Robert Siciliano Identity Theft Expert – Speaker

Not to long ago the CIO was a pocket protected, sugared up, soda pop drinking, potato chip eating, caffeinated, non sociable…..well….geek. Not anymore. But you knew that. Serious, Geek is getting even more sexy, stripper pole sexy. A familiar story, a colleague of mine built a tech startup, it has gone from $4 million to $175 million in 3 years. He tells me behemoth tech companies literally send scantily clad hotties to his office weekly, making numerous offers he has to refuse. Hes married, and, he has a board of directors that won’t sell.

Companies not so flush with cash and armed with solutions that actually work, are holding back and not selling out because they are undervalued due to the economic crisis. What compounds their pain is retailers and others who need their technology aren’t buying. It astonishes me that with the amount of data beaches over the past year alone, companies aren’t making the necessary investments.

I see struggling companies offering technologies including identity theft protection, data security that prevents data breaches, defending against criminal hackers from the inside and out, biometric solutions and credit card fraud prevention using multi-factor authentication, all solutions yet to be widely implemented. Solutions that work!

This kind of cost cutting has put the attention on the CIO. Budget cuts have put the CIO front and center.

CIO’s are benefiting big time from the current climate. Sure, many have a much bigger workload, but the chief information officer has become an attractive and strategic financial asset.

The CIO is now very in demand. High tech jobs are some of the most recession proof. While tech is their “job”, they have become go-to-gurus for security, and now for corporate strategy and long term company objectives.

Cost cutting often spurs innovation. Who better to turn to than the CIO who knows what works, and, deals with whiny co-workers when stuff doesn’t work. These are people that generally know what goes on in every nook, cranny and crawl space of the facility and know what is a waste and what streamlines productivity.

If you’re not already, tap your CIO for strategic initiatives and they may have something sexy to say.

Great article by Jon Fortt Here

Completely unrelated distraction of a video of credit card skimming Here