Rachael Lyon:
Welcome to To the Point cybersecurity podcast. Each week, join Jonathan Knepher and Rachel Lyon to explore the latest in global cybersecurity news, trending topics, and cyber industry initiatives impacting businesses, governments, and our way of life. Now let's get to the point. Hello, everyone. Welcome to this week's episode of To the Point podcast. I'm Rachel Lyon here with my co host, John Knepher. John.

Jonathan Knepher:
Hi, Rachael.

Rachael Lyon:
Hi. Can alright. So can I just tell you something that I ran into? Actually, last night, I almost I was so frustrated. Tell me if you had a similar experience. I don't know the last time you had to send a fax, but I had to send a fax last night, you know, to this company. They only accept this particular form via fax. And I'm googling, you know, how to send a fax. Right? I went to, like, seven different websites and I couldn't do it.

Rachael Lyon:
I couldn't do it. Like, it just wouldn't work. It's like Dropbox fax, eFax, iFax, you name it. It didn't work for whatever reason. Like, I I literally felt I was doing something wrong. You know? Yeah.

Jonathan Knepher:
Send sending a fax is so foreign today. I I remember the last time I had to send one as well off to a government agency a couple of years ago, And I had to go down this rabbit hole of Yes. Of getting getting, I use Asterisk as a PBX for home, but adding in all the fax plug ins to do the crazy voice over IP, t 35 fax stuff. It was it was insane. And, you know, it's like, can't I just send this to you as scan it and email it? Right. No. It's gotta be a fax.

Rachael Lyon:
It's twenty twenty five, like, literally. Anyway, I just thought that was funny, but not funny, the amount of time it took to send literally a four page fax.

Jonathan Knepher:
Did you get it sent though? That's the question.

Rachael Lyon:
Finally. Thank you, WiseFacts. To everyone out there, WiseFacts worked for me. I could do a one time fax. It's $4. It was amazing. So short plug. Yeah.

[02:07] Meet Michele Rigby Assad, Ex-CIA Intelligence Officer

Rachael Lyon:
But let's jump into today's conversation. I'm really excited for today's guest. We have Michele Rigby Assad joining us. She's an FCIA intelligence officer, spent the majority of her career in The Middle East. She is also the author of two awesome books, Breaking Cover and Get Off the x, both on Amazon. And, I really want her to talk a little bit about her Get Off the x Book, her new book, because I think there's some there's some wonderful messages and and opportunities in there, for readers. So welcome, Michele, to the podcast.

Michele Rigby Assad:
Oh, thanks, Rachel and Jonathan. It's so great to be here. Yeah. I think that the conversation we're gonna have today is is very closely associated with my latest book, Get Off the X, which is about getting out of your personal and professional comfort zone or, looking taking a fresh view at what you do every day and whether it's actually effective or not. Because so often when you're in government or you're in policy, or you're even in the private sector, you you do something every day a certain way and then one day it dawns on you, there's been so much change and this is no longer working for us. And it takes so much energy to get off the x and creatively think a different way to do things like the fact that anyone's having to send a fax is demonstrative of that. Someone is stuck on the x. But it's interesting because get off the ax is actually a counter ambush training, phrase that we use how to survive an actual terrorist attack.

Michele Rigby Assad:
And it's about, you know, not freezing, trying to get you to, fight or flight but not freeze because that'll get you killed. So I'm just taking that and reworking it to like our everyday lives and not how to not get stuck and stay there.

Rachael Lyon:
I love that. That sounds like an awesome TEDx talk. I hope you're planning one.

Michele Rigby Assad:
That's a great idea.

Rachael Lyon:
I would love that. I would love that. So, Jonathan, do you wanna kick us off? I so many places we can start today.

[04:12] The Current Threat Landscape and US Response

Jonathan Knepher:
Yeah. Michele, I was thinking, do you wanna talk our listeners through, your view of the current threat landscape? What are some of the common threats you're seeing and things coming out of, you know, other nation states like Russia, China, The Middle East?

