Behind the firewall: Susanne Bitter

A lot of people say that once you find your passion as your job, then you do not work anymore. And I feel like that sometimes. Not always, but most of the time, I just feel so happy that I can do what I love and I can be quite good at it. I can, as Arnold Schwarzenegger loves to say: “Be useful!”

Why is information security important? We are in the world of information. Everything is data and data is gold. There are so many data brokers you do not know about who sell your data, and try to understand your decisions and your patterns.

I'm big on human rights and freedom. You want to be human, you don't want to be someone's product or objectified to a person that is just interested in making money. That's why data privacy is important. I think it's very, very, very important.

Your information security should be your right. Your privacy should be your right, and you have to do something about it. You can't be healthy just because you go to the doctor. 

AI governance.. That's something which I'm passionate about, and I want to learn much more. AI governance, supply chain management, because that goes hands in hand. I'm also quite passionate about speaking at conferences and promoting information security within schools and the educational system."

What worries me most about the future of information security is that we will not do the basics. I think everybody is going on the fast train of buzzy words and buzzy things and we forgot the basics. 

I'm worried that people will be overwhelmed with all the information, the requirements and everything. They're just gonna switch off. And that's a lost battle already, if people switch off because you overload them. So let HR do HR, let marketing people do marketing, but make sure that when something goes wrong, you are there to support them. This is like what I would like to see more. 

So, don't overload them. Make sure that you respect people's time and people's knowledge. And again, I will probably say that for the third time as Arnold said, just 'Be useful.”

Susanne Bitter is a Head of Regional Strategic Alliances (UK) at the Cyber Security Forum Initiative. She’s also a Certified and passionate Information Security and Data Privacy professional with over 15 years of experience within the industry.