Last-minute opportunities often lead to the most exciting discoveries, and that’s exactly what happened when I got the chance to speak with Jeff Reich about the upcoming Identity Week Americas and SIDI HUB Summit.
Guest: Jeff Reich, Executive Director, Identity Defined Security Alliance [@idsalliance]
On LinkedIn | https://www.linkedin.com/in/jreich/
On Twitter | https://twitter.com/JeffReichCSO
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Hosts:
Sean Martin, Co-Founder at ITSPmagazine [@ITSPmagazine] and Host of Redefining CyberSecurity Podcast [@RedefiningCyber]
On ITSPmagazine | https://www.itspmagazine.com/sean-martin
Marco Ciappelli, Co-Founder at ITSPmagazine [@ITSPmagazine] and Host of Redefining Society Podcast
On ITSPmagazine | https://www.itspmagazine.com/itspmagazine-podcast-radio-hosts/marco-ciappelli
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Episode Notes
Welcome to this pre-event episode of On Location, where we’re diving into what’s to come at Identity Week Americas, happening September 11th and 12th, 2024, at the Washington Convention Center in D.C. Although I won’t be on-site, Jeff—who leads the Identity Defined Security Alliance (IDSA)—gave me the inside scoop on why this event is one you can’t afford to miss.
Our conversation ranges from the critical role of digital identities and payments, to the pressing challenges facing the identity landscape today. Jeff shared insights on the panels he’ll be participating in, like Interoperable Digital Identities and The Future of Payments, giving a preview of the big discussions that will take place at the event.
We even touched on more serious global issues, such as the plight of refugees who lack identification, and how Identity Week is working toward solutions that can have a real impact. On top of that, the SIDI HUB Summit will run alongside the event, focusing on creating a standardized, globally recognized digital identity system.
With Identity Week happening across multiple continents—from the Americas to Europe and Asia—the need for international collaboration has never been clearer. Jeff’s vision for a globally interoperable identity system is ambitious, but the starting point is simple: practical steps like multi-factor authentication and building awareness about identity security.
As we look forward to the event, Jeff also mentioned that there might still be some passes available for those interested in attending. Whether you’re in the public sector, tech, or simply passionate about identity solutions, this event is your chance to get involved in shaping the future.
Stay tuned for more coverage, and thanks for joining me on this pre-event journey as we explore what’s in store at Identity Week Americas.
Be sure to follow our Coverage Journey and subscribe to our podcasts!
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Resources
Learn more about Identity Week USA 2024: https://itspm.ag/identinwxn
SIDI Hub: https://sidi-hub.community/
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Learning about Identity Week Americas and SIDI HUB Summit | An Identity Week USA 2024 Conversation with Jeff Reich | On Location Coverage with Sean Martin and Marco Ciappelli
Please note that this transcript was created using AI technology and may contain inaccuracies or deviations from the original audio file. The transcript is provided for informational purposes only and should not be relied upon as a substitute for the original recording, as errors may exist. At this time, we provide it “as it is,” and we hope it can be helpful for our audience.
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00:00:52] Marco Ciappelli: Hello,
everybody. Welcome to an on location coverage, which is, as you know, if you read on the page where we talk about our on location coverage, we may be there, we may be not. Sometimes it's virtual, sometimes it's before, sometimes it's before, during, and after. This one is a last minute decision to do this because Jeff poked me a little bit, uh, because it, I didn't add it on the calendar, this one.
There are so many events going out there and Sean and I are trying to do all we can to, to cover everything, but it's impossible. But I'm glad that Jeff Rich did that. And, uh, and then now we're here having a chat, which we did a few months ago. We ended up talking about identity. We ended up talking about Pink Floyd, so I have to, I have to throw that out there.
I think it's a common passion in the musical world. That's, that and probably something else, but we're not here to talk about Pink Floyd, although feel free to quote it, Jeff, anytime you want.
[00:01:56] Jeff Reich: Sometimes you can't stop it.
[00:02:00] Marco Ciappelli: Absolutely, that's true. Anyway, I know that people that watch this show and listen to this show know who you are, but I would like to start with a little refresher on who is Jeff Reach.
And sorry, by the way, we're going to be talking about an event that is coming up in September that also has an event in within the event, but you will explain it a little bit better. So let's start with you and then we move on on the on the event we're covering today.
