With over 41,000 cybersecurity leaders descending on San Francisco, RSAC Conference 2025 promises an epic week for the cybersecurity industry.
There’s no shortage of news in the cybersecurity space and this year is more tumultuous than most. Tariff wars, political rollercoasters, new threats, new regulations AI, budget cuts – all stress that CISOs and security leaders must take in stride.
But here at Expert Insights, our mission is to help you cut through the noise and the cliches to get the insights that really matter to your business.
To help you find out what the underlying currents are that you really need to pay attention to at RSAC this year, we reached out to a few of our contacts at the show for their expertise.
Here’s what they told us:
1. Agentic AI Will Dominate Discussions
Agentic AI is set to transform cybersecurity, driving discussions on its role in enhancing GRC, securing applications, and evolving SOC operations.
- Boris Logvinsky, VP of Product, Vanta: At RSAC this year, I am looking forward to engaging in impactful conversations around the future of agentic AI – especially the role that AI agents play in the Governance, Risk, and Compliance (GRC) space. As our AI-driven world continues to evolve, I am excited to connect with industry leaders and peers on how they’re leveraging AI in their organizations and products to deliver value to their customers.
- Rupesh Chokshi, SVP & GM of Application Security at Akamai: With the rapid rise of AI-powered applications and growing interest in agentic AI, securing these technologies is more critical than ever for modern enterprises. We are looking forward to discussing security from this lens as well as AI for security and exploring new data on emerging threats to apps and APIs.
- Chas Clawson, Security Field CTO, Sumo Logic: We’ve spent the last year watching GenAI mature from a buzzword into a practical force in security operations. RSAC 2025 will spotlight the next evolution—from assistants to agents, and from isolated use cases to integrated defense. This next wave of innovation will redefine how humans and machines collaborate, evolving the SOC from fragmented workflows to intelligent, AI-accelerated operations.
2. The Role Of The CISO Is Evolving
The CISO role is adapting to AI-driven risks, demanding greater transparency and strategic leadership in cybersecurity.
- Patrick Joyce, Global Resident CISO, Proofpoint: At RSAC 2025, I’m looking forward to deeper conversations around how CISOs are navigating the risk-reward equation of AI and pushing for transparency in how these tools and their associated apps are built and secured. This year’s conference promises to facilitate crucial discussions and insights for anyone looking to stay ahead of the evolving CISO role and the scrutiny shaping the future of cybersecurity leadership.
3. In An AI World, Identity Is As Important As Ever
Identity-first security is critical as attackers increasingly target digital identities, making robust protection a top priority.
- Haider Iqbal, Director of Product Marketing at Thales: Look for identity-first security. A major shift that you might have observed recently is the increased attack on identity infrastructure. Whether it’s the identities of your workforce, your consumers, your suppliers, or your partners, malicious actors are targeting their digital identities as the focal point of attack. While there’s no silver bullet to thwart all attacks, protecting these various identities should be right up there on the CISO and CIO agenda. After all, identities aren’t a gateway to your data just for your users, but for your adversaries as well!
4. Zero Trust Meets AI
Zero Trust combined with agentic AI innovations will be key focus areas at RSAC 2025.
- Deepen Desai, Chief Security Officer, Zscaler: “Zero Trust everywhere meets AI will be a top theme. We expect to see Agentic AI innovations across various IT and Security domains. Non-Human Identities will be top of mind as we enter the era of Agents. PQC resilience is another top area for organizations to start preparing for.”
What’s at the top of your list heading into RSAC 2025?
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