If you missed the Cloud Resilience Summit 2025, you missed a wake-up call.
Actually, you missed four.
The annual forum featured critical lessons from modern cybersecurity experts, who explored cybersecurity strategies in sessions focused on cloud, security, and SaaS. The consensus from the speakers, which included former CISA Director Jen Easterly, FBI hostage negotiators, and more, was clear: You can’t keep attackers out of your business forever.
You need to act as if they’re already in.
This is your cheat sheet for everything we covered, organized by what actually matters.
Wake-Up Call #1: Attackers Are Walking in Through the Front Door
The gist: Hackers aren't bothering to break the lock anymore. They’re just stealing your credentials and walking through the front door, totally undetected.
The details:
Breaking in → Logging in: The new perimeter isn't a firewall; it’s identity. Attackers like Scattered Spider and Volt Typhoon aren't using zero-day exploits. They are socially engineering your helpdesk to reset passwords.
The "Storm-0501" playbook: Joe Hladik of Rubrik Zero Labs walked through a terrifyingly simple attack chain used by a real ransomware gang.
Steal credentials: Usually a hybrid account (on-prem syncing to cloud).
Live off the land (LotL): Use native tools like PowerShell so they look like a normal admin.
Get more access: They elevate privileges to "Global Admin" or "Azure Owner."
Ruin hopes of recovery: They don't just encrypt data. They delete your backups first.
The scary truth: Attackers are specifically targeting backup infrastructure. If you own the backup, you own the business.
The bottom line: Your credentials can be stolen at any time. Don’t think you’re safe.
Wake-Up Call #2: You Need to Change Your Mindset
The gist: Prevention is like using a paper umbrella. It’s bound to break. You can’t focus on only keeping hackers out. You need to start figuring out how to survive when they get in.
The details:
Resilience > prevention: Former CISA Director Jen Easterly says we need to stop blaming users for clicking links ("Humans will be human") and start blaming bad software design.
Secure by design: Stop buying software that requires a 60-page manual to secure. Use your money wisely to demand that vendors provide security defaults (like MFA) out of the box.
The "assume breach" mindset: You need to design your architecture assuming a bad guy is already sitting there, waiting to strike. Can you limit the damage? Can you recover?
The bottom line: Resilience isn't about avoiding the punch. It's about not getting knocked out when you take it.
Wake-Up Call #3: The Technical Blueprint for Recovery
The gist: You need a plan that doesn't rely on hope. Also, don't forget your code.
The details:
The 3-pillar blueprint: Matt Castriotta, Rubrik Field CTO, laid out the framework:
Preparation: You can't protect what you can't see. Find your "dark data" (shadow IT, old files).
Response: Your endpoint protection tools are blind to backups. You need Anomaly Detection in the backup data itself to see the blast radius.
Recovery: It needs to be orchestrated. If you are manually restoring VMs one by one while the CEO screams at you, you’ve already lost.
The air gap is non-negotiable: If your backups are in the same "trust domain" as your production environment (i.e., same admin keys), they will be deleted. You need an isolated, immutable vault.
Don't forget the code: Principal Engineer Courtenay Farquharson pointed out a huge blind spot. Everyone backs up databases, but nobody backs up the GitHub repos. If a hacker wipes your source code or infrastructure-as-code pipelines, your "cloud" is just a memory. Version control is NOT a backup.
The bottom line: Automate your recovery. A plan you haven't tested is just a wish.
Wake-Up Call #4: The Human Factor in Cybersecurity
The gist: Tech problems are actually people problems. If you can’t talk to humans, you can’t save your cloud or your business.
The details:
Psychological safety: Jen Easterly argues that if your team is afraid to report bad news, you won’t know something’s wrong until it’s too late. You need a culture where people can say "I think I clicked a bad link" without worrying they’ll get fired.
Tactical empathy: FBI hostage negotiator Chris Voss dropped gems on how to handle the Board of Directors or a crisis:
Calm is contagious: If you panic, everyone panics. Use the "late-night FM DJ voice."
"That's right" > "You're right": If someone says "You're right," they want you to shut up. If they say "That's right," they feel understood and are on your side.
Mirroring: Repeat the last 3 words someone said. It forces them to elaborate and reveals the "black swans" (hidden information).
The bottom line: In a crisis, your voice allows the team to think clearly. You are roughly 31% smarter when you are calm.
TL;DR
If you take nothing away, know your answer to this question:
"When your cloud is breached, how long will your business be down?"
If your answer is "I don't know" or "Let me check the runbook from 2019," watch the on-demand Summit to figure out your answer right away.
Or, contact us before you find yourself in the middle of a crisis with no way to answer that question.