[00:02:34] Jeff Reich: Thanks, Marco. I'll be brief talking about because I've done a bunch of things, but I'm the leader.
I lead the Identity Defined Security Alliance right now, which is a non profit, uh, member based That's focused on raising the level of identity security and awareness around that. And that goes everywhere from what you do on your phone to what identity means around the world. And when we talk about the event, I think you'll see what that means more.
[00:03:03] Marco Ciappelli: Yeah. So, identity, and we talked about that on the past episode, which I think people should listen. Identity is pretty much Involved in almost anything that we that we do in the real life, in the virtual life, when we we are on computers, we are on our phone. And of course, when we move from one country to another, and we use our passport, and I mean, it's really about Who we are, or at least who can we, can we kind of prove that we are who we are?
I think we can summarize it a little bit like that. And, uh, the, the, the event we're talking about is Identity Week, which is going to happen September 11 and 12, 2024. So it's coming up. Very, very quick. And Jeff happened to do a couple of things there, right? So you're going to be talking there, presenting, and you're also running a City Hub event in within the main event.
So tell us a little bit more about
[00:04:08] Jeff Reich: that. Sure, I'm happy to. And thanks again for the opportunity. Uh, I'm going to start with talking about Identity Week. Now, this is an event that, um, occurs in, in the EU. It occurs, well, technically the UK, I guess, for the EU as well. It occurs in the Americas and in Asia.
And the Americas event is, uh, September 11th 12th in, at the Washington Convention Center in D. C. I'm going to be speaking on two panels on the 11th of September. for listening. The first one is Interoperable Digital Identities and I'm going to bookmark that for a minute because I'm going to be talking about what that means more in just a minute with the other event that we mentioned.
In the future of payments, uh, I actually had someone address a question to me saying, what does identity have to do with the future of payments? And, and I asked a question with the exception of you taking cash out of your wallet and handing it to someone for a service. And sometimes you have to find people that can actually still do that, right?
And I'm okay with that because I rarely do it, if at all. If you're doing anything other than that, you have to identify yourself. You have to log into Venmo. You have to log into Apple Pay or whatever it is you're using. You have to identify yourself with whether it's a face ID or an ID and a password.
Whatever it's going to be. Thumbprint. You have to identify yourself. Now that's a simple form of payment. Let's get down to, and, and I've done some consulting work in the past where an organization sent an invoice to their, one of their largest customers. And the response they got back was, we already paid this.
Whoops. And they were very surprised. This was, this wasn't a 50 invoice. This was six digits, seven digits, pardon me, of, of revenue that they were expecting. And when they looked into it, they found out that the invoice that their customer paid Was an invoice that looked a lot like theirs, and it looked like it came from their email account, even though it didn't.
But the bank information they gave to say, you know, why are your money here, was a bank in the People's Republic of China. So, that money was gone. With a SWIFT transaction, sometimes you can get something back within 72 hours, but this is well past that. Couple weeks past it. And they blamed it on their IT system.
And an IT system would have fixed it, would not have fixed this, because you didn't know who you were dealing with, and they didn't know who they were dealing with. So identity and payments, there's just one example. Identity and payments is crucially important, and we don't have a consistent way of establishing trust.
for identity when you're making payments like that. So I'll be talking about probably that example and then some others about what identity and payments really means going forward. Um, I'm going to give one other quick example of that. Refugees, and there are a number, a measurable percentage of the world's population right now are refugees.
It's more, you know, it's more than just like less than one percent. Refugees often have a challenge of saying, I don't really have a country. I don't really have any form of true identification, but I want to come here, I mean, being given refugee status, I want to work, I want to establish a bank account.
They can't do it. Because they can't identify who they are. So when I said it goes from something on your phone to worldwide I think I just gave a pretty good description of what identity really means nowadays for us and that's only going to increase
[00:07:56] Marco Ciappelli: Jeff, can I ask you a question on the one that I mean the second one is very relevant because we're talking about people that are they need to restart a life and they need to to be able to to recreate and it's hard to say again, are you just like a I mean, who are you really in that case?
That's, that's a big question, but somehow you need to be able to identify this person and say, you know, now you can move on with your life and rebuild something. But the one before, the way you describe it, and the pointing the finger to IT, I mean, is that, and I, is, was that like, I mean, some to me is considered like efficient.
