Private Client Risk & Resilience

Solving the 98% Cyber Problem for HNW Individuals and Families with HardTarget

July 23, 2024 • Kurt Thoennessen, CAPI • Episode 33

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According to some sources, social engineering is used in 98% of cyber attacks, while others say it's involved in 70–90% of successful attacks. Social engineering is a critical part of an attack that uses manipulation or tricks to coerce victims into sharing sensitive information. Attackers may pretend to be a known person or legitimate entity, or use other tactics like impersonating a brand, using current events, or offering something the victim wants or needs. Social engineering can occur through email, phone, face-to-face, or the web.

In this episode of the Private Client Risk & Resilience podcast Kurt Thoennessen begins with introductions of the guests, Bill Roth and Anwar Visram, who share their extensive backgrounds in entrepreneurship and cybersecurity, respectively. Anwar emphasizes his experience in building cyber defense plans for high net worth families, while Bill highlights his expertise in visual thinking and experience design.

Kurt and his guests delve into the complexities of cybersecurity for affluent families, discussing the growing threat landscape and the importance of proactive risk management. They highlight the need for high net worth families to adopt comprehensive cybersecurity strategies, which include regular education, simulation exercises, and clear rules of engagement. The conversation also touches on the unique challenges faced by high net worth individuals, such as the increasing attack surface due to multiple generations and the involvement of numerous advisors and staff.

Highlights:

  1. Proactive Cyber Defense:
    • Emphasis on creating cyber defense plans tailored to high net worth families.
    • Importance of regular education and simulation exercises to prepare families for potential cyber threats.
  2. Human-Centered Approach:
    • Cybersecurity as a human-centered problem, integrating technology and focusing on the human element.
    • Social engineering and human error account for 98% of cybersecurity issues.
  3. Innovative Solutions:
    • Hard Target's approach to cybersecurity through gamification and tabletop exercises.
    • Development of mental models for cybersecurity similar to playing a board game, enhancing understanding and retention.
  4. Real-World Scenarios:
    • Anwar shares examples of cyber threats, including virtual kidnapping and social media exploitation.
    • Importance of creating a family cyber committee to enforce governance and rules of engagement.
  5. Emotional Resilience:
    • Focus on building emotional and relational resilience within families to handle cyber threats.
    • Preparing families for the emotional impact of cyber incidents.
  6. Cyber Literacy for All:
    • Vision of expanding cybersecurity awareness and education beyond high net worth families to the broader public.
    • Importance of cyber preparedness in reducing vulnerabilities and making everyone a hard target.

Conclusion: Bill Roth and Anwar Visram provide valuable insights into the evolving landscape of cybersecurity for high net worth families. Their innovative approach, combining human-centered strategies with advanced training methods, offers a comprehensive solution to protect against the growing threat of cyber attacks.

Thank You and Resources: A heartfelt thank you to Bill Roth and Anwar Visram for sharing their expertise and experiences. For more information about Hard Target, visit hardtarget.ai. Connect with Bill and Anwar on LinkedIn to stay updated on their latest content and initiatives.

Thank you for listening to this episode of the Private Client Risk & Resilience podcast. Stay tuned for future episodes as we continue to explore innovative solutions for protecting high net worth individuals and their families.

Kurt Thoennessen:

