In this episode of the AlchemistX Innovators Inside Podcast, Ian Bergman sits down with Danny Brickman, CEO and co-founder of Oasis Security, to uncover one of the most overlooked yet critical challenges in cybersecurity today: non-human identity management.

As AI, automation, and machine-based workflows grow exponentially, so does a hidden vulnerability—identities that don’t belong to humans but still have access to your most sensitive systems. Drawing from his background in elite cyber units of the Israeli Defense Force and deep startup experience, Danny shares how innovation, trust, and risk intersect in this fast-evolving landscape.

Here are the five main takeaways from their conversation:

1. Non-Human Identities Are the Next Big Cybersecurity Threat

Danny explains how traditional security systems were built to manage human users, not bots, AI agents, or machine workflows. Today, these non-human identities outnumber humans by 20 to 50 times in most organizations. Without proper controls, they become prime targets for cyberattacks.

→ SEO tip: Cybersecurity for AI agents, non-human identity management, and identity-based attacks are emerging areas to watch.

2. 80% of Cyberattacks Are Identity-Based

According to Danny, more than 80% of attacks today start with compromised credentials. As innovation accelerates, attackers target the identity layer—particularly non-human accounts that are often poorly tracked and loosely managed.

→ Businesses must prioritize identity governance to mitigate the growing identity threat landscape.

3. Startups Can Solve What Enterprises Can’t—Yet

While tech giants move slowly due to legacy systems and internal inertia, nimble startups like Oasis Security are able to pivot quickly, experiment, and build cutting-edge solutions. Danny emphasizes how startups can lead the charge when the market moves faster than enterprise response times.

→ This speaks to the larger trend of cybersecurity innovation coming from agile, focused startups.

4. Security Innovation Is Both Technological and Philosophical

Innovation isn’t just about better code or smarter tools—it’s also about philosophy. Oasis Security embraces a mindset where security must integrate seamlessly into developers’ existing workflows without friction. As Danny says, “Security isn’t a product—it’s a mindset.”

→ Emphasize user-centric design and developer-first thinking when implementing security strategies.

5. Trust Takes Time—But It’s the Foundation for Adoption

Using analogies like autonomous cars and the iPhone’s early days, Danny reminds us that cultural adoption lags behind technological advancement. Building trust in new systems—like non-human identity management—requires time, education, and empathy.

→ Companies should invest not just in the solution, but in the storytelling and onboarding experience.

Final Thoughts

This episode is more than a conversation about cybersecurity—it’s a deep dive into how innovation happens in the real world. From military-grade resilience to startup agility, Danny Brickman offers a roadmap for anyone navigating the intersection of AI, automation, and enterprise risk.

Have a question for a future guest? Email us at innovators@alchemistaccelerator.com to get in touch! 

Timestamps

🎙️ Introduction to Danny Brickman and Oasis Security (00:00:00)

🪖 How Military Service Shaped Innovation Thinking (00:03:25)

🔐 The Birth of Oasis Security and the Rise of Non-Human Identities (00:05:36)

⚠️ The Alarming Scale of Identity-Based Attacks (00:09:08)

🧩 Philosophical vs. Technological Differentiation in Security (00:15:23)

🛡️ Security as a Mindset, Not Just a Product (00:16:51)

📊 Non-Human Identity Threats in a Developer-Driven Culture (00:23:06)

📘 Behind the Book: Non-Human Identity Management for Dummies (00:24:51)

🌍 Why Trust and Cultural Shifts Take Time (iPhone & AI Analogies) (00:27:28)

🧙‍♂️ How Sci-Fi Becomes Reality—and Why We Ignore the Risks (00:29:18)

📈 What’s Most Exciting About the Next Generation and Tech Culture (00:39:08)

🔄 The Acceleration of Change—and Learning to Ride the Wave (00:41:13)

🔗 Where to Follow Danny Brickman and Oasis Security (00:45:00)

Full Transcript 

00:00:00:03 - 00:00:01:26

Ian Bergman

Danny, how are you today?

00:00:01:28 - 00:00:04:01

Danny Brickman

Amazing. And how are you doing?

00:00:04:04 - 00:00:14:03

Ian Bergman

I am doing so well. I mean, as we talked about a little before, we recorded, It's a Monday as we're recording this, so we're both energized for the week and like ready for a great conversation, right?

00:00:14:05 - 00:00:14:26

Danny Brickman

Exactly.

00:00:14:27 - 00:00:38:16

Ian Bergman

I'm thrilled to welcome you, Danny. To Alchemist x innovators inside. And you know, for folks who don't know you, maybe a little bit of an introduction. Danny Brickman is the CEO of Oasis Security, CEO and co-founder, a leading provider of non-human identity management solutions. And, we're going to talk a bit about what that means, because that's a fascinating topic in today's world.

00:00:38:19 - 00:00:58:26

Danny Brickman

You know, I could not be a better timing to speak about it, right? Like, it's it's the world has changed so fastly. I'm actually always having a joke that and it's not a joke, by the way. But like the the infrastructure entered into it's Gen Z era, right? Like, everything is happening so fast. Like everyone is trying new things like AI is coming in.

00:00:58:26 - 00:01:00:14

Danny Brickman

There's a lot of plays, right?

00:01:00:17 - 00:01:26:14

Ian Bergman

Everything's moving. It feels it feels hard to keep up. Everybody's trying and shifting. Absolutely. And before co-founding Oasis, which I think was just about two years ago now, you had a really interesting career. You have led product strategy at Build Dots, working in the Construction Technology Center and 11 years and in the Israel Defense Force and various roles, including head of cyber R&D.

00:01:26:16 - 00:01:40:24

Ian Bergman

You must be drawing on a lot of this for what you're doing now. I'm wondering if maybe you can just start by telling us a little bit more of your story. Like, how did you end up in this chair right now? Having this conversation today?

00:01:40:26 - 00:01:44:04

Danny Brickman

Well, I need to go very, very back in my in my past.

00:01:44:06 - 00:01:45:15

Ian Bergman

What's I think.

00:01:45:17 - 00:02:13:05

Danny Brickman

The most impactful, job that I had was when I was eight years old. I was actually working at my father's company and throwing envelopes and marketing stuff and marketing operations back then. And why I'm stating that is because, born to like an immigrant family, just like you, always trying to, like, build proof and like having this chip on your shoulder and, like, doing things and just, like, kind of breaking the glass ceiling because in many cases, it's in your hand.