Type of operation there. So, you know, how do an identity proof can can get in between being phished and Manipulated into taking the action and say wait a minute. You got you're getting you're getting punked here
[00:08:59] Jeff Reich: Yeah, so exactly so you asked the right question. It's not who are you? It's who are you?
That's what you ask and that's the that's the right adverb to put on it So when I was with this organization, they said, what can we do to fix this? Because what happened, it was a form of phishing called business email compromise, where someone created a domain name with one letter that looks similar, but was different.
And they were able to get ahold of one of their invoices, which in all honesty, isn't that hard to do. And they made it, they copied it. So they created an invoice that looked the same, that came from a domain name that looked pretty close to it, and anyone not paying attention, which is all of us at any given time, said, fine, you know, I approve this, go process it for payment.
And from then on, it was considered valid. Right? So, when I was asked, what technology can we put in place? to prevent this. And I said, well, there's two things you can do. First of all, the phone still works. You could ensure that, um, because the question was, where's the risk? Who really has to pay for the millions of dollars that was lost?
Because they want to know, could they really charge their, their customer now? Which was their choice? Of course, they were going to lose that customer if they did. So the most simple thing is to ensure that every customer can validate before they make a payment to call you if you want. That's a, you know, bottom line, everyone has a capability.
Not every customer is going to want to do that. You could also state to every customer in notices and reinforce that this is our banking information. We will, anytime that we need to change that, you will get an authorized, whether it's a certified mail or something on our website that says our banking information is changing.
So what that would have done, by the way, with minimal effort, would have at least put the responsibility back on the payer, on the customer, where it needs to be to begin with. And then it's a matter of educating customers to say, what does phishing mean? What do you need to look for? You could just validate that, um, your, uh, your accounts payable department.
Never makes a payment that doesn't go to a domain name that you already pre registered with your vendor. Like if, if it was IDSA. org and the domain name was anything else, don't pay it.
[00:11:31] Marco Ciappelli: Right. It's kind of like a two multifactor or, or.
[00:11:35] Jeff Reich: Exactly. So it's, it's, it's difficult as it is, you know, as expensive as it can be.
In many cases, there are simple solutions to it. Now there are more complex long term automated solutions, certainly. And but I would start with a simple because you could do it now
[00:11:51] Marco Ciappelli: So let me connect this because i'm sure i'm going to have you back on redefining society We can talk more about this as a societal impact, uh level because you know, it touches even the refugees it touches border control it touch a lot of things, uh These events like security identity week You it's not just for government or just for enterprise.
I mean, it's kind of like trying to put together You Different players because and I'm reconnecting to how do we manage this if we don't all agree on some kind of And way to secure each other's business or each other border, each other country, and everybody does whatever it wants. I think, I think they're kind of like in a far West, which we may, may be where we are now.
I don't know. I'm probably exaggerating, but the importance of putting people together. Yeah, but
[00:12:48] Jeff Reich: the
[00:12:49] Marco Ciappelli: importance of putting people together in conference that involved government, enterprise, developer, and all the people that are in the cybersecurity space.
[00:13:01] Jeff Reich: So what Identity Week does is brings all those parties together and then some, because there are, there are, there's a vendor expo floor as well.
So you're going to get some, solutions from vendors where they're going to say, here's how we can solve that either for you or with you. Um, and, and the vendors are going to be fine, but I offer caution because anytime someone says buy you this one thing, like it's kind of like the clickbait, you know, this one trick will solve all your problems.
Just be, be aware. It might not.
[00:13:30] Marco Ciappelli: It's the easy button. People want it.
[00:13:31] Jeff Reich: Yes, exactly. Uh, but the panelists and the speakers there are going to give real life examples like I just did of here's what's going on. So. Start, um, expanding your awareness and knowing what you can address and what you know you need technology for.
Go talk to the vendors about what's out there. I would offer never buy a solution until you really know what your problem is. So, define it for yourself, get that awareness, and go see what solutions are there. So all the right people are in the same space for a couple of days at Identity Week. Now, one thing Identity Week is doing, and I really, uh, we really appreciate this, is I'm also a member of another community called CD hub, which is the sustainable and interoperable digital identity hub.
