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The Security Interviews: Mick Baccio, Splunk | Computer Weekly

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The Security Interviews: Mick Baccio, Splunk | Computer Weekly


A lot of people struggle to pronounce the name of American politician Pete Buttigieg. When Mick Baccio, now global security advisor at Splunk SURGe and Cisco Foundation AI, went to work for him in a previous life, it was helpfully spelled out in large letters on the office wall. Buttigieg says it ‘Boot-edge-edge’, if you were wondering.

“I was like, oh that’s clever, thank you for that,” says Baccio. “I’m going to meet the man in a second, I should know this!”

A former US Navy Reserve intelligence officer who began his political career as the mayor of South Bend in Indiana, Buttigieg served as secretary of transportation during the administration of US president Joe Biden, from 2021 to 2025.

However, before that, he had a tilt at the White House himself, running a primary campaign that won in the state of Iowa, before he dropped out at the start of March 2020 as the Democrats rallied behind Biden.

It was on this campaign that Baccio met Buttigieg, and in conversation with Computer Weekly, he reflects on the experience of bootstrapping cyber security for a US presidential campaign.

Baccio admits he was sceptical about taking the gig at first, having just escaped Washington DC himself after serving as a threat intelligence expert for the Executive Office of the President under both Barack Obama and Donald Trump.

“I got a call one day. They said, ‘Hey, do you want to come be CISO [chief information security officer] for the Buttigieg campaign?’ I said ‘no’. I was like, ‘I’m good’,” he says.

“When you look at a political campaign in the United States, win or lose, you’re going to be unemployed in November.”

Someone must have kept on at him, because the record shows he took the job, and even though “president Buttigieg” did not take the job, Baccio has no regrets about his choices.

“It’s the most fun you’ll have,” he says. “The closest thing to a political campaign, I think, is a startup, but a campaign is a most unique organisation because it’s a non-profit funded entirely by donations and its sole purpose is to elect your mascot.

“Now, I say mascot not in a mean way, but secretary Buttigieg was not involved in day-to-day operations. He didn’t run things in the campaign – he was the campaign. He’s not even the CEO, he’s who we are – we’re Pete for America.”

In such a campaign, the role of CISO takes on a fundamentally different aspect, says Baccio. To start with, most campaign staffers are volunteers, or in their first or second jobs after university. “Most of them don’t even know what a CISO is. I had to explain that a lot, why I was there and what I was doing – teaching folks how to ‘do the cybers’,” says Baccio.

Such a campaign faces challenges that large organisations with security budgets and supportive boards do not. For one thing, every dollar that a political campaign spends on something like cyber security, office furniture, or coffee and doughnuts is a dollar it is not spending on winning votes, so Baccio quickly learned he had to operate lean and operate cheaply.

But despite what tales of Russian espionage and interference in US election cycles might lead you to believe, the campaign faced a threat environment much like any ordinary business.

“I think one of the most under-appreciated threat vectors is just plain old fraud and business email compromise,” says Baccio.

“This is a $100bn a year industry, and we talk a lot about the agentic AI [artificial intelligence] threat, polymorphic-enabled malware, APT [advanced persistent threat], blah blah blah – everybody wants it to be that, but it’s generally fraud,” he adds.

“I never underestimate folks who are just trying to do their job. If your job is to process invoices, it’s all you do all day, if you get a PDF labelled ‘invoice’ you’re going to open it. Fraud is a bigger problem than any APT or AI attack, but I don’t think it’s sexy enough to get column inches.”

Five a day

Indeed, an often-neglected security message, and one Splunk is keen to repeat, is the importance of eating your cyber vegetables – that is to say, nailing the basics.

Having driven around this block several times over the years, Baccio thinks these vegetables account for at least the bottom third of the cyber food pyramid.

“You know you’re supposed to drink lots of water, you’re supposed to eat lots of green things, and if you don’t, your body reflects that,” says Baccio. “And you know you’re supposed to MFA [multifactor authenticate] all the things, you know you’re supposed to segment your network, you know you’re supposed to patch your things – and if you don’t, your network gets popped.

“I’m not saying do all these things and you’ll be okay, I’m saying do all these things and you’ll be in a better position.