There are more wealthy people today than ever before in the history of the world. The risks they are exposed to through the assets they acquire and their unique lifestyles are significant. The bigger the asset, the bigger the potential loss. The bigger the potential loss, the more complicated the mechanisms for protecting those assets becomes. This show seeks to uncover the risks that successful people face. So we can provide some guidance towards minimizing, mitigating and transferring them. From Coverage contracts and carriers to client experience, technology and claims, we will cover it all. Whether you're an agent looking to hone your skills, or someone with significant wealth to protect, I hope this show becomes a valuable resource you can come to rely on to help you protect yourself, your family, and your clients. Welcome to the private client risk and resilience podcast. My name is Kurt Thoennessen. And I've been a broker in the high net worth space for the past 17 years. And as for the last five, I've also been the CEO of risk review. Risk review is a software platform that helps agents and their clients save time by digitizing the information gathering process for sales and service. Now we have two great guests on the show today, Bill Roth and Anwar vis from from hard target. Bill is a serial entrepreneur. And Anwar is an international speaker, and privacy expert who specializes in high net worth helping high net worth families protect themselves in a digital world. He's been described as a chief information security officer or seaso, for ultra high net worth families and individuals. I connected with them on LinkedIn, because I was intrigued by their story. And I thought you would be too. So I'm excited to bring you another valuable and valuable conversation with industry leaders and experts. So let's get started by asking bill and Anwar to give us a quick background of themselves, and hard target. So Anwar, why don't you start us off, and just tell us a little bit about yourself and how you got to where you are today.

Anwar Visram:

Thank you, Kurt. My name is Anwar vishram. I've got about 30 years experience in technology and security, including being the security chief advisor for Canada's largest financial firm or investment bank. And over the last 12 years, I've been focusing on working with family offices and high net worth families, where a pioneered solutions around building cyber cyber defense plan are these families, including how to recognize and protect against some of the latest threats and tactics used by criminals. Good.

Kurt Thoennessen:

So you've been doing this for quite a long time, and helping high net worth families. I like the term cyber defense plan. I think that that's, it definitely tells you that there's something serious behind it that you need to protect. So thanks for sharing that with us. Bill. Let's turn it over to you.

Bill Roth:

Yeah, you both Thank you. So yeah, longtime entrepreneur, as you mentioned, built a number of businesses over the past 20 plus years, several creative agencies and a couple of health and fitness brands, I'd say that, you know, core skill set of mine is as a visual thinker, and experienced designer, which has led me into areas of gamification and

Anwar Visram:

bespoke

Bill Roth:

event design, that sort of thing. And I think I really enjoy the the process of taking something complex and turning it into an accessible idea. And that's what we get to do with hard targets. So Anwar and I were introduced not too long ago by a family office and took a look at what he does, and has been doing successfully all these years. And I saw something really exciting there. And we'd love to tell you more about that. Excellent.

Kurt Thoennessen:

I'm looking forward to it. So I love the term visual thinker. It resonates with me, because I feel like I do a lot of that too. Mostly, you know, right before I go to bed, I'm like, visualizing, you know, the things that I'm going to be doing or somebody's idea that I want to make happen. And it's a really great term. And the connection that you mentioned to that you have with the family office that Bruce brought you and Mr. Together is super interesting as well. There's so much of that going on today. And it's so important. We just had an event for the private Risk Management Association, and we had record attendance, record registrations for it. And it just goes to show you is just people after the pandemic, people want to get back together, they want to be in physical space together. And and this, this event was a testament to that. And there's so many great collaborations that come out of it, ideas that come out of it, aha moments, information sharing. It's just something that is so important, and it's really nice to hear that that's part of your history and that a family office brought you guys together. So looking forward to talking about your company today. And just to kind of level set a little bit, you're in the tech space, you know, you're focused on cybersecurity, which in today's world is a huge topic, covering so many different facets of life in general. And, you know, if we take a step back, and we look at, you know, the last 20 years, you know, we got the internet that came along, in, you know, late 90s, and we had cell phones, then we had drones, and then we had laptops, and all these different technologies. And there's a lot of hype that comes along, along with these technologies at the beginning of the curve, and people just want to grab hold of it, and start using it right away. And what they often don't think about at that time is the risk and how to secure themselves. When using they're just so excited about doing it. We have that today with generative AI. There's a lot of hype around that, and not a lot of thought about what are the risks. And so I love that, you know, you're you're talking about cybersecurity for high net worth families, and really helping to, to focus them in on this topic, because it is a growing concern. It is a major concern. And we need solutions. So I'd like to just start off by asking bill first, if you can tell us a little bit about your mission with hard target. And what inspired you to start this this company? Well, yeah,

