even know how he got to my sliding glass door. Sometime in the middle of the night the power goes out. Everything is pitch black. God. I I am I I literally am so terrified. I don't know what to do. Now the person that I was working with came to my room. We work from
DEP FSC Kristin King Author of Securing What Feeds Us 1 (34:36)
He's apologizing profusely. Of course. Because you know, he's just mortified that this even happens. This happened a couple times while I was at that facility.
DEP FSC Kristin King Author of Securing What Feeds Us 1 (34:47)
Site being older. Yeah. I should have changed rooms. But you were at my hotel. But you were stressed. And you're under duress. I was scared to death. Yeah. Can this guy get in my room? Can he go back to the desk? Can he get a key? Can he break the glass and get into my room? I don't think I slept for the entire time I was there. Yeah. I was so scared. This guy ultimately he he called somebody to make sure that I was protected while I was at that facility.
DEP FSC Kristin King Author of Securing What Feeds Us 1 (35:17)
But I was still scared. Yeah, of course. Yeah. These things happen. I was telling Sharon at Bill's about a time when, you know, I was I I was teaching a class and some guy I went to collect the the chat and this man backs me up against the wall. You know, yeah, to your point. I mean I could sit here and tell stories all day.
DEP FSC Kristin King Author of Securing What Feeds Us 1 (35:41)
we tell these younger women that? how do we tell them that we've sat in our car and cried, you know, because of different situations that have happened? Yeah, what we do is you know they look at us and think, you know, all these wonderful things and we love what we do. Yes. Because we love what we do. Of course. But be careful. Yeah. Because these are things that you really need to to think about and prepare for because unfortunately these things do
DEP FSC Kristin King Author of Securing What Feeds Us 1 (36:11)
Well, I think you already did. I in this podcast you already did. And you know what it's sad, 'cause I I also see that happen.
DEP FSC Kristin King Author of Securing What Feeds Us 1 (36:20)
And what I say to my daughters, for instance, is for every one to two guys like that, there are eight to nine guys that aren't. And so when you find the guys that you can trust, like the guy that he was worried what I would have done is exactly what you said like, Okay, let's get you out of that hotel, let's put you over here, like we'll we'll send somebody to make sure that they get your room, get your key, you
DEP FSC Kristin King Author of Securing What Feeds Us 1 (36:42)
over to there because that unfortunately does happen and it means guys like us have to be the ones that are putting the other people in place because that's not okay. I was safer in a high security
DEP FSC Kristin King Author of Securing What Feeds Us 1 (36:56)
male penitentiary in Kentucky. I believe it. I believe it. I believe it. I believe it. I think I've decided over my career to just be honest. If if a if a woman approaches me and says she really wants to be in this industry, and she'll say, Tell me about it, I'm gonna be honest about it. I'm not trying to change her mind to come in, but I want her to come in with an open mind. I wish more people would do that, because I think that that would
DEP FSC Kristin King Author of Securing What Feeds Us 1 (37:23)
keep people safer in the long run. I think the other thing too is to find your advocates. also that's super important, especially if you can just call and talk to somebody if you need to or I usually have a good group of people around me at all times or I can call up just to to be there, whether it's male or female. Also too, there was this
DEP FSC Kristin King Author of Securing What Feeds Us 1 (37:43)
before my husband and I started dating and obviously now we're married, we we worked together. And one day he said, Well, come into my office every time that you're sexually harassed and I said, I will be in your office almost every hour
DEP FSC Kristin King Author of Securing What Feeds Us 1 (37:57)
So you really sure you wanna play this game and do this exercise? He's like, Yeah, sure. He expected me to come in maybe once in a while. I walked into his office every thirty minutes almost onto the dot. And he was like by the by like lunchtime, he's like, Kristen, you'd have to stop coming in my office and I said, so I'm just supposed to bear this on my own? This is how this exercise works. You need to be as uncomfortable as I am And he was like, point taken and I said, Okay
DEP FSC Kristin King Author of Securing What Feeds Us 1 (38:22)
I'm gonna go back to my desk now, kind of thing. And he he said that that was probably one of the most eye-opening things he'd ever experienced because he'd never thought about it like that. To this day, I will tell you both. This is the first job, because I work for myself, that I have not been sexually harassed in because I work for myself. And and I I look back on my career and I'm very proud of it, of course. So are you, I'm sure you both are very proud of your careers.
DEP FSC Kristin King Author of Securing What Feeds Us 1 (38:49)
And I don't want anybody to think that we're we're victims and we're c complaining or whatever and please g take a seat, go touch some grass if that's how you feel about it. But I will say that
DEP FSC Kristin King Author of Securing What Feeds Us 1 (39:02)
Things have to change, but it is not my responsibility to change it. My responsibility is to remind people to be good human beings and that when they see something they need to say something and that's the truth about it. Whether it's a food safety incident or a sexual harassment moment or a just people being horrible, say something. I wish I stood up more, I think when I was younger.