00:02:13:05 - 00:02:35:07

Danny Brickman

Right? But like when you're studying very early on this, like understanding what is the value of like creation and value of money and values. This is where like your, brain is becoming like more oriented of like, okay and ascending like I'm starting to understand a little bit the system. And I want to make sure that my talent, as everyone has a talent in the world, right, is emphasized in the best way.

00:02:35:07 - 00:02:52:01

Danny Brickman

And I'm just like using that to contribute it out, right? I'm always just like quoting my father is like. And it's like, maybe we'll start to be very depressive, but like you said, like you got to think what will be written on, like your grave, right? Like it won't be reading like your bank account. Like balance. Right?

00:02:52:01 - 00:02:57:23

Danny Brickman

It will be reading like what you did. Like people remember you for something. And I think this motion started very early in my career.

00:02:57:26 - 00:03:17:16

Ian Bergman

Tell me more about that. Like I, I sent sort of a drive to accomplish a drive to, to do meaningful things. And I think that's wonderful parental advice. It makes me think a little bit about the advice I need to be instilling in my own young children right now. But you know what was next, right? Like, you got some work experience at a young age.

00:03:17:19 - 00:03:25:04

Ian Bergman

What got you into, the world of, quote unquote, innovation building or driving change in the world?

00:03:25:06 - 00:03:47:17

Danny Brickman

I gotta gotta give a lot of credit to my, Army service, because I think it has a lot behind that. That was driving innovation. I'm always saying that's like when, like, especially in Israel or in general, like, when you're trying to accomplish something for a nation, security innovation is not a form of, like, making money.

00:03:47:19 - 00:03:49:06

Danny Brickman

It's a form of survival.

00:03:49:09 - 00:03:50:03

Ian Bergman

Yeah.

00:03:50:06 - 00:04:11:24

Danny Brickman

And a form of survival in many cases brings out of you the best. Like the creativity, the thinking out of the box, bringing people together around single mission. Right. All of those elements are so critical. Elements. And when it comes to innovation, because innovation, there's no singular explanation to that word, right. Like it's it's kind of a combination of a lot of things that happen together.

00:04:11:24 - 00:04:20:09

Danny Brickman

And then people are like, oh, wow, something amazing happened, right? But but nobody feels that like when they're in the process of innovating, right?

00:04:20:09 - 00:04:21:00

Ian Bergman

Yeah.

00:04:21:03 - 00:04:36:05

Danny Brickman

So kind of like I feel that like a lot of that are coming from that era and personally, like spending 11 years, in the Army was just like it was embedded in your brain all the time. You need to think out of the box. You need to be ahead of the curve. You need to be ahead of your enemy.

00:04:36:05 - 00:04:41:08

Danny Brickman

Right. If you want to be surviving. Right. So I think this is like the main driver.

00:04:41:10 - 00:04:59:28

Ian Bergman

Well, and I love that note. I'm going to put a I'm going to put a mark on. So I'll come back to this a little later. I love that note on also the singular mission. Right. Like what is it? What is the environment? What is the context? What is the crisis? Whatever it is that causes a group of people to rally and execute really well, because we can have all the ideas in the world.

00:04:59:28 - 00:05:19:03

Ian Bergman

We can have all the problems in the world, right? But you've got to come together and execute. And whether it's the, the moon landing, right, which was instilled by its own crisis, whether, frankly, whether it is like solving a procurement problem at a small company, like whatever it is, you kind of gotta execute. So I like that that note about the mission.

00:05:19:05 - 00:05:36:12

Danny Brickman

Exactly, exactly. It has a lot behind it. Right? Like and value creation in many cases. Like, look, all of us are living for a specific value that we want to achieve or be like, or a goal or a mission, right? So it's the more the bigger the mission, the bigger the value, the bigger, like the companies that you can create around that.

00:05:36:14 - 00:05:40:10

Ian Bergman

Well, incredible. So tell me about the mission of Oasis Security.

00:05:40:12 - 00:05:57:24

Danny Brickman

When you were coming and both of us, me and my co-founder and a lot of our founding members came from the IDF, right? And we were always just like looking at the security space from maybe from the other side, from the offensive, with the right flags behind our back. Right, like with like the right purpose, but like a lot of looking at like, what can we do with that?

00:05:57:24 - 00:06:19:15

Danny Brickman

Right. And when we actually came to the market, I was mentioning to like, we, we saw this Gen Z environment like infrastructure change, right? We saw that things are happening very fast. We're transitioning actually to a more machine like world. Right. Like today it's like very dominant. The AI exposure. Right. Like that is just like driving a lot of like value creation from machine agents, you name it.

00:06:19:15 - 00:06:37:22

Danny Brickman

There's different names to that. But at the end of the day, it's just like machine replacing humans, right? Yep. And both as both of us were like very focused, like in the Army days, like under like focusing on the identity space and the identity security, like, identity is like, I don't know, your username and password. Right. Like your accounts in the organization, right.

00:06:37:24 - 00:06:59:09

Danny Brickman

When we look at that space, we said the space haven't changed for like I think 15 years, if you give it like maybe ten or like a decade, okay. But this force of like change to machine lit era, right. Created just in different creature of identities that are like everyone said, they're they're the same, but they're not the same, which we call them like non-human identities.

00:06:59:09 - 00:07:21:11

Danny Brickman

Before that, it was like had different names to that. But at the end of the day, it's all of those identification methods that are supporting applications, supporting workflows, supporting AI agents to access to infrastructural databases, resources, and you name it, right. When we took a look at that, we realized that the scale of that problem is so big and is expanding, right?

00:07:21:11 - 00:07:37:10

Danny Brickman

So we're talking 20 to 50 times more non-human identities. And then human identities in an average organization is like, wait a second. There is a gap that like will continue growing and growing and growing that nobody's focusing on. There's no solution to it.

00:07:37:12 - 00:07:53:05

Ian Bergman

And the systems of today presumably just can't keep up because they're built for sort of that human onboarding, that human infrastructure, and maybe to an extent, some assumptions about how humans behave both positively and negatively.

00:07:53:07 - 00:08:14:29

Danny Brickman

So it's even more than that, right. Like my, my account. Let's assume like it's to break the rules of security. Right. We know who is the owner of this account. Right. It's me. Sure. When when you're creating an account for a machine right. It doesn't stay the name of the machine. Right. It doesn't state, like who's the owner of this account necessarily.

