Trust Engineering: Building Security Leadership at Early-Stage Startups
Mike Privette
BSidesSF 2025 — Here Be Dragons · Day 2 · Main
Being the first security hire at a startup is fundamentally different from enterprise security — it is a business leadership role that happens to do security. Mike Privette's "trust engineering" framework provides five concrete steps for building credibility and influence before attempting to build a security program, flipping the conventional model on its head. ---
AI review
Privette knows his lane and works it well. The trust engineering framing — security leader as business diplomat first, technical practitioner second — is pragmatic advice for first security hires who keep getting fired for doing their jobs too well. Doesn't pretend to be more than it is.