Cybersecurity Today RSAC Presenter Says "Time to Kill One of Cybersecurity's Most Overworked Terms"
Mar 25, 2026
A debate over retiring the overused APT label in favor of describing actors by motivation and activity. Trade show trends from RSAC, including fading zero trust talk and a surge in agentic AI hype. The FCC's move to block new non-US-made Wi Fi routers and its supply chain rationale. Reports of public Zoom calls being scraped into AI‑generated podcasts. A Kubernetes supply chain campaign deploying an Iran‑targeting wiper. Treasury weighing cyber terrorism insurance changes.
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Retire APT Label And Describe Actors By Motivation
- The term Advanced Persistent Threat has become overused and lost clear meaning in threat classification.
- Robert Lepofsky urges labeling actors by motivation and activity (espionage, nation-state, e-crime) because tooling and tactics now overlap between states and criminals.
AI Dominates RSAC While Zero Trust Fades
- RSAC floor showed zero trust hype cooling while AI and especially 'agentic AI' dominated vendor messaging.
- Booth creativity ranged from 90s CRT rooms to wrestling rings, with MindGuard using a 90s theme to warn about immature AI security.
MindGuard's 90s Booth Makes AI Security Point
- MindGuard built a 90s-themed room with CRT monitors to make a point about AI security immaturity.
- Aaron Portnoy compared AI security today to the late 1990s when systems were easy to hack.