00:08:14:29 - 00:08:27:08

Danny Brickman

Not always. Right. And those machines are tend to stay longer than humans. Any like average organization. Right. So this problem is has different characteristics to that different scale of problem. Right.

00:08:27:08 - 00:08:28:04

Ian Bergman

Absolutely.

00:08:28:07 - 00:08:33:12

Danny Brickman

And and suddenly the fundamentals that were used to have are just not present.

00:08:33:14 - 00:08:53:05

Ian Bergman

As we record this. Right. We are going through a period of time when AI is on everyone's tongues and it's it means something completely different than it few a few years ago. But let's be honest, there's a lot of people thinking about call it digital staff, call it, replacing humans, human units of work. Call it whatever you want.

00:08:53:10 - 00:09:08:24

Ian Bergman

They're calling about a generic, proactive behavior on behalf of humans. Is that what you were looking at when you founded Oasis Security? Or did you kind of serendipitously fall into, into the right time? Tell me. Tell me a little bit about that.

00:09:08:26 - 00:09:31:24

Danny Brickman

I have to say, like security from one end, like security innovation. It's kind of like, it's it's easier. Why? Because security always comes last, right? First of all comes innovation and technology. Then the infrastructure changes. And then we realize we have a lot of security gaps, right? Yep. So basically when when we saw the problem we saw the change in the infrastructure.

00:09:31:24 - 00:09:47:10

Danny Brickman

We saw that like the change of like even before I there was a cloud transformation right there. We saw that happening. So we said okay the gaps will be just like massive, right. And it will just like it will be a matter of time until everyone in the sense that and by the way, the hackers will leverage that.

00:09:47:10 - 00:10:08:01

Danny Brickman

Like in security. There's a lot of problems, right. But at the end of the day, for every era of like security, there will be focus on the few vectors of like attack. Right? Like, yes, there will be like, you know, 20% that are like all over the place, but 80% will be focused on something specific. And actually, this is the statistic that we're seeing today of the attacks.

00:10:08:04 - 00:10:18:07

Danny Brickman

More than 80% of the attacks are identity based, just like someone found the credential. And just getting in through the door and stealing data.

00:10:18:10 - 00:10:35:28

Ian Bergman

I'm going to ask you a question that I normally hate, but feels appropriate. I hate asking startup founders this, and I'm going to I'm about to do it to, access management identity. Right. There are major players, major infrastructure players that have been doing this across cloud and on premise services and complicated networks for a very long time.

00:10:35:28 - 00:10:48:01

Ian Bergman

The Microsofts of the world and many others. What is it about non-human identity management that requires an outsider, someone to come in and build a new solution to solve a new problem?

00:10:48:05 - 00:11:06:26

Danny Brickman

It's a circle of life, of technology at the end of the day, right. A lot of the companies that came like, you know, through the years, if we're looking at these three, we're looking at something that is happening there. Understand that, like they need to be ahead of the curve. Right. And when you were a startup like you, when you were like, I would say smaller than a big enterprise, you can move faster.

00:11:06:26 - 00:11:08:04

Danny Brickman

Much faster, of course.

00:11:08:04 - 00:11:08:25

Ian Bergman

Right.

00:11:08:28 - 00:11:40:23

Danny Brickman

And there's like less limitations, less things stop you from innovating, which allows you to be like ahead of the people that are coming after a problem. Right. And by the way, in many cases, what happens with innovation is that there's everything is moving so fast that like, there's a big need for this to be coming in, right? So if like a big player, like looking at that problem and saying like, well, I will shift and steer this ship to that solution, it will take it 18, 24, 36 months until they're getting to the resolution.

00:11:40:25 - 00:11:59:08

Danny Brickman

While a startup, a nimble startup, a lean startup can so always within a few months, right. And innovate through that and the ability to understand this market. By the way, if you ask me, like what will be the next for Oasis? I'll tell you, look, I have a prediction to that. But at the end of the day, the market will dictate right?

00:11:59:11 - 00:12:00:06

Danny Brickman

Like that's.

00:12:00:09 - 00:12:17:25

Ian Bergman

That's that's a that's a wise founder answer. Follow the customer in the market basically. But but it makes sense. But let me ask you, you know, you're talking about a fast moving market, right? You're talking about being able to adapt and listen to customers. Do your customers, understand the problem that you're trying to solve? And do they feel it?

00:12:17:25 - 00:12:20:08

Ian Bergman

Do they feel this is a problem now?

00:12:20:11 - 00:12:42:22

Danny Brickman

You know, when we started, I think that even our customers felt it even strongly that us when we were presenting that we're just like, okay, like take a look at this. But they were speaking from the point of pain. Yeah. Now, from the point of innovation, when you're speaking from the point of pain, it's a completely different mindset, right?

00:12:42:25 - 00:13:01:08

Danny Brickman

I can understand the problem completely all in just like, you know, the technological side of that, how to solve it. He understands that from the point of like, I need to solve it now. Like my job is on the on the line here, like my people are on the line. Right? I have to solve it right. And this emotional attachment, it's much stronger in many ways.

00:13:01:08 - 00:13:04:05

Danny Brickman

And this is why I said it is like the market should dictate.

00:13:04:07 - 00:13:25:16

Ian Bergman

So how would you describe that pain they're feeling? Because you're right. And I think this is actually a topic that comes up on the podcast constantly. But it's because it's important, right? Like innovation almost always derives from pain, real or perceived present or future. Right. And it gets really hard when people don't understand that pain. So. So who is feeling the pain and and what is it.

00:13:25:16 - 00:13:33:06

Ian Bergman

Are they just pulling their hair out trying to manage, wildly multiplying set of identities, or is there something more fundamental?

00:13:33:08 - 00:14:02:14

Danny Brickman

I think the best word that I'm hearing across, is, a paralysis mode right now. And when they're seeing the problem, they're seeing how it's expanding. They don't have a clue of like how to start address it at scale. Yeah. And and this is like, kind of like a painful but a beautiful moment in innovation, that like, you know, customers like, well, they see the risk, they see other organization being based off that.

00:14:02:14 - 00:14:17:12

Danny Brickman

They see the scale of a problem. They're seeing themselves reach with that, and they're seeing that they're like chasing fire right now. And the sad thing, and maybe it's also the happy thing, is that nobody will admit that it has a problem if it doesn't have a solution.