Michele Rigby Assad:
Oh, yeah. So so the biggest threat right now, in my opinion, is actually Iran and China. If if and and the reason is, Iran has been kind of backed into a corner by world events, and it seems like there's nothing Iran won't do to attack us. And whether that's cybersecurity attacks or whether it's physical assassination of journalists or, US leadership, They they've done it all, or they're trying to do it all. So I think because of what's happening in Israel with Palestine and Hamas, we have this heightened terror threat posed by Iran, which as we all know is a religious dictatorship that's been in power since 1979. And they're doing their best to hold on to power, you know, and none of us can even believe it's still there, but it is. And no one wants them. And they pose a threat not only to us, but also to the rest of the Middle East.

Michele Rigby Assad:
So the Arab states are terrified of Iran. So this is this is something that we should all be talking about and collaborating together on the threat posed by Iran.

Rachael Lyon:
That's that's, really interesting because I'd I'd also be interested in your perspective of, you know, how's The United States? Right? Where where are they playing in here to to help address these these threats and, you know, are are there more we should be doing or should be considering, from that landscape?

Michele Rigby Assad:
Yeah. So I think, to kind of compare things to post nineeleven, we realized after the attacks of nineeleven, how we weren't very good at sharing information and collaborating across agencies and countries, and it gave us a huge wake up call. And so I think we're, you know, things have started to change in our space right now, but I think there's a lot that can be done in terms of, marrying what we see technically with subject matter experts. And we've got technical folks like you who see certain things in systems. You've got subject matter experts, FBI and CIA, which see kind of that broader global threat. And we need to get these two sides talking. So the more that we can get public and private collaborating, the better it is for all of us. And I'll give you a very tangible example.

Michele Rigby Assad:
This last year in December, China attacked, nine different telecom companies. Now they didn't all realize that China had found a backdoor. But what I love is the US government said, hey, heads up, everyone. This this kind of attack has gone on. They provided a hunting guide, which is how do you look at your system and see whether you've been penetrated. Then it turns out several more telecommunications companies that didn't know they'd been penetrated realized it. So that intelligence that the US government passed on to the to to everyone, was very helpful for them to not only see what happened, but then, you know, close close the gap. Right? Yeah.

Michele Rigby Assad:
Improve the firewall.

Jonathan Knepher:
Wow. Yeah. Wow. That's so yeah. I mean, are are there things that our listeners should be taking from that for themselves to to protect them that? Because that I mean, that sounds like a very real threat.

Michele Rigby Assad:
It is a very real threat. You know, so here's, here's where I can take my, like, human experience and apply it to your world. So we have this little thing called optimism bias, where we believe the best of what's happening and we can't can't conceptualize that something is actually happening to us. And so I live here on the Space Coast Of Florida. So I'm in a land full of Patrick Space Force Base is literally right across the river from me. We have NASA, SpaceX, Blue Origin, all the big engineering firms. So we're a target rich environment. But the funny thing is, as I and my husband, as former CIA officers interact with the law enforcement community and private sector, they say things like, well, we're we're a small town.

Michele Rigby Assad:
Why would the Chinese be interested in us? Like, they can't fathom that the Chinese could be in this on the Space Coast and or up to no good. And and I'll I'll give you very tangible examples of this. This morning in our local press, a Chinese born man who is lives in Canada was arrested for flying a drone over Brevard County space and military installations. So he was it wasn't like I was looking at the animals and then suddenly I veered over. He was actually taking, videos of, Patrick Space Force Base, a submarine base at Port Canaveral and launch facilities at Cape Canaveral. So very sensitive areas. So that just happened. That just happened.

Michele Rigby Assad:
We literally have physical Chinese or people of China descent running around our area, which every time we tell people this, they're like, are you kidding? They're like, no. It's here. We just had an individual last year who left his job at an engineer engineering firm because he's of Chinese descent. The Chinese are very good at finding people who are, Americans, who are working in in, engineering and other similar companies. And that individual did not want to be extorted because that's what they do a lot of times is they try to force someone, they extort them to do something for China or they say your family's still in China. We're going to destroy them and put them in prison. That gentleman had so much integrity that he'd rather quit his engineering job here in Brevard County than be extorted by the Chinese for intelligence.

Rachael Lyon:
Wow.

Michele Rigby Assad:
But think about how many people can't do that because you gotta feed your family and you need your job. Like, you know, maybe he had other options, but a lot a lot of people do not. Yeah. So unless you have your engineering company is aware of what's going on, unless your government agency talks a lot about how the Chinese or the Iranians are working, shield your employees or you can't figure out a way to protect them if you don't know what they're doing, if you're not talking constantly with your workforce about this. So this is this is where we really need to step up and, you know, kinda crush that optimism bias. It is happening to you. If it's not, there's actually that's kinda weird.