Bill Roth:

thanks, Kurt. Yeah, I think you know, we're, we're family man, I'm, I'm a father. I've got kids, Anwar is as well. And so we view from our perspective, that this is a human centered problem that cyber threats cyber security's a human centered problem that integrates with technology, right. But I go back to Charlie Munger, who's Warren Buffett's recently, past partner, brilliant man. And he had a number of mental models that he developed over the years, and there's a lot of videos you can find out and one of those mental models is what's called surface area. And so back to the idea that this is a human centered problem. We take a look at the surface area of these high net worth family, so I want you to picture a family tree for me, right? You've got generation one, you've got the patriarch and the matriarch. And they've got four kids. Okay, they so that six, including G two, collectively will say those four sons and daughters have nine children of of their own. So that's 15. Now you add their advisors, Mom and Dad use this wealth manager here and two of the kids use their own. Okay, so that's four on staff with each wealth manager. Before you know it, that's 27 people. Now you had attorneys, accountants, property managers, frontline employees, for the family business they own before, you know, you have dozens of people that are in the sphere of influence, or in the direct pathway of this high net worth family. And all of all of these people represent attack vectors or potential. I guess vulnerabilities, right. And that includes kids, too. So as parents as family, men ourselves, we look at this as a family issue that encompasses all of the people that are trusted advisors for that family. And that's who we want to protect. So there's a few ways that we do there's, there's really kind of three, three issues here. There's this large and growing threat, which I just just just described, that, and that I think equally, the bad actors, the cyber criminals are getting around the technology. And they're doing that through social engineering ploys human error. That's, that accounts for 98% of the problem. And I think the the last, the third component here is that the topic of cybersecurity is kind of a heavy lift for most people, especially families with kids and teenagers and everybody doing their own things. It can feel really dense, intimidating, and tedious. And so there's a lot of doom and gloom in this industry. And I'd say that's really one of the first things we want to do is change the tone.

Kurt Thoennessen:

So awesome. So it reminds me of a movie, one of my favorite movies, Meet the Fockers with Robert De Niro, and Dustin Hoffman. And, like, I think you guys are De Niro. And he's he's got his whole circle of trust, you know, in the family. If you're in the circle of trust, you know, you're part of that sphere of influence. And and you got and he's the one protecting the whole family from all the bad, the bad actors out there. So it's really, really funny anyway, thought I'd share that. So the attack the attack surfaces, it gets bigger and bigger. As you get multiple generations. You get more people involved in a family. There's more attack vectors for these bad actors. So it's it becomes more and more complicated as families grow. So it's so totally get that. And as far as like the, you know, you guys are kind of in a niche space, if you will, you know, hard target focusing on cybersecurity for high net worth families, you know, there's been, you know, in our space, there's cyber insurance is definitely a growing product line for people. And it's got more and more take up of late, but it's taken some time to really catch on, but it is catching on now. So what does the cybersecurity landscape for the high net worth space look like today? And and where do you guys fit into that?

Bill Roth:

Yeah, great question. So I think you can look at it somewhat broadly, in that there's awareness, there's our tech security, there's companies that will put themselves in the middle between you and the threat. And there's training companies. And I think, you know, a lot of these, there's some really great MSPs and associates that are there out there that's needed, that's not going away. And a lot of them position what they do as your digital bodyguard, and they'll tell the families, that's their, their mission. And we think that's a great mission. And the way that we, I guess where we fit on this, if they're the digital bodyguards, we're the self defense class, we're the MMA Academy, that where the family comes together, they put on the black keys, and they learn about the basics of cyber self defense. So just like you, you know, a world class, self defense class trains you through sparring, we're doing the same thing through dozens, actually, literally hundreds of social engineering scenarios and simulations. And it's all tabletop. So we actually take a very analog solution to a complex digital problem.