00:14:17:14 - 00:14:20:24

Ian Bergman

It's philosophical, but but is it true?

00:14:20:27 - 00:14:34:24

Danny Brickman

But it's true, right? Yeah. It's true. You will do everything around that. Yeah. To do that. Right. So like not to admit that you have. And by the way it's it's very it's very, it's like natural to do to have this feeling. Right.

00:14:34:26 - 00:14:55:08

Ian Bergman

There's oh classic framework to thinking about innovation or at least it's one that I fall back on a lot. Right. Which is that you require a few ingredients and you require some pain, some some visceral pain that a human feels right. But you also require possibility, something about the art of the possible that makes you believe that, that there's a better way.

00:14:55:08 - 00:15:20:19

Ian Bergman

And I think that's what you're getting at. And and in that gap lies this trap of serious dissatisfaction. Right. Because when you know, when you know that there is a solution out there that you might act. And so, you know, how is that conversation going in your, in your industry? Do people do are people just starting to realize that, oh, this is a pain that I have to get out of paralysis mode.

00:15:20:21 - 00:15:23:06

Ian Bergman

Our best practices getting written.

00:15:23:09 - 00:15:43:19

Danny Brickman

In the regular stack, right. There's like first of all, let's set up like the problem statement and then let's think about a solution right. In most of my conversations, like, is this okay, can you start with the problem statement? Understand completely how can you solve it right. People want to solve the problem. They want to understand, what is the vision and philosophy of doing that.

00:15:43:19 - 00:16:04:19

Danny Brickman

Right. And and then the stand, the scale. They want to make sure that you understand them as well. Right. You understand like when you're addressing this problem, you're addressing it in a way that is actually, you know, meeting our business needs, by the way, like, you know, every product, every solution needs to have two things. It needs to have technological differentiation, right.

00:16:04:22 - 00:16:25:17

Danny Brickman

But it needs to have also philosophical differentiation like what is the philosophy that you're driving here? Right. I'm like, we're driving those two together because from a logical perspective, yes, we can discuss about it. Like what is it differentiation. What if we build what is the IP. Right. But when it comes to philosophical and this is something that we understood pretty quickly, organization.

00:16:25:17 - 00:16:51:06

Danny Brickman

Because of the Gen Z infrastructure. Right. We cannot be forcing developers or like infrastructure to use something different or like don't you. Oh don't use the on premises. Oh, don't use this cloud provider. No the opposite. We need to support them. We need to hug it. We need to make sure that like security is coming in their mind when they're acting in a simple way and security, at the end of the day, it's not a single product, right?

00:16:51:08 - 00:16:55:00

Danny Brickman

It's it's also it's a mindset. Yeah. And we got to.

00:16:55:00 - 00:17:23:04

Ian Bergman

Make sure philosophy it's a lot. But that is such a that's such a beautiful framing of philosophical differentiation. Right. Versus oh a positioning statement or a competitive slide in a pitch or, or whatever else. And so you're really grounding, if I understand it correctly, you're really grounding in this philosophical perspective and kind of a principle that change in development infrastructure, IT infrastructure, employment relationships is coming is the Gen Z phrase.

00:17:23:04 - 00:17:37:15

Ian Bergman

But people are working from different locations. They're pulling in new tools, and there's a new tool available every day. Right. And the security apparatus and the security system has to be able to adapt to that. Do I get that about right?

00:17:37:18 - 00:18:03:09

Danny Brickman

100%, 100%. And and it's also, you know, as always, just like creating those bridges between what security is trying to protect to how the organization is being operating and creating value. Right. In general. It's like the best analogy that I heard is that security is like a seatbelt, right? Like without a seatbelt, you will be scared to drive, like more than ten miles per hour, right?

00:18:03:12 - 00:18:06:05

Danny Brickman

With a seatbelt, you can drive faster.

00:18:06:07 - 00:18:06:22

Ian Bergman

Yeah.

00:18:06:24 - 00:18:28:29

Danny Brickman

And when innovation comes from the organization itself, like, you know, cloud adoption, AI adoption, you want to make sure you're doing it right, by the way. So and in that case, specifically not even advanced are like one of the two factors, if you need 2 or 3 factors is we need to keep our eyes on when it comes to this, like new, Gen Z era of, infrastructure.

00:18:29:01 - 00:19:08:19

Ian Bergman

You spent a lot of time in, like, national level, nation state level defense and nation state level security. And it strikes me that there's, in some ways, a number of parallels, right, to thinking about national security and organizational right. You have to deal with employees, citizens, whoever, kind of doing what they want going off the reservation. And you have to combine some freedoms and some preventative measures and restrictions and all of that good stuff can can you talk to me a little bit about how your time in the Army and how your time thinking about national level defense has informed your approach?

00:19:08:22 - 00:19:11:01

Ian Bergman

And, and the product that you're building.

00:19:11:03 - 00:19:32:00

Danny Brickman

Maybe specifically for me, the background for me and my co-founder background came from a specific unit that, had the characteristics of getting a problem that is not solvable, like, just like, you know, like, the highest ranks or like, even the Prime minister can come in and say, like, I want this. What is that like? It's not achievable.

00:19:32:00 - 00:19:59:09

Danny Brickman

Like it's it's impossible. Right. And then you're working for a year or sometimes more, sometimes two, sometimes three, just to figure out how to solve that problem. Right. And you're getting addicted to try and fail. Try and fail until it's become successful. Right. And obviously like this is like in many cases, why specifically the unit was like winning, like almost every year.

00:19:59:09 - 00:20:24:13

Danny Brickman

Like actually every year, these early defense prizes by the president because, like, the model was just like making, the impossible possible. Right. And with this mindset, with this, like, you know, failing and standing up, failing and standing up, it's it becomes much more, reasonable how to solve big problems. Right. And we're going after a big problem.

00:20:24:13 - 00:20:37:14

Danny Brickman

We're going after a huge problem, right after a huge market, a problem. And you fail a lot and it's painful. And I tell you, like, no matter how much you fail, it's always painful.

00:20:37:17 - 00:21:00:02

Ian Bergman

But when you fail in the world of security, in whatever, in whatever instance, you're using the word security. I think almost by definition, it's probably more painful. How do you like how do you think about balancing the iterative nature of sort of startup development with the fact that, you know, a failure can actually be very consequential, right.