Rachael Lyon:
Right. Right. It's it's not if, it's it's when. Right? Yes. Yeah. Yeah. Absolutely. I would like to dig in a little too because your perspective of The Middle East, you're gonna have more, I guess, personal experience probably with things like Facebook or, you know, when we talk about, right, you know, bias and and and all the things.

Rachael Lyon:
And, you know, I'm curious your perspective on how bad actors are, you know, capitalizing on modern technology. And you think like social engineering, right, through social media. But also some of these countries, is there a digital literacy gap? And, you know, I know a lot of them use like Facebook for news. And so it's kind of set up almost as a feeding ground. And how do you actually get get to a more neutral perspective?

Michele Rigby Assad:
Yeah. So there is so much social engineering going on using social media. In fact, like there are there are literally tens of thousands of Chinese operatives because, you know, labor is cheap in China so they can they can hire that many people, whose job is to socially engineer interactions with people that they want to target or use to get to where they need to go. So for me, I've had multiple, what I believe are Chinese operatives reach out, under the guys, they they look like Asian individuals, and they want me to provide training for some, Asian country. And, I mean, I'm like, do you think I'm stupid? Like, I was not born yesterday. But I am a knowledgeable former counterintelligence specialist to CIA. Now interesting. Listen to this one.

Michele Rigby Assad:
This is a fascinating story. A, a friend of a friend who is, out of a job, he's an engineer, he doesn't have a job right now, was, approached on LinkedIn. LinkedIn is a biggie for Chinese operatives and ISIS, by the way, as well, Hamas, things like that. They said they wanted to talk to him about potential job projects. And so they set up an interview, but suddenly the tech company, their Zoom camera doesn't work, which I love that. Right?

Rachael Lyon:
Right. Right.

Michele Rigby Assad:
Suddenly. Suddenly technology doesn't work for the tech company. You know what they said? They said they were Israelis.

Rachael Lyon:
Okay.

Michele Rigby Assad:
So they were it was a false flag operation

Rachael Lyon:
Right.

Michele Rigby Assad:
Likely by the Chinese, but we can't confirm, obviously. A false flag operation to pose as someone that they thought the target would be okay with. Right. And that person came to us and said, do you think it could be something else? Or like, oh, yeah. It Wow. Yes.

Jonathan Knepher:
Yeah.

Michele Rigby Assad:
And so as Americans, because we don't work like that, it's not in our heads that it could be a false flag op. We don't most people don't even know what that is. So, again, there's so much education that needs to be had in the public and private arenas so people understand how these actors, approach us.

[14:20] Social Engineering, AI, and Cybersecurity

Jonathan Knepher:
And, I mean, as I think about too, like, you know, you're talking about the social engineering and so on. How how does that, like, just I'm just thinking of, like, AI is like a force multiplier for them. Like, how do we like, what are the real challenges behind, like, that enablement of AI in generative things, and how do how do we counter those?

Michele Rigby Assad:
Such a good question. And it's not there's not an easy answer, but let's just this is one little way that I've dealt with it. So, for a while I was being targeted by, I don't know what entities. They kept saying, we have speaking engagements. We'd like to hire you to fly to The UK. We'd like to hire you to fly here or there. Maybe they just wanted me to click on a link eventually and get into my computer. Worst case scenario, they wanted me to fly somewhere and it was a personal security threat.

Michele Rigby Assad:
I don't know.

Rachael Lyon:
Right.

Michele Rigby Assad:
But in any case, it was easy for me to see what this was because there were misspellings. It was poor syntax and poor grammar. But now I'm like, with AI, that Those things are gone. Yes. Those indicators are not gonna be there. Right? So you're gonna have somebody who can't speak English who can still send you a beautiful letter. So you know what I do now is I immediately say, okay, I'm gonna get on a phone call with this person. And so then I have to assess if they're speaking to me, and I can do it very quickly, like an actual company that needs a speaker.

Michele Rigby Assad:
You know, there's certain ways they introduce themselves. They speak English. You know, all of this. I see them. I do a video chat or, you know, a Zoom or Microsoft Teams with them. So you have to take it to the personal and direct very quickly in order to assess what you're dealing with. I don't know how you do that on on a mass scale, though. Right?