Kurt Thoennessen:

Very interesting. So you're talking about managed service providers, the MSPs, there are, you know, lots of them. And I just think of all the VPN services out there, you can sign up for a VPN, and then you, you know, you got a virtual private network on your phone. So that's, that's helpful. But, you know, it's all these little different tactics that you have through the MSPs. But then you're saying, and I liked the term again, you guys got great terms digital bodyguard. Alright, that's what they are. And then you're the self defense training course. So taking them, you know, more in person human training method to helping people be more aware of these issues. Because like you said, with social engineering, that's 98% of the the risks that are out there. And so that's a human problem, not a technology problem. And so let's talk a little bit about, you know, technology and what a hard target means. And I'd like to switch over to Anwar, if I may, and just say, ask Anwar, can you tell us? You know, when you talk about a hard target, what is a hard target? You know, before I came to you guys, I didn't really know what that term was. I know it is out there. But I wasn't really familiar about with it. But can you explain to us what a hard target is, and why it's why it's important for high net worth individuals to make themselves one.

Anwar Visram:

Well, Susan, as Bill described, you know, when we look when I work with a family, family is this enterprise, this family enterprise, they have so many avenues at which that they can be exposed. And as Bill correctly identified, just taking one family, I think the number he came to was somewhere around 27. Sometimes some of the families who work with our multi generation multi branches, and some agree with the family mission, and others don't. And so what is a hard target a hard target is a family that works kind of cohesively together in some level, they have set up a cyber defense plan, which includes things like regular education, right education around the latest attacks. They also include simulation exercises, where they go through, you know, stimulated events because here's the thing, we don't want a family to go through, for example, a virtual kidnapping for the first time, in real time, we want them to have that experience in advance so that they know how to react. And then finally, it's kind of the the next thing we help them with is is the technology rules of engagement. So what are the do's and don'ts? So what that builds, effectively is a real peace of mind for that family. That's the hard target because they are aware of what are the latest things are happening? Maybe not everything, but have a pretty good understanding and then are able to manage those scenarios and react safer than they might otherwise.

Kurt Thoennessen:

Yeah, it makes perfect sense. And it reminds me of some a mantra that we have, in the insurance business today predict and prevent. It's all about being proactive. It's experiencing something in advance of the actual event so that when it happens, you know, how to act. And, you know, I think it's something that's really important with when you're talking about working with families, because, you know, on the corporate side, you know, we deal with this all the time, you know, we have cybersecurity training, compliance, training, all that stuff. And so they train you on a regular basis on how to do deal with those situations if they happen as an employee. But as a family member, it's a little bit different. And there could be other aspects involved, like embarrassment, emotional attachment to something. And so that's, that's really where the training can really help. And so, you know, we talked about social engineering, we talked about being a hard target, can let's get some real world examples here. You know, so people can really get a handle on what this looks like, Do you have any situations or scenarios that you've been through with clients that you can share with the audience to help them get their minds around this?

Anwar Visram:

Sure. There's, there's there's so many, but I'll pick one because I think it's really poignant, and it addresses multiple generations. And that was a scenario where I had a matriarch reach out to me, because her son, who was on Tinder, you know, in his early 20s, went from Tinder to Instagram to telegram to extortion, all within less than 12 hours. And the son thought, okay, you know what, I'm going back to your point about embarrassed want to keep this under the radar, he paid the attacker $500. And you think, okay, that's the end of it. Okay. The moment that attacker received the the buttons about 10 minutes later, there abouts. Oh, I'd like $3,000 more. This is when the young gentleman had a moment of reflection. And this is his initial reaction in this part of the training, his initial reaction was okay. Let's turn all these other systems off. So what did he do? He just he deleted his Tinder account. It disabled, his telegram account, he did all these sorts of things thinking, Okay, if I go dark, they can't find me. But the unfortunate scenario was during the course of that 12 hours, and using the various different platforms, the attacker found out a tremendous amount of information. So then the attacker decided to take it to the next level. So he reached out to the matriarch. And she was she owned her she led financial firm of a very high distinction with a lot of high profile clients. And the attacker basically extorted her and said, Well, I'm going to share videos and pictures of your son if you don't pay, and he upped the ante to 100, starting at $100,000. So you can see how it kind of escalated from just simple dating to a massive extortion amount.