00:21:00:04 - 00:21:06:04

Ian Bergman

Economically, physically, you know, life and safety, whatever it might be.

00:21:06:06 - 00:21:28:12

Danny Brickman

So this is where security becomes like the most tricky and hardest work. Yeah. I don't know if I would say, because unfortunately, all of us who are not measured about our success were measured about like how much we failed or didn't fail. And this is where the commitment of, like every good staff in security space is to make sure that like the baseline is always there, right?

00:21:28:12 - 00:21:52:03

Danny Brickman

The eyes are always open. It's like it's understanding, discovering, like explaining that in a good way. When I was addressing the failure, just a failure as a founder, failure of like doing mistakes during year like period of time, which all of us do. Right. But you need to have this core safety nets, if you will, when you're delivering a product or when you're receiving that from the security teams.

00:21:52:03 - 00:22:12:29

Danny Brickman

And right, you need to make sure you have the strategy. You need to make sure that even when you're failing right, you're like taking full responsibility, addressing that immediately and doing that job. And my suggestion to everyone in the world not to look at people in security, just like, say like, oh, you did that. Like those people doing the hardest job ever.

00:22:13:01 - 00:22:21:22

Danny Brickman

Yeah. Like I can sympathize with that because being on that side. But without that notion, just like it's very easy to just blame.

00:22:21:24 - 00:22:48:15

Ian Bergman

Well, and I, I actually think that's a very important bit of kind of empathy and compassion, but also it helps understand the business that you're in. Right? Because, you are, by definition, in an escalating arms race against of the unknown. And so how are you seeing in your world at Oasis Security? How are you seeing the threat landscape evolve?

00:22:48:15 - 00:23:06:05

Ian Bergman

Right. You talked about human identity. You're right. You pick up a pass, you scan somebody out of their Pin code or password. You're in. I think we can all wrap our head around that. Yeah. What's the non-human identity management threat landscape of the immediate future look like in your mind?

00:23:06:07 - 00:23:34:01

Danny Brickman

It will be. And it's already a huge gap and something that is so easy to to leverage. You know, like the simplest way to explain that, right? You have your own personal password in the organization. You will think twice before you're sharing your password with anyone in the organization. Sure. But let's assume I'm a developer and I have an access to a specific database and I need a help.

00:23:34:04 - 00:23:56:08

Danny Brickman

I would share it to my buddy easily, right? Like by slack or something like that. So security becomes like secondary to to to like to moving faster right. And this like imbalance situation needs to be solved. Right. We don't want to slow down. No. But we want to make it make sure that like we're doing it in a secured way.

00:23:56:11 - 00:24:24:19

Ian Bergman

And so to continue that that kind of analogy you're using. Right. I might share the database or API or data level access to the database with my buddy to help troubleshoot it. But in today's era, I might say, hey, can I plug this into an anthropic model or an open AI model? Or hey, maybe there's a tool that somebody just threw up on GitHub that is a bridge between the two and add some a genetic oversight.

00:24:24:19 - 00:24:33:17

Ian Bergman

And I might just connect to them, but not maybe think too hard about what's going on behind the scenes. Is that kind of where you're getting at?

00:24:33:19 - 00:24:34:20

Danny Brickman

Exactly.

00:24:34:23 - 00:24:51:23

Ian Bergman

Yeah. It it's, I it does sound like a new mental model for a lot of people. And it sounds like you and your team are trying to help your customers in the industry understand the problem as well. You just you launched a book for dummies recently. Is that right?

00:24:51:26 - 00:24:53:11

Danny Brickman

It's true.

00:24:53:13 - 00:25:11:06

Ian Bergman

Can you tell us tell us a bit about the book? Like, it takes it takes a lot of work to pull a piece of content into that formal of a construct. Right. So tell us what what drove you to write, non-human identity management for dummies? And what's been the reception in the few days that it's been out?

00:25:11:09 - 00:25:33:23

Danny Brickman

The reception is amazing because people are trying to put their hands around the problem. Right? Yeah. And like, what does it mean? Like, give us, like, a little bit of terminology, give us like, you know, like like everyone loves to say like 90% of the solution is just like identifying the problem. Right. And so having this discussion makes all of us as a community very engaged in solving that.

00:25:33:23 - 00:25:55:15

Danny Brickman

Right? Like taking up all of us out of this, out of this paralysis mode into like resolution mode. And I can tell you that, like our team in general, like in Oasis, not only committed to bringing the best product, but also helping to market a solution, understanding just like as we're speaking right now, like a week ago, our team also published an MFA bypass.

00:25:55:15 - 00:26:15:13

Danny Brickman

We call it earthquake, right? That like, we were working with Microsoft and resolving that. But the impact could be like 400 million of accounts being compromised. That could scale very simply. And this is like our research team from Israel was sitting and just like going through the through the authentication method that it was going there and find a flag there.

00:26:15:16 - 00:26:27:20

Danny Brickman

And we needed to highlight it pretty quickly. So to resolve that. So our mission is not, as I said, not only the product amazing product, but also have the all identity space to secure identities in a better way.

00:26:27:23 - 00:26:52:10

Ian Bergman

It's a big mission, but I think anyone's going to agree that it's an important one, and I think one where it's ripe for, well, let's just call it what it is innovation and a new way of thinking, you know, that comes with its own set of problems, right? Like when you are bringing in a novel lexicon, a novel framework, a novel way of thinking, or even just forcing people to go head on against what feels like a novel problem, right?

00:26:52:10 - 00:27:11:02

Ian Bergman

The scale of the non-human identity management. There's always going to be cultural resistance. There's always going to be, you know, kind of momentum and classic innovator's dilemma. I want to be careful here, Danny, because like you, you said earlier, oh, my customers feel the pain. And I don't just want to fall into the trap of being like.

00:27:11:02 - 00:27:28:12

Ian Bergman

No, they know this is a problem. Solving it for them. Where are the friction points in bringing Oasis security, or more broadly, this idea of non-human identity management into organizations? Is it just education as a culture? Is it process like there's always friction points, right?

00:27:28:14 - 00:27:51:21

Danny Brickman

We can take the analogy of autonomous cars, right. Like it's it's a change in mindset. Like does people trust that it will take time to trust, right. Something like that. This is the nature of of the mankind, right? Like it takes us time to trust it. Change. Try something new. And, you know, I'm always looking at the story of the iPhones, right?