Jonathan Knepher:
Yeah. Because, I mean, I fear that, right, like, when you combine the the AI bits to give scale and then, you know, you're talking about, you know, countries that have a huge labor force to respond, right, and handle handle all those phone calls, if you will. Right? Like, that that becomes a pretty scary proposition.

Michele Rigby Assad:
It is. And I I I think that our government is really behind they're really stuck on the x. They're really behind the curve because we don't have policies or we don't have directives that say, let's really focus on what do we do about this threat. Right. You know, our government, so again, there's a lot of changes that are need needed in government, drastic changes, and it looks like we may have a kind of administration that's willing to do that, but we need to really bring on board people who have excellent technical skills. And we need to pay them for those skills. Because a lot of people will go to the private sector because it pays a whole lot more than government. Right.

Michele Rigby Assad:
And so if we wanna attract the best talent to set better policies and to look at these things, we have to be willing to hire probably fewer people, better skilled Yes. And then we gotta pay them well. In both intelligence and cyber and, you know, all all of these government agencies that deal with, cyber threats and, you know, critical infrastructures threats.

Rachael Lyon:
Absolutely. You know, in addition to kind of where we see the talent gap, and I and I agree with you. Right? I mean, it's the right people in the right place can be very impactful. You know, but as as we look at kind of the emerging threat landscape and, you know, your in your background in intelligence as well, you you have to be a little bit forward looking. You know, how can organizations and policymakers get proactive, right, get ahead of these emerging threats instead of kind of being reactive as they develop?

Michele Rigby Assad:
That's a good you guys are full of good questions. I mean, that's the question of the hour there. Right.

Rachael Lyon:
How

Michele Rigby Assad:
do we get ahead of it? Because we're barely just dragging behind it right now. Never mind get ahead of it. I think Right. I think having, you know, people like the Elon Musks of the world who are kind of visionaries, there there there aren't a lot of them, you know, but those are the kinds of people we need to say the AI threat could coming down the pike. It could potentially look like a, b, and c, and this is how we need to start thinking about it. So I love I love if there could be a, public private link up where the government says, this is where we need to head, and they try you know, kind of give some directions. And then, you know, The US we're we're such create the great thing about Americans is we're very creative, you know? And you give us a challenge, and we're gonna get on it. Right? So but we need someone to say, here's the challenge.

Michele Rigby Assad:
This is where we're going. We need that leadership. And then and then we can, like, make it happen. It's always leadership. Right?

Rachael Lyon:
It is. It really is.

Jonathan Knepher:
But then, I mean so on the leadership front. Right? Like, I think there's kind of mixed messages now in government, right? Like, we have all of the focus on reduced spending and a lot of shake up going on, right? Like, there's both new visionary things but also cost controls. How how is that going to affect, you know, our ability to to defend and all of the various agencies that are that are potentially being questioned?

Michele Rigby Assad:
Right. So you've you know, in getting control over the spending, what you're trying what what it looks like they're trying to do is to get rid of, the fat. You know, I having served in the federal government, unfortunately, I've seen all kinds of fraud and programs that are should have never been set up that are not achieving anything. And we're very good at setting up programs and we're terrible about take deconstructing them if they're not working. Again, we it's government. We get stuck on the x and we sit there forever. So that has got to happen. We gotta call those ineffective programs or say, okay.

Michele Rigby Assad:
CIA, you're focused on this. Okay. NSA, you're focused on this. Then you start building. So you get rid of you free up funds, you free up resources from what's not working, and then you set up these new really high-tech programs that are very strategic in nature. So I think it kinda has to happen, like, that's the next step. Right? But but you also don't wanna leave it, like, too much, of a vacuum too. Yeah.

Michele Rigby Assad:
Because nature hoars a vacuum, and that also sets us up to be exploited by our enemies.

Rachael Lyon:
Double clicking into that a little more, you know, because I I have worked in, like, city government, and I know exactly what you're talking about. You know, the the the end of your budget, I gotta I haven't spent it. If I don't spend it, I don't get it next year. So we gotta do this thing, you know, public works project, tear up the roads, so we can get the same amount next year. I I'm a % I've I've seen that happen. You know, but also there's just general infrastructural in inefficiencies, right? I think you've mentioned this earlier, and it's built up over decades, right? We've always done it like this, you know, why would we change? And it's like turning the Titanic. And in many ways, I think that's kind of what you're talking about. Like how do we turn the Titanic, you know, looking at it from, you know, structurally infrastructure, right? That then enables you to do, you know, take on the more, you know, modern tools and, you know, kind of put folks in place or different programs in place to be more effective?

