Fed Gov Today Burning Down Cyber Risk: DHS’s AI-Powered Playbook to Outsmart Hackers
Mar 26, 2026
Hemant Baidwan, former DHS Chief Information Security Officer who led the shift to real-time risk reduction, discusses how AI is changing both defense and adversary tactics. He explains the move from compliance to continuous risk prioritization. He introduces the Risk Operations Center, attack-path analysis, and ideas for self-healing, automated infrastructure.
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AI Rewrote The Cybersecurity Playbook
- AI has shifted cybersecurity from compliance checks to real-time risk reduction.
- Hemant Baidwan says AI accelerated both defender automation and adversary tactics, forcing a strategy focused on true risk visibility.
Prioritize Automation Over Paper Compliance
- Move beyond compliance by automating manual processes and focusing resources on the highest real-world risks.
- Hemant recommends department-wide strategies that align components to prioritize fixes that reduce attack exposure fastest.
ROC Turns Alert Noise Into Prioritized Risk
- A Risk Operations Center (ROC) complements the SOC by providing continuous, enterprise-wide risk visibility and attack path analysis.
- Hemant describes the ROC as the function that translates noisy SOC alerts into prioritized, actionable remediation.