Kurt Thoennessen:

Yeah, yeah.$500 To 3000 to 100,000. You know, once the bad actor understands that they have a fish on the hook, why would they let go? If there's if they have, if they have something that they can get a lot of money out of, and they know it's a high net worth or ultra high net worth family that's willing to protect? And that that kind of talks to another topic, which is the reputation of these families? Because, you know, yeah, a son being on Tinder. It's not something it's something that is definitely possible. You know, it's not so far fetched. So, is there a thing? Is there a part of your training modules that you deal with and how do you help families protect their their reputations along the way?

Anwar Visram:

Yeah, that's a very important part. And when we talk about reputations, we involve multiple different parties. We involve their lawyers, a lot of them have media, people that represent them in the media. And we bring them all together to build a reputation plan. What is what is acceptable behavior, it all gets sort of baked into the governance policies and the governance framework for the family. And those are really important because reputation Is, is extremely valuable, it's a commodity they use every single day to garner deal flow, it helps them within their business, the rep, the reputation has real value. And it's an intangible. So those are really important that we have to bring in all the appropriate parties to set the standards on what it is that the family needs, wants, and expects from everyone else in the family.

Kurt Thoennessen:

Now, excellent point. So you know, the the important thing here too, is knowing who you're working with. And one of the things about this technology world is it moves at an incredible pace. And so high net worth families are looking for a service provider, they may go through and do a search on Facebook, or may talk to someone and get a recommendation. How often is it that these families? And maybe bill, this is something that you can you can speak to? Is it that the families will take the extra time to go through and do their due diligence on the service providers that they're working with? And conduct a background check? And what are some of the scenarios that you work with families in that in that respect?

Bill Roth:

Well, I think that the problem is starting to really manifest itself I think of there's a lot of families that still are unaware of just how exposed they are. So one of the the big things, there's really three parts of the web, right, we've got the surface web or the public web, the Google searchable web, we have the the deep web, essentially anything behind a paywall or a login. And then we have the dark web, which is a repository where stolen data is housed in and bought and sold. And so the challenge for high net worth families is that as corporate America has hardened itself to the increasing cybersecurity threats, and the global the estimated impact on the global economy, by the end of next year, something in the neighborhood of $10.5 trillion. And growing at about trillion a year. That's what's reported. And so the low hanging fruit for cyber criminals is, is becoming families of needs, affluent families, because who would you rather attack a billion dollar business that's got a team of cybersecurity experts on staff or a family that is just trying to live its life and communicate with one another find the best ways to do that? Well, it's it's a no brainer. So the families, the awareness of this is starting to grow. The other challenge for families, I think, is that if there is an event, if there's a compromise, most families don't want to publicize that or talk about it. So there's not a lot of data about how often this is happening. We're starting to get some more details on family office side of things as reports are done. Dentons did a great survey. JP Morgan just did one number that a lot of the larger banks are starting to do reports on the family offices. And it's a significant issue. In fact, one of the top gaps first family offices, so you can extrapolate that out and overlay that quite a bit, I think on the the family dynamic there. And so they're Yeah, they're oftentimes just easier targets. So cyber criminals are, are looking for the easy, easy wins, right. And you also have to understand that the cybersecurity gangs are their businesses that run like corporations, small ones, collectives, what have you. And they're trying to do this as cheap as they can. Because, you know, finding talent that's able to barge through the front door on a brute force attack. That's more expensive talent than some than training someone to be a social engineer, and do an end around on the technology that a family might be using. So I'm not sure if I answered the entirety of your questionnaire. But I think the problem is growing and the awareness is growing. And so we're seeing more and more families out there trying to understand what do I have as my options. And we feel that the 98% problem here is human error and social engineering. And that's what we trained for. But the other issue for the families is that it's a tough topic for them. And by playing around the coffee table and coming into their homes and doing on site events, and we do some really cool things in that regard. The walls start to come down, people in the family began to communicate about this topically and to begin to share a common language. And as you play a game together, you develop an instinct for it. So I'll share an example we've all played Monopoly. And I go back, I think I first played it with when I was about nine or 10, with my, my, my older brother, and he beat me every time. But the one thing you come away with after you play Monopoly for years, is a mental model. So back to Charlie mongers, mental models for greenhouses, right hotel, right. So that's a mental model that we all have, going into adult life, for creating vast amounts of Real Estate Wealth, if we so desire, and we set ourselves up for that. So in much the same way, we're taking the simplicity of an analog thing like a tabletop game, and developing a mental model and something that's rather complex and growing and becoming more sophisticated all the time. So as as the cyber threats become more sophisticated. Our game approach mirrors that and models that so that our clients can stay up to date on the latest threats.