00:27:51:21 - 00:28:01:08

Danny Brickman

And, like, I love looking at, like, iPhone four, because iPhone four was a transitional moment when, like, a lot of people were started looking at this. Yeah. I was like, well.

00:28:01:11 - 00:28:02:13

Ian Bergman

It's a platform now.

00:28:02:16 - 00:28:12:10

Danny Brickman

It's a platform now, right? And it's actually doing something better than the rest. And I had the Nokia's for many years.

00:28:12:12 - 00:28:25:05

Ian Bergman

I missed I'm not. Okay. So I worked on some of the ones that we shall not name in a collab between Microsoft and Nokia. I miss those devices, but, but but, I think that actually just amplifies the point you're about to make.

00:28:25:07 - 00:28:50:08

Danny Brickman

Yeah. And and it took us time to, to, to adjust ourself to that change of smartphones. Right. And I love it because it's, it just shows us how the mankind is just we need it to trust it, to see the value, to adjust to that. And it takes time. Everything takes time in life. It doesn't matter, right? Like even building good relationship with your partner or like your friend or whatever it is, it takes time because we're building trust.

00:28:50:08 - 00:28:56:23

Danny Brickman

We're getting to know it like we're seeing the value of that. We're seeing the mutual mutual value of that. Right. And only then which transition?

00:28:56:26 - 00:29:18:01

Ian Bergman

You kind of got me thinking about how it takes time to transition, but then you almost don't notice that it's happened. I think humanity is very good at taking the magical and making it banal and making it every day. Right. Like let's talk about self-driving cars. Like I, a disturbing number of my friends are just sort of like, oh yeah, that's cool.

00:29:18:01 - 00:29:31:15

Ian Bergman

Of course, there's a Waymo driving around. But but actually that comes with that comes with trust, right? To an extent, you're trying to get to a point of, of blasé banality because people trust the, the software. I think exactly.

00:29:31:17 - 00:29:40:09

Danny Brickman

100% in ten years people will be on the moon and everyone's like, yeah, it's basic, right? Yeah. No, it's not basic right now.

00:29:40:12 - 00:30:00:26

Ian Bergman

That actually. Okay, I'm not gonna lie, that actually drives me nuts. Like it's true. It's so true. It's human. But, like, it drives me nuts that we are living in the world that I, you know, read about in sci fi. As a kid growing up, right, in the kind of through the 90s. And, you know, you can just look around, you're like, of course.

00:30:00:27 - 00:30:11:21

Ian Bergman

Yeah, of course I can talk to my phone. And it responds in real time with things that are way smarter than I ever knew. Like, of course, spotting magic.

00:30:11:23 - 00:30:34:20

Danny Brickman

I've always loved looking at that back to the future movie. Like, I'm always like reviewing that again and again and again. And there's some things that I'm saying, like, wow, you see, we still don't have over boards and we still don't have like those small meals that we put in the microwave and then become a big meals. But I'm saying there was a lot of things that were thinking of like futuristic and like, right now we're just like, it's yeah, sure.

00:30:34:22 - 00:30:54:28

Ian Bergman

And, you know, it is interesting. I think a lot of the, the sci fi that required some kind of like breakthrough or magic in, in physics, I think is maybe a little farther away than a lot of the more computational stuff. But I, I hold out hope for anti-gravity and hoverboards. But it does bring us back to, you know, this idea that actually.

00:30:54:28 - 00:31:18:03

Ian Bergman

Yeah. Like, let's, let's, let's talk about sci fi. The threat side of sci fi doesn't always come up right. And back to the future, right? The the negative consequences of these technologies doesn't always come up. And so I think it's it's it's comforting to think about people working hard to secure all of these new tools that are, that are in our hands.

00:31:18:05 - 00:31:33:00

Ian Bergman

But in some ways, it actually feels a little less trod in the public mindset. Right? Like we get the magic, but you don't get the the common sense of the work required to make sure that these new tools can't be used against us easily.

00:31:33:03 - 00:31:58:07

Danny Brickman

Sure that it's it is. And it's always the challenge, right? Like we don't know like we're sometimes we're innovating. We don't know what we do. Right? Like when we're doing something in the organization bringing like new models, like new AI tools, like we're just like super excited about the value to be created. We want to be like, you know, surprising our boss or like our organization that we forgot that there's like a huge element of risk that we're putting in place.

00:31:58:10 - 00:32:13:08

Danny Brickman

Right? Yeah. And but we don't want to remove this excitement. Oh, no. We want everyone to be excited when they're innovating. We want everyone to do some great stuff. We just want to make sure that like, you know, we're guiding it, right. We're doing it in a proper way.

00:32:13:10 - 00:32:27:22

Ian Bergman

Well, how do you how do you keep that level of excitement up in your own company and perhaps also with your sort of customer and partner set? Right, like building a startup is stressful, cybersecurity stressful. So how do you maintain that excitement and energy?

00:32:27:29 - 00:32:37:13

Danny Brickman

I can tell you a personal story that I had, there's a beautiful album, that is called Moon Safari by the band Eric.

00:32:37:15 - 00:32:39:12

Ian Bergman

Okay.

00:32:39:14 - 00:32:58:18

Danny Brickman

A French electronic band. And like, I was listening to that in through, like, different periods of my life, right? Like, good, bad, ugly. Oh, like, I like every song represents, like some piece of my personal history. Right. And I've been on their show. They were performing that whole album here in New York, and I just like threw the show.

00:32:58:18 - 00:33:15:21

Danny Brickman

It was just a crew member each and every one of the moments of my life, and it was again good, bad and ugly. But at the end of the show, I was so happy. I was just like, was so thankful for everything that I've been through. Good, bad and ugly, right? And I'm taking this analogy to to the startup world, right?

00:33:15:23 - 00:33:39:15

Danny Brickman

We have like ups and downs, ugly days, bad days, good days, all the time. As long as we're remembering that we're on a journey, and a journey has it and we're like eyes open on like the good, bad and ugly. And we can survive that with very optimist way of looking forward, right. The chapter that we're going through right now, we'll close it and we'll look back and say like it was amazing.

00:33:39:17 - 00:33:43:00

Danny Brickman

It was like it was such an excitement to feel those feelings.