“Hackers don’t hack the cloud, they log in. They’ve already bought those credentials from an access broker. They’re not hacking anything. But if I have phishing-resistant MFA available to me, they might not be able to log in, the account takeover won’t happen, and the rest of the cyber attack changes going forward. So it’s those things that I think go a long, long way towards raising that overall bar.”

Blue collar for the blue team

Splunk SURGe was set up to help defenders tackle real-world problems that they face today, with a mix of actionable guidance, in-depth analysis on cyber issues and practical solutions during fast-moving security panics. Think of its output as a cyber buffet with excellent vegetarian options.

SURGe had its genesis during one of the “headless chicken” moments, when unit founder Ryan Kovar was poring over various Slack groups one evening and spotted a lot of chatter surrounding an apparent SolarWinds compromise – heralding the now legendary Sunburst/Solorigate incident.

In the wake of this, Kovar realised there was a big gap in Splunk’s offering, in that the company had pretty good tech and processes when it came to applying data science to security, but wasn’t so hot at cutting through to the human side of things.

In short, it wasn’t being holistic enough.

That said, Kovar – in his own words – “wasn’t sure the world needed yet another security vendor research team”, so he formed SURGe to be a practical resource for users, or “blue collar for the blue team”.

Baccio was intimately involved in the unit’s creation – Kovar credits him with coming up with the “blue collar” line – and several years down the line, he still spends a lot of time helping Splunk’s customers make sense of the security landscape through blogs and other forms of outreach, as well as participating in a regular series, Coffee talk with SURGe.

He reflects: “I’m really lucky that I was in the Buttigieg campaign, that I was at the White House prior to that, the Pentagon, HHS [the Department of Health and Human Services], the CDC [Centre for Disease Control], and I’m now able to take all of that experience and bring it into SURGe and say, ‘These are the security things I’ve seen in my career – this is what I believe people want’.”

Threat intel at the foundations of AI

However, since July 2025, SURGe’s core mission has changed somewhat, after it transitioned to work within Cisco Foundation AI, a new initiative by Splunk’s network-centric parent that is developing open-weight, security-specific AI models.

In April 2025, Foundation AI launched Foundation-sec-8b, an eight-billion-parameter large language model (LLM) expressly designed to enable security teams to work faster, act more precisely and scale their operations without compromise.

You might reasonably wonder what a threat intelligence unit is doing jumping into bed with a bunch of LLM developers. Baccio himself declares he was shocked when it happened, but now he thinks it may be the smartest move Cisco has made since acquiring Splunk.

He characterises it as bringing SURGe’s collective experience as a steward of threat intelligence and a trusted advisor to customers to bear on a highly technical field and build AI tools that actually help security teams.

The advent of agentic AI in the past 12 to 18 months helps drive this narrative forward, says Baccio, and makes the promise of AI more real, at least compared to where it was a couple of years ago.

“If I throw generalised AI at a cyber problem, it’s not going to be great. But if I built a very specific model to do a very specific thing, then, yeah, that’s what I wanted a year ago when you sold me this AI hype,” he says. “Agentic is focused on one task, and it’s going to do it really well, but don’t ask it to do anything else.”

He cites the work of his colleague Shannon Davis, a principal AI researcher at Foundation AI, as a case in point. Davis created a tool called PLoB – standing for post-logon behaviour – to help detect intrusions instantaneously.

“To my point where you don’t hack the cloud, you just log in, after you have done so, PLoB detects all the activity that you’re doing and will be able to say, ‘This is a malicious actor’ or ‘This is just Mick from research’,” he says.

“Being able to do that at machine speed is something we’re going to have to lean into more when you take into account API calls, non-human identities, and all these things we’re introducing to the Rube Goldberg machine of the internet.

“Learning how agentic is applied becomes critical,” says Baccio as he looks ahead. “We have some stuff going on in the background that I can’t speak to, but we’re actively working together to brainstorm ideas and build these things to help move that Sisyphean security rock further up the hill. I’m excited about that. We’re going to help to keep someone’s security programme a little more secure.”



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I Tested Garmin Watches for a Decade While Hiking, Biking, and Climbing. Here’s What You Should Buy

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March 28, 2026

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I Tested Garmin Watches for a Decade While Hiking, Biking, and Climbing. Here’s What You Should Buy


Last year, Garmin introduced a Pro version that incorporates the inReach’s satellite communications savvy. Not only does it cost at least $400 more than the Apple Watch Ultra and $200 more than the regular Fenix 8, but you also have to pay for the inReach subscription plan, which has several tiers and ranges from $8/month to $50/month depending on whether you want features like unlimited texting or sending photo messages.