And we are a collection of some government people, um, some commercial, a lot of nonprofits like IDSA that are focused on what can we do to start normalizing what identity means so that when you do the example, you used Miracle. When we get to the point where you can have a digital identity in your digital wallet on your phone, you can present that at a border and say, this is who I am, and there's a, and that border agent will trust it and trust you just like they do with a passport today.
Mm-Hmm. that is coming in our future. The challenge you, you referred to though, is the US may say, well, here's how we're going to do it. And if France says, well, here's how we're gonna do it. And then if Australia says, well, we're doing it this way. It doesn't work.
[00:15:10] Marco Ciappelli: Mm hmm.
[00:15:10] Jeff Reich: So we want to find a way to normalize all that and it's more than just passports.
It's banking with refugees. It's cross border issues. It's data transfers, all of that. We want to find a way to normalize and standardize that through the standards organizations. And I'm guessing at some day it'll end up probably being a UN level treaty just like The, um, treaties that exist now for passport acceptance at some time in the future, but without the vision, we're never going to, we don't know which steps to take.
Uh, I believe that's going to get there. Now, CD hub is meeting the day before identity and identity week is hosting us. They're giving us facilities and we really do appreciate that. And we are bringing in people from different governments, from different countries, uh, different continents, uh, to address this.
We've had summits in the past in Paris, in Berlin, in Cape town. We have D. C. coming up, we have Japan coming up in October, and then after the first of the year, we'll be in Brazil. So we're doing these summits around the world because this is not A, a technology only problem, and it's not a US and the EU only problem.
This is a worldwide thing we need to address, and the only way to do that is to, to include the world.
[00:16:30] Marco Ciappelli: I couldn't agree more because as you know, I'm not the cybersecurity guy. I just happen to talk about cybersecurity in the, in the societal context. So I look more of pol politics and sociology and. What you just said about identity I can say is cyber security in general, right?
I mean, how do I know where this attack comes from? How do I know? How do I put a label on it? How do I attribute? The, the, the, the cyber crime, where is it coming from? Who is doing it? There's no border. And when you, when you talk about the border, the real one, again, if you, if we want to live in a global economy and community, we all need to agree.
It's, it's that simple, right? You can't just do your own rule or we go back to the walls, uh, the city States and, uh, you know, you gotta know the password to enter the city. Um, Yeah, and then you go in,
[00:17:27] Jeff Reich: and everyone that's outside doesn't know what happened to you when you're in there, so. Um, yeah, no, you're absolutely right.
We need to, and this is a societal issue as well. This is not a technology issue at all. The technology will help solve it, but it's not a technology issue. And the point you brought up is, who's attacking me and where is this coming from? When we get to the point both for human and non human entities, I'm talking about computers and chips and programs.
Once we can have a validated way of identifying every entity, then the only ones that are doing the attacking are the ones that can't be identified. And, and just think about how much easier it's going to be to ignore and block them when that happens.
[00:18:12] Marco Ciappelli: That's, that's a really simple, intuitive, and yet not much common sense point, right?
I mean, like, if you, if that's what helps always every crime or what you think that is the fact that they, they, you know, Can one try to get away with it without knowing, you know, it could be a mask when you rob a bank in You know years and years ago or in the movies that you still see or you just do the same thing You're you're you're masquerading yourself and you're disguising yourself, but you're doing virtually.
So is there a Is there a solution right now for it? It's a more a political.
[00:18:58] Jeff Reich: So this is a complex, this is a complex situation. All right. And very complex situations rarely have a solution early on in the process. We are still, this is a nascent process we're in. Even the EU, which is leading the world, in my opinion, right now on regulations for what digital identity means and what a personal identity has to, what components have to be there and everything else.
And even they are not even close to a compliance state yet. And they're in front. Australia is pretty close behind them. So we're early on in the process. So I hesitate to say that there's a solution today. There is a solution. And of course, when a solution is put in place, there will be people that undo it as well.
Just like that's how crime works, right? But, um, but the solution starts with that thing between your ears. Because in the same way that You know, uh, uh, a misdirected multi million dollar payment could have been prevented is the same way that you identify phishing or a border agent could determine what a false identification document is.
It's using your head, knowing the, knowing the experience that you have and applying current state to what you're dealing with. And as we advance in technology and we know where we want to be. That current state will evolve. So I know that's a very vague long answer to you. Is there a solution? The answer isn't quite no, but it's also not yet,
[00:20:35] Marco Ciappelli: right?