Kurt Thoennessen:

That's excellent. And it's something that appeals to all ages, you know, because you can play Monopoly, when you're two years old, not two years old, five years old, seven years old, whatever, at a young age, you can really start to understand some of these concepts and learn. And so the earlier you teach these concepts and skills, the better, because it's going to stay with them a long time. And you know, what you're saying about low hanging fruit, large corporations, even small corporations, mid sized corporations, they spend a lot of money a lot of time to protect their business, and from cyber criminals, cyber, cyber threats. But like you said, individual families don't necessarily have a model for that, that transfers, until obviously, you know, what we're talking about today with hard target is your providing that similar model, but one that fits for the high net worth family? I. And the other thing you mentioned is that the technology is not the answer. It's not the answer to everything. Technology won't save us from, from the cyber threat, it's 98% of this is from the social engineering, it's the human aspect of it. So I love I love what you're saying and how, and your approach to bringing awareness and education to these families. And so I'd love to hear Anwar, from you, again, if there's any other examples that you can share, where you've dealt with a family, maybe it was, you know, you know, one of the things on the corporate side that I've learned is that the sooner you react to these situations, the better the outcome can be, you know, if you wait, it can be exponentially worse. So, you know, there's some other examples that you can point to a lot of our listeners are brokers and advisors. And when they talk to their clients, you know, those stories are extremely helpful.

Anwar Visram:

Yeah, so I think, what we're, what when we bring these situations to clients, the, unfortunately, about 95% of clients I get are after something bad happens. And so the goal is how do we how do we get them get in front of them before so whether it be something like virtual kidnapping, which is, which is now a growing thought, and then I had one family that reached out because their their son was travelling through through Africa? And, you know, he was on a safari and, you know, not generally reachable, but the challenge with that, and how do they find out is that he was posting on social media, I'm here I'm doing this I'm doing, you know, I'm traveling around. So of course, the family gets reached out. And they typically reach out because they, because one major risk a lot of families face, or one of the big things that we talked about as one of the top topics is oversharing. And, and families just overshare now oversharing then, and I'll go into the example in a moment, oversharing goes beyond just what we post on social media. It's the things that we have online, like our our services, we use Calendly. And, and all these different connection tools or messaging tools are a tinder are, you know, dating apps or Facebook or any could also include the apps on your phone? Because remember, those apps are constantly sharing a ton of tremendous information. They're vacuuming up at those details. So when you combine that that goes to what Bill was talking about earlier, which is the deep web that's although it's behind some sort of paywall, or some sort of a restricted service. Those are where the data breaches that information gets leaked out there. So combined with people openly sharing with information that is on the deep web that makes it too in the hands of the criminals. Now going back to the virtual kidnapping What I was explaining is, okay, so this person is posting. I'm here in Africa, nothing, you know, I'm having a great time, here's a picture of a lion, here's a picture of an alligator and look at my head between the alligator whatever, you know, just the fun stuff, right? But But what happened is they reached out to the grandparents. They knew exactly what social media what method, actually they knew their phone number. So they reached out and called the grandparents on their phone, they reached out and they knew at the right time, because they had an idea they had a up profile of the family. And that is the attack that that grandparent wasn't aware of, that they didn't understand how that could happen. And so they did end up paying a substantial amount of money for their what they thought was a real attack.