DEP FSC Kristin King Author of Securing What Feeds Us 1 (39:25)
'cause I was quieter back then. Now I'd now gz give zero Fs and I will say something like, Wow, that is really shady what you just did like or how about no? there's a
DEP FSC Kristin King Author of Securing What Feeds Us 1 (39:38)
There's a fine line between living and surviving, and thriving. And I want to thrive and I want people around me to thrive. So I don't wanna just survive my moments with my job. I wanna thrive through them. So I think that's the point I really wanna tryna make, especially with the younger generation coming through, is find your find your your peace with it and find your way of moving through it. And if you can't then find a different place to be. that's that's actually
DEP FSC Kristin King Author of Securing What Feeds Us 1 (40:05)
the best way to put it, I think, for me. Yeah. Okay, so
DEP FSC Kristin King Author of Securing What Feeds Us 1 (40:10)
just like our podcasts all the time, we never know where it's going to end. We have a pretty good idea of where it's going to start. A fantastic idea of where it's gonna end. And I I I I like that we have these
DEP FSC Kristin King Author of Securing What Feeds Us 1 (40:25)
Tough conversations about real life. Because a lot of times it just gets thrown on the rug and everybody feels that they're isolated when they're when they're not, and it's unfortunately the real world in which we live in. but for our audience that wants to get to know you more, sure. Where can they find your podcast? Where can they find your book? Where can they find your website? And how is the best way to reach you? Sure. So the website.
DEP FSC Kristin King Author of Securing What Feeds Us 1 (40:49)
for the book is securing what feeds us dot com. So it's just the title of the book. I try to make it very easy for people. And I have all kinds of contact information on there. I am also on LinkedIn. That's a great place to find me, Kristen King. I have an Instagram, which is the same
DEP FSC Kristin King Author of Securing What Feeds Us 1 (41:05)
name. and then I write on Substack underneath my own name as well. The podcast is Bites and Bytes, so it's bites like you bite something and then computer bites with a Y.
DEP FSC Kristin King Author of Securing What Feeds Us 1 (41:14)
And I'm everywhere on all platforms, just like you guys are too. and then my book is at every retailer you can think of. I just found out they're selling online for Walmart and Target, which was like whoa, 'cause that was kind of like really impressive. We're also at like
DEP FSC Kristin King Author of Securing What Feeds Us 1 (41:30)
waitros and things like that in the UK, which my in laws were thrilled about. They were like, wow, we're gonna go order the book directly from them and I just started laughing. I was like, this is what is life? What is life? Amazon obviously is the preferred where everybody gets their books. but if you want to buy locally you just take the ISBN number and tell your local person that you want to order the book. That's fine too. I I'm totally agreeable to any of those avenues. I will say I I am a bestseller, which is amazing after this month.
DEP FSC Kristin King Author of Securing What Feeds Us 1 (41:56)
Congratulations. Wow, the book's been out and you've been a you're a bestseller. I'm a bestseller, yes. and that make sure you write that on like
DEP FSC Kristin King Author of Securing What Feeds Us 1 (42:03)
LinkedIn and I d I do. I actually I'm also won awards for my podcast too, so I that's also something that's been really amazing. I didn't you know, I just do this job for the love of what we do and I I'm really grateful to be in this space and then when you start to have accolades like that happen, it's just like it's validation, yes, but it's also motivation to keep moving forward more and keep pushing. there's there's so much work to be done and I'm really thrilled about that. I'm also on TikTok, so if you really want to go there, go for it. I'm embracing the cringe of being
DEP FSC Kristin King Author of Securing What Feeds Us 1 (42:31)
influencer and I even hate saying that out loud but I guess that's what we do. and I'm just yeah it's so much fun. So I'm working on researching for my second book so that should be really exciting. more to come on that. and I also have an idea for my third book more to come on that too. So I guess I'm a writer now. Very cool. Very cool. Is there anything that you would like to talk about that we have and anything you would like to say
DEP FSC Kristin King Author of Securing What Feeds Us 1 (42:56)
No, actually. I think I think we've we've covered a lot actually. Is there anything in the book? Do you want to look at the table of context? Is there anything you want me to talk about? I think we to have you back and then probably like a couple times because there's there was stuff that we want to cover like in the book. We'd love to know too, like in the future when you have your next book. But there was also a great conversation that we were having beforehand about nerd.
DEP FSC Kristin King Author of Securing What Feeds Us 1 (43:18)
versions. yeah. Yeah. and that should be its own episode. I think that that's that's fascinating
DEP FSC Kristin King Author of Securing What Feeds Us 1 (43:24)
So I guess the answer to your question is yes, there's more we want to talk about, but we're gonna be very greedy and tell you no, not today. We're going to have you. No, you're fine. You're fine. No, absolutely. It's my pleasure. And I also wanted to say that I did dedicate the books to both my grandfathers as well as everyone who touches food in the industry. I don't care what part of it you're in. So So about a billion people. Yeah, and that I think that's actually really important to distinguish 'cause a lot of people don't realize how many people work in the food industry. It's a it's the biggest industry in the world.
DEP FSC Kristin King Author of Securing What Feeds Us 1 (43:54)
Right? Right. So yeah, it's crazy. But thank you very much. Thank you. Thank you.
DEP FSC Kristin King Author of Securing What Feeds Us 1 (43:58)
and don't eat poop.