00:33:43:02 - 00:33:56:21

Ian Bergman

And what do you want that legacy to be when you close this chapter and you kind of look back, do you? There's obviously an emotional context, but is there some kind of other objective context or legacy that you're working towards?

00:33:56:24 - 00:34:21:02

Danny Brickman

So I'm afraid of thinking about the legacy that I'm leaving behind. It's it's something that like if if you're defining that, you're kind of like sometimes losing the purpose. It's just like, you know, like, like quantum physics, right? And you open up the box, it is like 0 or 1, right? But when the box is close, it's like it's all this motion in play, and you can build a lot of great things with that.

00:34:21:02 - 00:34:38:13

Danny Brickman

Right? So I don't want to open that box. I want to just make sure that the values that we're driving forward, the beliefs like, like the transformation that we're bringing every day is present and that we can enjoy the present. We can enjoy the past. But most most importantly, we can be excited about the future all the time.

00:34:38:15 - 00:34:57:24

Ian Bergman

No, genuinely. Thank you for sharing that. I mean, I think it's a powerful mindset and everybody's got their own approach, but that you mean you come across as an optimist, you're a future oriented optimist or like despite working in kind of risk mitigation, risk management and threat assessment? And I think you can accomplish a lot with that if you're okay with it.

00:34:57:24 - 00:35:07:10

Ian Bergman

I'd love to get into, another little segment and maybe just learning a little bit more about who you are as we start to, as we start to wrap the episode. Are you okay playing a little game with me?

00:35:07:12 - 00:35:08:11

Danny Brickman

Sure.

00:35:08:14 - 00:35:21:17

Ian Bergman

All right. I'm just going to. It's a rapid fire question game. I'm going to ask you a rapid fire question. Please answer as quickly as you can. And then maybe some of these. We'll talk about some good sounds good. I'm going to start with an easy one. Maybe a really easy one because you talked about the iPhone four.

00:35:21:19 - 00:35:43:23

Ian Bergman

You're an Apple or Android guy or Apple. Apple okay. So I won't hold my Samsung up and get in a fight with you this time. But we all have to fall into our own tribes and camps. Yes. What about, for getaways? Are you more of a beach guy or a mountain guy? Oh.

00:35:43:26 - 00:35:45:28

Danny Brickman

No. I'm both. I'm sorry.

00:35:46:00 - 00:35:51:06

Ian Bergman

Oh, you can't split that line. Are you kidding me? If I had to force you to choose,

00:35:51:08 - 00:35:58:12

Danny Brickman

All right. I'm. I'm a beach guy, but just because I surf, so, like, it's kind of like I have this this drive in me for that.

00:35:58:15 - 00:36:03:29

Ian Bergman

That's a good reason to have, Do you have a favorite break?

00:36:04:01 - 00:36:11:18

Danny Brickman

I love the California one. But it's tricky for the. Because I'm not from California, so. Yeah, it's it's sometimes.

00:36:11:20 - 00:36:15:08

Ian Bergman

You're a ways away. It's a, it's a long way to travel with the board.

00:36:15:11 - 00:36:16:20

Danny Brickman

Yes, exactly.

00:36:16:23 - 00:36:25:09

Ian Bergman

You're you're an optimist and you're curious are you know, are you more of a space tech guy or an ocean tech guy? What excites you the most?

00:36:25:11 - 00:36:27:00

Danny Brickman

Ocean.

00:36:27:02 - 00:36:29:08

Ian Bergman

Okay, tell me more about that.

00:36:29:10 - 00:36:52:17

Danny Brickman

When you're surfing. Foreign, foreign, off time. You understand? You cannot resist the ocean. You got to be, like, in synergy with with the ocean. You cannot be doing things that you want to do if the ocean is disagreeing with you. And mentally, I think you're just like, it's the best. It's the best feeling in the world to to feel this synergy with the ocean.

00:36:52:19 - 00:36:55:21

Danny Brickman

That's just like, I cannot just I cannot explain that.

00:36:55:24 - 00:37:12:22

Ian Bergman

Okay, I'll I'll take it though. That's, it's kind of it's it's beautiful imagery and it's it's true. There's also there's synergy, but there's a sense of, helplessness is probably the wrong word, but like, you kind of have to go with it because it's the ocean.

00:37:12:24 - 00:37:13:28

Danny Brickman

Exactly.

00:37:14:01 - 00:37:23:12

Ian Bergman

There's actually something comforting in that. You get to, you get to give up a little bit of your agency in a way to, do it to a massive force.

00:37:23:14 - 00:37:24:17

Danny Brickman

Exactly.

00:37:24:19 - 00:37:44:03

Ian Bergman

Okay, I like it. Well, and you're allowed to think about this one for just a second, then is there someone who has been very inspirational to you in your personal or professional life? Could be a famous innovator or famous person like, you know, who who has really inspired you that you think others should learn from?

00:37:44:05 - 00:38:09:16

Danny Brickman

Well, I wish that many people could learn from, like my relationship with my parents. Right. I think there like, few musicians, famous musicians that I'm like. I think they're like, like incredible innovators and incredible, like, changers. Like, I don't know, everyone can speak about Zeppelin or the Beatles, but like, at the end of the day, like it's it's, you know what?

00:38:09:17 - 00:38:34:23

Danny Brickman

Let's take the Beatles as an example. I wouldn't say that. Like, they're definitely in my top ten, right? Those folks were like, innovating music. Yeah, they were like like, you know, going through challenges and they're only and like partnerships and like bringing their own talent, like, to the front and creating music that nobody heard before. Right. And still, like, if you ask many people around the world, they would say, like, the Beatles is like my one of my favorite ones, right?

00:38:34:28 - 00:38:57:27

Ian Bergman

Yeah. I mean, you know what, 60 years later and and to your point, you know, it it wasn't immediate for them. They pushed through a lot of resistance and not the generational like, oh, we all hate the kids music resistance. Right. They pushed through like kind of institutional forces and what music should be. I think that's great.

00:38:57:27 - 00:39:08:14

Ian Bergman

I think it's, it's a less common answer to think about, you know, music, great musicians. But yeah, I think there's a lot of the best art is innovative. Whether or not it was recognized at the time.

00:39:08:16 - 00:39:09:13

Danny Brickman

Exactly.