Kurt Thoennessen:

Yeah, it's and it's, it's something that, in today's world, there isn't a solution from insurance, insurance doesn't pay. The limits that are being offered today for these types of things are not high enough for what can happen, whether it's reputational damage or financial loss. And so the solution really is what you're talking about. It's, it's, it's training, it's awareness, it's education. And so after you work with a family and you, and maybe this is not a one time thing, it sounds like this is an ongoing engagement, where it's, I don't know, maybe you can talk to us a little bit about that. Anwar, as far as what the framework for an engagement would look like, where, you know, you have some some training sessions scheduled throughout the year? And then is there a document of or some sort of governance that's created as well? Can you share a little bit about that.

Anwar Visram:

So typically, that that depends on when they come, if they come to me when something bad has happened, then the first goal is to deal with whatever the issue is, right. So once we kind of gone through that process, then the next structure is typically what I was saying, education is the first piece, right building that cyber defense plan, education, going through the simulation exercises, and then the rules of engagement, which the rules of engagement would be working with governance, you know, building a governance, mapping are the cyber defense plan into the governance framework, which they have with their family office, if they have one, with their advisors, the lawyers, all that sort of stuff. And then every branch is assigned a particular individual, that is the kind of the authority, and we create a committee of a family cyber committee, that it denotes and sets the rules for the entire family. And they they collectively set the rules of engagement for everyone. And then and they enforce it within their specific branch. There's, there's accountability, there's certain things that that the family must do. And if anything happens, there's a communication protocol countability. And again, setting up what their do's and don'ts and what are they? What if something happens? You know, what are the next steps?

Kurt Thoennessen:

Excellent. Yeah. So it's a real journey, you know, journey map that you're able to create with these families and help them visualize what success looks like. But like you said, some engagements are going to be before an event happens, and some engagements are gonna be after unfortunately. And so it really depends on the situation. So yes, I wanted to go over to Bill now and just see if you had any thoughts on that topic as well. Yeah, I

Bill Roth:

would say that. The key here is that cyber preparedness equals resilience, right? And it's not just resilience on the technical side, it's emotional resilience, when that's the cost you can't count that it's hard to quote, it's hard to quantify the emotional toll that a breach takes the emotional trapdoor I heard on another podcast, I thought was a great way to put it emotional trapdoor that hits the person who's under attack, who's been told, this person has your son or your daughter in some crazy cyber kidnapping, virtual kidnapping scenario, or some other ransomware is now on the phone. And, you know, they get that screen that says Pay up. That is a gut punch for most people. And we want to help our client families and their advisors. So we work with family offices and wealth managers or IRAs. And increasingly, you know, the, the whole sphere of that to harden the entire family enterprise and we want It's to help all of these people have that emotional resilience. And that's backed by, I think a true competence and confidence that they know what the next step is. Even if something bad has happened. There's a plan in place. I think, a lot of times the worst feeling is when something just comes out of nowhere and blindsides you, and you know, you don't have a plan, and all of a sudden, you're sitting there going, what now who do we call usually they call their wealth manager. And this is where a lot of wealth managers and statistics prove this out. They feel unprepared, because now they're on the hook for the conversation, we'll Why did we lose this money? What was this man in the middle attack? Like, how did this happen? Why did why did this happen on your watch. And so, and again, nine times out of 10, that's even on the attack is coming through some social engineering ploy, or some exploit that's been enacted upon the wealth manager. And so they're in the hot seat all of a sudden, so we take a holistic look at the family enterprise, from about age 10, on all the way up, to help them prepare emotionally and relationally. Because once the family has this common language, this common instinct that they've developed through real cyber self defense training, I think the the alertness goes up, we don't want to have our clients living in a state of paranoia. It's not about fear. It's about can we take a fun approach to this where everybody can start to develop real skill, and feel good about where they stand as a family and what that plan is, what's in place, if something awful were to happen. It's

Kurt Thoennessen:

excellent. And I love the strategy. And I think you're you're absolutely right to want to help wealth managers, other advisors, family offices, because though, like you said, those are the people that the client families are calling first, to get advice in these situations. So last question, you know, as we kind of wrap up this conversation, this has been excellent information. So thank you for sharing. But I just wanted to say to ask, you know, what do you think when you think about the future goals for hard target, what do you see is the vision, you know, going forward?

