Today on the Social-Engineer Podcast: The Security Awareness Series, Chris is joined by Travis Farral. Travis has been working in information security since the 90s at places such as Nokia, ExxonMobil, and XTO Energy. He is currently VP & CISO at Archaea Energy, a bp owned, renewable natural gas company based in Houston, Texas. He has spoken at events around world on topics such as Cyber Threat Intelligence, MITRE ATT&CK, and Incident Response. Notable activities during his career include everything from programming logic controllers, building and leading SOCs, driving forklifts, standing up cybersecurity teams, developing threat intelligence programs, and handling responses to incidents, among many other things over the last few decades. [April 21, 2025]
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Show Notes
Today on the Social-Engineer Podcast: The Security Awareness Series, Chris is joined by Travis Farral. Travis has been working in information security since the 90s at places such as Nokia, ExxonMobil, and XTO Energy. He is currently VP & CISO at Archaea Energy, a bp owned, renewable natural gas company based in Houston, Texas. He has spoken at events around world on topics such as Cyber Threat Intelligence, MITRE ATT&CK, and Incident Response. Notable activities during his career include everything from programming logic controllers, building and leading SOCs, driving forklifts, standing up cybersecurity teams, developing threat intelligence programs, and handling responses to incidents, among many other things over the last few decades. [April 21, 2025]
00:00 – Intro
00:18 – Intro Links:
- Social-Engineer.com– http://www.social-engineer.com/
- Managed Voice Phishing– https://www.social-engineer.com/services/vishing-service/
- Managed Email Phishing– https://www.social-engineer.com/services/se-phishing-service/
- Adversarial Simulations– https://www.social-engineer.com/services/social-engineering-penetration-test/
- Social-Engineer channel on SLACK– https://social-engineering-hq.slack.com/ssb
- CLUTCH– http://www.pro-rock.com/
- org– http://www.innocentlivesfoundation.org/
02:08 – Travis Farral Intro
02:58 – A Different Path than Today
05:25 – Healthy Hacking
08:08 – Anything Can Be Weaponized
10:54 – Questionable Behavior
14:31 – Smash That Report Button!!!
18:58 – Improving Our Odds
21:00 – You Have to Keep It Simple
22:25 – Letters to a Young CISO
24:20 – Find Travis Farral online
- LinkedIn: com/in/travisfarral
25:01 – Mentors
27:02 – Book Recommendations
- E. Lee: A Biography – Douglas Southall Freeman
29:34 – Wrap Up & Outro