What you get for this mind-boggling price is a sports watch that can do anything and everything. It has best-in-class battery life (every Fenix can last for weeks on a single charge, and up to a month with solar charging) and features like the depth sensor from Garmin’s Descent line, which means this watch works as a full-on dive computer for scuba and free diving. It has a microphone and speaker for basic voice commands (although no onboard cellular connectivity), the surprisingly useful built-in LED flashlight, and Garmin’s signature built-in topographic maps, 24/7 health monitoring, and tracking for over a hundred different activities.

I’ve taken the 51-mm version on pretty much every outdoor sport—snowboarding, trail running, mountain biking, and rock climbing. Every time I use it, its capabilities far outclass my own. I have irritated many a fellow climber by attempting to track route difficulty, duration, and falls while integrating my Body Battery metrics and so on. The danger is always that you’ll spend more time fiddling with your Garmin Fenix 8 than you do with your actual sport. I have the version with the sapphire glass face and the titanium bezel, and have smashed it into rock faces with nary a scratch. If you’re up for paying the price and want a good-looking watch that will last forever (I have friends who are still wearing their Fenix 5s and 6s, and honestly, they’re fine), this is the one to get.

Best Running Watch

The Garmin Forerunner series launched in the early 2000s and has become the quintessential runner’s watch. Like all Garmins, the Forerunner comes in a range of price points, each offering different features. Last year, Garmin released the Forerunner 570 ($550), a midrange model with no LED flashlight or onboard maps, and the Forerunner 970 ($750), which is the premium version. Before I go into detail about why the Forerunner 970 is the best option, I should also say that I have tested many previous Garmin Forerunners at various price points. If you’re not a triathlete, the older Forerunners are still worth considering, and the entry-level $200 Forerunner 165 is aimed explicitly at runners, instead of including triathletes as the more expensive models do.



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Save Up to 40% With These Acer Promo Codes and Discounts

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21 hours ago

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March 28, 2026

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Save Up to 40% With These Acer Promo Codes and Discounts


Acer is one of the top largest PC manufacturers in the world, perhaps best known for its gaming line and budget-friendly options. If you’ve already got your eye on an Acer product like a laptop or monitor, and are shopping at the company’s online storefront, you should be using one of these Acer promo codes and coupons to save some cash on your purchase.

Save 40% on Accessories When You Build an Acer Bundle

If you’re buying from Acer, you’re most likely shopping for either a desktop PC or laptop. With this discount, you can get a really solid deal on accessories if you bundle it with a mouse, laptop bag, or headset. When you go to purchase a PC, just click “Build Bundle” and you’ll see some of the eligible options, all of which are reduced by 40%. The Nitro Mechanical Keyboard, for example, goes from $50 to just $30. That 40% is a real discount, too, as that same keyboard costs $50 on Amazon when I checked.

Beyond peripheral add-ons, you can also save 10% off Acer Care Plus extended service plans or McAfee LiveSafe antivirus subscriptions. You can bundle up to five products together to save the most money. If you’re headed off to college (or have a kid in the family), a bundle like this can get you everything you need for a gaming or studying setup on the go.

Shop Rotating Weekly Deals on Monitors and Gaming Gear

Acer’s PC gaming offerings come in either the flagship Predator brand or the budget-tier Nitro. Acer offers rotating weekly deals on everything from monitors to gaming laptops, some of which are my favorites that I’ve tested in their given category. The Acer Nitro V 16, for example, was a budget gaming laptop that I recommended quite a lot last year because of its incredible price. The one I tested was the entry-level version with an Nvidia RTX 5050 inside, but Acer has the RTX 5060 model in its own storefront. It’s $100 off right now at $1,200, which comes with 16 GB of RAM and a terabyte of storage. In fact, it’s only $30 more than the RTX 5050 model, despite offering a significant jump in gaming performance. These discounts are reflected right on the product pages, so there’s no promo code, discount code, or coupon code required.