Bill Roth:

Yeah, I'll take that one. And we're, I think, our heart is for cyber resiliency, cyber literacy for all. And we serve up the high net worth families, we serve amazing people that are captains of industry and just the leaders in their field. But we feel like this is a message that needs to go out to everyone, not just wealthy families, because I'll give you an example the FBI did a report last year alone, $90 billion 90 billion with a B was pilfered out of the hard earned bank accounts of our elderly in this country in the US alone. That's heartbreaking to me. And so part of what we do is help, you know, through some volunteer work and such help help those folks be more prepared. We're serving top to bottom with grades or not grade school, but Junior High in high school programs through CyberPatriot and other things that we find value in. We want to fight cyber slavery and there's there's just a whole host of things that are happening in proliferating around the world that we want to be in on so I think that's what hard targeted is about is that we should all feel like we're hard targets that we have that mindset that we walk that out in our lives, and we walk circumspectly with how we perceive and live out our digital footprints. And we do that with some some level of deliberateness. So that's how I would see the future and we're How would you share on that? What were what are your ideas?

Anwar Visram:

I completely agree. And I think it's about being prepared and you know, building those cyber street smarts as you suggested, because we as families or families are certainly criminals are continuously evolving. So I think we as families, as those who support and surround those families, we also need to continuously evolve.

Kurt Thoennessen:

100% agree cyber literacy for all i love that concept. No more low hanging fruit. We should all be hard targets and how much more confident, you know would would our clients and friends and family be if they had the skills and they knew going into the social media apps that they use their phones the internet. They knew the guardrails to avoid to make themselves safer, which in turn, makes their family safer protects their friends, as well. So I love the cones. saps love the vision. And I'm really excited that you guys are doing what you're doing and look forward to seeing more from you. And and just as, as I close out the show here today, I just wanted to say, thank you, Bill. And thank you Anwar, for being here today. And for sharing your expertise and knowledge and experience with the PCR audience.

Bill Roth:

Heard, it's been a real pleasure, thank you for the opportunity. You've got a great podcast. And I really enjoyed listening to the other episodes in the other subject area experts. So it's been an honor to be on the show with you.

Kurt Thoennessen:

Thank you, and

Anwar Visram:

myself as well, sincerely grateful for the opportunity to be a part of your network.

Kurt Thoennessen:

Thank you very much. And if there's people who are interested in I'm sure there are in getting in touch with you and learning more about hard target. Bill, why don't you share the best way to get in touch and how they can learn more?

Bill Roth:

Yeah, you bet. So you can check us out at hard target.ai is our website to learn about the different gamified service offerings that we have? We're taking on select early stage partners this summer, and we've got a waitlist for some some fun things that we're doing. You can also reach out to us on LinkedIn. Both Anwar and I are on that platform. That's our primary social media outlet. So we're working on some fun things. So newsletters and podcasts of our own here through the summer, and we'll have some great content that'll be super useful to you as well.

Kurt Thoennessen:

Excellent, thank you so much. That's that's really helpful. And I obviously I'm connected with you on LinkedIn and look forward to to seeing some of that content that you'll be putting out i and insists thanks again, for this this conversation. It was super helpful. And lastly, thank you to the audience. Thank you to everybody who's listening to this episode. Really appreciate you tuning in. Feel free to give us a Like on LinkedIn. If you see us publish the episode or we're on Spotify or iTunes, anywhere you listen to your podcast. I really appreciate you listening in and helps keep the energy going for this project. I look forward to seeing you on the next episode. Thanks again for everybody and be safe out there. Take care