Michele Rigby Assad:
Yes. Oh my goodness. So again, from my world, the example I would use is that the way that we were taught to carry out human operations in the collection of human intelligence, which was our focus, is outdated. Why? Because there's cameras everywhere. Yeah. And and so it's changed fundamentally how you even collect intelligence on the ground. And so if we're we're still stuck, we're still stuck in that old way. Our our training hasn't changed.

Michele Rigby Assad:
Our hiring hasn't changed. I don't as far as I can tell from, you know, conversations with people who recently left the government, we we haven't changed our approach to HUMINT. Like, are you kidding me? How do we even accomplish anything right now, which I don't think we really are.

Jonathan Knepher:
End of

Michele Rigby Assad:
the day. So we have a whole CIA system set up for the wrong thing. Mhmm.

Rachael Lyon:
Yeah. It's crazy. Yeah.

Michele Rigby Assad:
So now I think, you know, HUMINT has to change so dramatically that we need to link up tech with HUMINT in a really, creative way. Right? And then so let's just take China as an example. We need people who understand China. I understand the Arab world. Like that's my area. I'm not a Chinese expert. I'll never be, but we need those people. But we also know how the Chinese government is exploiting people or extorting them or, you know, targeting them.

Michele Rigby Assad:
So then you say, okay, if we're going to hire people of Chinese descent into the U S government, which we desperately need, how do we set them up to protect them? Now, have we even asked that question? Probably not. I've been a government and I'm sure as obvious as that is, we have not asked that question. How do we use cover in a more in a better way to protect them? How do we how do we use dangle operations? Dangle the the Chinese American in front of the Chinese, and then you run an operation based on that. They're gonna serve it back to them. Right. Right. Yeah. So there's so many things that really need to change on in the way we do cyber and intelligence that, if we could get those two working in tandem, we'd be in much better place.

Jonathan Knepher:
But part of part of that too, though, like, you bring up other concerns. Right? Like, you mentioned, like, security and cameras. You know, we know that, you know, there's a lot of surveillance, around around the world. How do we balance that, though, with civil liberties, privacy, our own individual, you know, constitutional privileges. Right?

Michele Rigby Assad:
Yeah. Our privacy is gone. There is I mean, we all know that. We we have happily given up a lot of that to the fact that we wanna, you know, use Amazon and receive everything the next day, like Google search. Nothing is private. So it's it's really hard. It's a good question. Like, how do we ensure we collect what we need to do, what we need to do, and we don't infringe on American civil liberties? That's that's where we need, to be extremely careful because, you know, post nine eleven, we had these special provisions that allowed us to collect all kinds of data for the counterterrorism mission and over time that shifted course.

Michele Rigby Assad:
And now you're now you're using those same, same law laws or regulations to collect on things we should not be collecting on. So, yeah, you're right. You're absolutely right to ask that question, and this is and then it's gonna get harder and harder as we get more and more and more digital.

Jonathan Knepher:
Well, in which way do you think it's going to go? Do you think that we're going to continue to erode these privacy protections, or do you think there will be a balance that will kind of, like, allow us to maintain at least some level of privacy?

Rachael Lyon:
Oh, wait. And can I piggyback on that, John? Right? Just, to maybe we'll give a two for here for you, Michele. I love TikTok. I love my TikTok. I get all the animal videos. And, you know, when TikTok was going away, right, I mean, the mass exodus to Redbook. Right? The the Chinese app been everything was in Chinese. People were like, I don't care.

Rachael Lyon:
I'm giving away all of my information just so I can have a TikTok.

Jonathan Knepher:
Yeah. And talk about jumping out of the frying pan into the fire there. It's like Yeah.

Rachael Lyon:
And they were calling them TikTok refugees and, you know, it was crazy and people didn't care. They're like, I'd rather learn Mandarin than go back to using Facebook. Right? So they you've got these this dichotomy that's just crazy today. We talk about privacy but you're willing to give it up just so I can get my TikTok replacements.