I think my my point was more like from the technological tools perspective I'm assuming There are solutions but to put everybody together It takes time So what you said before, it's not just one solution that has an easy, but it's probably in a togetherness of different technology, right?
[00:21:01] Jeff Reich: If that one solution actually existed, I'd be on a, um, successful, um, startup launch podcast.
So, um, but there are good solutions out there, but they are solutions that are components. They aren't the solution to the problem and maybe that's where the difference is in your question, right? There are solutions out there that are good components to what you need. That's a good point And and just by the way, one other thing you mentioned multi factor authentication is a It's an almost easy general housekeeping, good step solution.
[00:21:40] Marco Ciappelli: For sure. So let's, let's wrap this on location, which we try to keep into the 20 minutes or whatever, a few minutes more or less. Um, And a call to action for people to get involved, especially, I mean, I know Identity Week, it's, I'm looking here at the website, they got 250 speakers, more than 4, 000 attendees, exhibitors, 250, 100 startups, which is a good thing.
And so it's, it's a real conference. And, um, And then there is your, your city hub, which is also important. So, uh, you got a couple of minutes, uh, to kind of wrap up what's coming, uh, in a few days. So,
[00:22:26] Jeff Reich: if, if, if you have an interest in this and you want to be involved in either your city hub or, uh, Identity week.
I think I may have some passes that expire soon, um, but if you're interested in either and want to attend, let me know. I'll make sure I get to Marco the contact information for me. We'd like to include you. Just keep in mind, we're not looking for vendors to sell their solutions there. Should, should you come in and want to do that, we'll probably And then, uh, close the door.
It's a little
[00:22:56] Marco Ciappelli: too, it's a little too late for that.
[00:22:57] Jeff Reich: Yeah, but if, as long as you want to participate, especially working, supporting your governments, and, and how we can normalize this, Let us know for CDHUB. I still have, I think, a couple passes for Identity Week, as I said, um, that I'm happy to get with you.
Everyone can get to the Expo for free, but the pass I have gets you into all the conference events as well. Um, love to see people there, and it doesn't end there, by the way. You know, there are a lot of activities going on. CDHUB is going to continue. From an IDSA perspective, you know, we are starting to ramp up planning for our next identity management day, which is April 8th.
I had to put back that plug in.
[00:23:37] Marco Ciappelli: Yeah. Also a reminder for me to actually have a conversation with you about this.
[00:23:41] Jeff Reich: Yes. It's just, it's just yet another opportunity. And there's always membership with IDSA that can keep you, um, continuously involved in where we're going with the identity evolution.
[00:23:53] Marco Ciappelli: Yeah, it's an important conversation.
That's why I, I, I got your, uh, I got your knock on the door and, and I'm happy to, you know, invite you on the mic beside the fact that I always enjoy Chatting with you and sometimes even online on LinkedIn, we, we poke at our passion for music and, uh, you know, another, another thing. And, and I remember in the last conversation, we said that we were going to talk about your broadcasting past and, uh, and, uh, you know, I would still like to, to, to talk about that.
[00:24:26] Jeff Reich: Well, that's something we can do one day. I'll, I'll, I'll share with you. My air name was Sonny Richards.
[00:24:31] Marco Ciappelli: There you go. Okay.
[00:24:32] Jeff Reich: It comes across easier. It was a long time ago. It was back when my voice still worked really well.
[00:24:38] Marco Ciappelli: I think it still does. You're a great storyteller. So, you know, there's room for that conversation as well.
Like I said, I always enjoy talking to you and this was an excuse and it definitely a great topic to present, of course, Identity and, uh, Identity Week America and the City Hub. And as you mentioned, people can get in touch with you. Um, I will put in the note for this podcast or in YouTube, if you're watching, a way to get in touch with Jeff and links to the events and, uh, get involved.
That's the most important thing. We need people to get involved as Jeff said, from everywhere around the world, because it's not something you're going to win as an individual, uh, or one entity.
[00:25:23] Jeff Reich: Yep, we all need to be there. Marco, thank you very much. It's always a pleasure being on here and always, always a pleasure talking.
[00:25:29] Marco Ciappelli: I always enjoy it myself. And everybody else stay tuned. There's many more coverage and interesting conversation coming from where this came from and uh, that's it. Till the next one. Thank you, Jeff. Thank you so much. Thank you, Marco.