Acer has a wide selection of monitors available, too, whether that’s a massive 49-incher or a more modest 27-inch gaming workhorse. One of my favorite discounts I saw right now was the Acer Nitro XV2, a 27-inch 1440p display with a 300 Hz refresh rate. It’s 44% off at the time of writing, bringing the price down to just $250. Because these discounts are swapped out on a weekly basis, it’s worth checking back to see if the product you’re eyeing has a new discount.

Select Customers Can Get 15% Off Their Purchase

Acer also offers a number of added discounts at checkout, including 15% off for students. Students will need to verify through Student Beans or SheerID. Because a lot of the devices Acer offers are budget-friendly, they can be attractive for students, and the extra 15% off is the icing on the cake.

We tested the Acer Swift 16 AI last year and really enjoyed the high-resolution, OLED screen and impressively quiet performance. Acer has the smaller version of this same laptop available, the Swift 14 AI, which is currently $150 off. You also might check out the Acer Chromebook Plus 514, a laptop we liked quite a bit when we reviewed it in 2024.

Acer offers this same 15% discount for active duty military, veterans, and their families. It also applies to healthcare professionals, which can be verified through its healthcare discount portal.



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AI Research Is Getting Harder to Separate From Geopolitics

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March 27, 2026

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AI Research Is Getting Harder to Separate From Geopolitics


The world’s top AI research conference, the Conference on Neural Information Processing Systems—better known as NeurIPS—became the latest organization this week to become embroiled in a growing clash between geopolitics and global scientific collaboration. The conference’s organizers announced and then quickly reversed controversial new restrictions for international participants after Chinese AI researchers threatened to boycott the event.

“This is a potential watershed moment,” says Paul Triolo, a partner at the advisory firm DGA-Albright Stonebridge who studies US-China relations. Triolo argues that attracting Chinese researchers to NeurIPS is beneficial to US interests, but some American officials have pushed for American and Chinese scientists to decouple their work—especially in AI, which has become a particularly sensitive topic in Washington.

The incident could deepen political tensions around AI research, as well as dissuade Chinese scientists from working at US universities and tech companies in the future. “At some level now it is going to be hard to keep basic AI research out of the [political] picture,” Triolo says.

In its annual handbook for paper submissions, issued in mid-March, NeurIPS organizers announced updated restrictions for participation. The rules stated that the event could not provide services including “peer review, editing, and publishing” to any organizations subject to US sanctions, and linked to a database of sanctioned entities. It included companies and organizations on the Bureau of Industry and Security’s entity list and those on another list with alleged ties to the Chinese military.

The new rules would have affected researchers at Chinese companies like Tencent and Huawei who regularly present work at NeurIPS. The database also includes entities from other countries such as Russia and Iran. The US places limits on doing business with these organizations, but there are no rules around academic publishing or conference participation.

The NeurIPS handbook has since been updated to specify that the restrictions apply only to Specially Designated Nationals and Blocked Persons, a list used primarily for terrorist groups and criminal organizations.

“In preparing the NeurIPS 2026 handbook, we included a link to a US government sanctions tool that covers a significantly broader set of restrictions than those NeurIPS is actually required to follow,” the event’s organizers said in a statement issued Friday. “This error was due to miscommunication between the NeurIPS Foundation and our legal team.”

Before they reversed course, the conference organizers initially said that the new rule was “about legal requirements that apply to the NeurIPS Foundation, which is responsible for complying with sanctions,” adding that it was seeking legal consultation on the issue.

Immediate Backlash

The new rule drew swift backlash from AI researchers around the world, particularly in China, which produces a large quantity of cutting-edge machine learning papers and is home to a growing share of the world’s top AI talent. Several academic groups there issued statements condemning the measure and, more importantly, discouraging Chinese academics from attending NeurIPS in the future. Some urged Chinese academics to contribute instead to domestic research conferences, potentially helping increase the country’s influence in relevant science and tech fields.

The China Association of Science and Technology (CAST), an influential government-affiliated organization for scientists and engineers, said Thursday that it would stop providing funding for Chinese scholars traveling to attend NeurIPS and would use the money instead to support domestic and international conferences that “respect the rights of Chinese scholars.”

CAST also said it will no longer count publications at the 2026 NeurIPS conference as academic achievements when evaluating future research funding. It’s unclear if the organization will reverse course now that NeurIPS has walked back the new rule.



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