Michele Rigby Assad:
Right. I'll give it up to the Chinese communist government where there is no freedom. Like, and and some I had a conversation on a podcast with someone of a of a younger generation who's like, we you haven't done a good job of communicating to us why this is a threat. I'm like, oh my God. I don't even know what to say because it's so, it's so obvious to those of us who have been around for a couple of decades how not having freedom of religion, freedom of speech, freedom of media, freedom of process is integral to who we are. And when and somehow this linkage between your buying habits or your social media usage, being in the hands of this foreign regime that stands for everything you abhor. They don't understand at the end of the day that information is power. And China is the world vacuum of data to feed their AI program primarily through, like vehicles like TikTok.

Michele Rigby Assad:
And they're soaking and people like, but it's just information. I'm like, information is power and information will rule the world. Right. Period. And so it may or may not happen in your generation, but you may be setting up your children for complete disaster.

Jonathan Knepher:
And I think people don't realize, like, that the information is valuable in ways that you can't comprehend. Right? Like like, as Rachel was saying, like, people thinking, oh, I'm just giving up the fact that I like cat videos. It's like, well, that's not what you're giving up. You're giving up the aggregation of who you are.

Michele Rigby Assad:
Yes. Exactly. I don't know what it's yeah. People are like, well, I don't care if they know I like cats. Like, that's not the point.

Jonathan Knepher:
That's not what you're giving up.

[28:25] Balancing Privacy, Security, and Economic Espionage

Rachael Lyon:
A %. No. I I yeah. I I don't disagree. I'm conflicted because I I just I love my animal videos, and they serve them all up. But, you know, I do recognize on the back end, you know, I'm giving up. And then part of me, Michele, honestly, and maybe as a cyber professional I shouldn't say this, but I kinda feel like a lot of my stuff I get those alerts saying you're compromised, you're compromised. Your email's out there.

Rachael Lyon:
Your personal details are out there. Your password's out there. So I I'm like, if they already have it, is this the wrong kind of thinking? I mean, it's a lot of it's already out there in the dark web. It's true. Yeah.

Michele Rigby Assad:
It's true. It is so much of it out there. It is tough. But I think there's just some obvious things like buying from Timu using TikTok, you know, and I try to explain it like this. Like, you just pretend that you have spent a bunch of money setting up a company. Let's say you're making clothing, and and then the Chinese came in and stole your design ideas because this is what they do every single day, every single day. And then they start selling them because, again, labor is cheap. They start manufacturing what you designed, what you've invested in, and they start selling from China.

Michele Rigby Assad:
And then the next thing you know, your business is shut down because they can underbid you. That is exactly the race that we're in right now with China, which is saying, go ahead, spend hundreds of millions, if not billions of dollars in space and technology and your, you know, your aircraft and your your seeds for food, your special seeds that you've created, you've developed. We're we will break in. We will steal the engineering designs that you spent all your capital on. Then we will take it to China. We will reverse engineer it. We will then produce it ourselves, and we'll undercut you by selling for less. And we, in the long run, Ron, will destroy you economically by stealing from you in that manner.

Jonathan Knepher:
Well, I'm sufficiently scared now.

Michele Rigby Assad:
It sounds so, like, I sound so extreme. I know too much, I think.

Rachael Lyon:
I hate to do this, but we're at the end of today's podcast. This is such a great conversation with Michele that we're going to pick up for part two next week. To all of our listeners out there, thank you so much for joining this week. And for our new listeners, welcome. And if you're enjoying the conversation, please subscribe. We're on all major podcast platforms. Until next week, everyone. Stay secure.

About Our Guest

Michele Rigby Assad, Ex-CIA Intelligence Officer

Michele’s career began in Washington, D.C. working for an international relief and development agency in its government relations department. Michele joined the CIA in January 2002 and spent a decade serving as an undercover intelligence officer in the Directorate of Operations. Specializing in counterterrorism, counterintelligence and lie detection, Michele spent the majority of her career in the Middle East. She had five overseas tours, to include Iraq and other secret locations.

Since leaving the CIA, Michele and her husband Joseph have run an international consulting firm that provides support to Western and not-native companies working in the Arabian Gulf, the wider Middle East, and several countries in Asia and Europe (SITE Advisors). She is also a keynote speaker, trainer, and author.

Check out her LinkedIn!