00:39:09:16 - 00:39:36:11

Ian Bergman

It's amazing. Okay, well, we're coming up to the end here, but I'm curious to just get a little bit back more in sort of your professional domain. What really excites you in tech right now? Is there something I don't know if you're a gadget guy, but like, is it if it's AI? But like what? You know what? What excites you and makes you optimistic for the future?

00:39:36:14 - 00:39:51:17

Danny Brickman

It's not in the tech itself. It's more in the culture that we're confronting right now. Right. So there's obviously a lot of complaints about like the new generation of kids and like how they're like attached to their phones and like this kind of stuff.

00:39:51:19 - 00:39:52:17

Ian Bergman

Yeah.

00:39:52:19 - 00:40:11:10

Danny Brickman

But from the other hand, I think I'm personally learning a lot from like, the new generation that is coming because they're thinking out of the box now, like 12 years old, and they're thinking out of the box. And both things that we are not used to, they're like instrumented think out of the box. They're instrumented to think differently.

00:40:11:12 - 00:40:11:20

Ian Bergman

All the.

00:40:11:20 - 00:40:36:20

Danny Brickman

Time to be exposed. So yes, there are challenges. Like there is like like every generation has challenges. But I think that like the hunger for like new novel, like something better, stronger, more interesting, right? It's pushing all of us to this. Like new and exciting place and like, you know, eyes is everyone is talking about it's at the end of the day, it's just, what do we do with this technology, right?

00:40:36:23 - 00:40:53:23

Danny Brickman

Yeah. How do we like, use it. Right. And today there's less hesitation, less fear. People are just like getting into that and just like driving that something that like 70 years ago, eight years ago, we didn't have like the change was very slow. And today's change is like it's it's incredible.

00:40:53:25 - 00:41:12:28

Ian Bergman

It is. And you know. Oh man I have so much on this. But it is incredible. And I love to hear you say that. It's, it's actually really fascinating. I you can trace back angst about the pace of change in society in the world. I mean honestly to the, to the dawn of recorded history and humanity, it's really wild.

00:41:13:01 - 00:41:38:01

Ian Bergman

But you can also, objectively measure it and you can realize that the angst that people felt around generational change, like changes that was taking 40, 50, 60 years, basically, or hundreds of years in some cases, all the way up until the Industrial Revolution. You know, like is it feels a little different than the angst around the change that's happening.

00:41:38:01 - 00:41:55:06

Ian Bergman

Sub decade sub. Yeah. And not being able to predict what the world is going to look like in 12, 24, 36 months, right? I, I, I don't know, I think that's really exciting. But, you know, I did you might get a kick out of this. I did a little analysis a while ago of like, just how long did it take to communicate back and forth like one ping?

00:41:55:07 - 00:42:13:29

Ian Bergman

One? What was the latency of one ping of communication back and forth for the last kind of 500 years? And as you can imagine, it went from a bunch of weeks down to email and fax and phones and all that good stuff. But we kind of reached an inflection point round about now or a year or two ago when it actually went negative.

00:42:14:01 - 00:42:34:07

Ian Bergman

As in, you can reasonably predict what somebody's going to say to you and generate an answer in advance based on data. And that's a lot of what has been happening recently with, customer organizational communications. And to me, that, I don't know, that hit me. That was like, whoa, what kind of unknown world are we in?

00:42:34:10 - 00:42:56:15

Danny Brickman

Oh, well, this is like a philosophical topic of the era that we're entering to that like, our way to predict is stronger than, like, our way to to actually to live, to see this reaction. Right? Like when. But but but it's also natural, right? Like sometimes when you're enough time with a person. Right. You know how we will react.

00:42:56:18 - 00:43:17:11

Danny Brickman

So you don't do it and you're actually building something more beautiful together, like for example, with your spouse or your partner or like it's you're like building something that is like, feels unnatural, but you understand each other. You don't need to ask the question. You already know the answer. So you're like proactively acting to build something better. So it's actually a very positive thing that's.

00:43:17:11 - 00:43:37:15

Ian Bergman

Actually really interesting. It's another catalyst and drive well, I wish we could argue about this a little, but I think we're really in fundamental agreement. Like, I, I was at a, a discussion about a week ago with some VCs and startups and a bunch of folks basically talking about AI employees in the enterprise. And we were, you know, a bunch of debating back and forth stuff.

00:43:37:15 - 00:44:00:04

Ian Bergman

But one of the things I shared there, which is true, is that this is the first time where I have ever felt a lack of confidence that I was in touch in what tech is and is going to be over the next few years. And I don't know how much of that is dating myself. Right. Because, you know, I've got some young kids.

00:44:00:04 - 00:44:09:26

Ian Bergman

I'm, you know, there's an up and coming generation and how much of that is the pace of change? But it is a interesting combination of exciting and scary for me.

00:44:09:28 - 00:44:27:03

Danny Brickman

But at the end of the day, this is like it's just like the famous phrase of like, you know, if you want to make God laugh, tell him about your plans for tomorrow. So, so it's kind of like we need to in a way accept that. And it's actually exciting. It's just it's a journey. It's a real journey right now.

00:44:27:03 - 00:44:28:10

Danny Brickman

There's no limits.

00:44:28:12 - 00:44:34:18

Ian Bergman

There are no limits. There's you give yourself. You give yourself to the ocean. And there are no limits.

00:44:34:20 - 00:44:37:28

Danny Brickman

Exactly. Saying enjoy the moment.

00:44:38:00 - 00:44:55:25

Ian Bergman

Well, that is a wonderful note, actually, to wrap up on, Danny, I want to say thank you for joining us on Innovators Inside. This has been a lot of fun. I have one final question for you, and that is for folks who want to stay in touch, where should they go? Are you on LinkedIn? Do you have a website?

00:44:55:25 - 00:45:00:21

Ian Bergman

Where should they look to, follow the journey of Danny Brookman and Oasis Security.

00:45:00:23 - 00:45:14:04

Danny Brickman

On all the fronts? Obviously they can go to Oasis Dot security. Find me on LinkedIn. Any way to communicate? Like everything is open channels. So like, I'm excited for, like, connecting with more people.

00:45:14:07 - 00:45:24:01

Ian Bergman

Amazing. Well, again, Danny, thank you so much for joining me. It's been an absolute pleasure. And I hope you have a chance to get to enjoy the rest of your evening.

00:45:24:04 - 00:45:25:14

Danny Brickman

And thank you very much for having me.