State of (Absolute) AppSec
Seth Law, Ken Johnson, Kevin McDermott, Astha Singhal, Clint Gibler
BSidesSF 2026 · Day 1 · AMC Theatre 12
The "State of (Absolute) AppSec" panel at BSides SF delved into the seismic shifts occurring within application security due to the rapid advancements and integration of Artificial Intelligence (AI) into the software development lifecycle. Moderated by Ken Johnson and Seth Law, the discussion featured a distinguished panel comprising Kevin McDermott, Astha Singhal, and Clint Gibler, who offered diverse perspectives on the challenges and opportunities presented by this new technological era. The central theme explored how AI is not merely an additive tool but a fundamental disruptor, necessitating a radical rethinking of AppSec strategies, tooling, and professional competencies.
AI review
A competent panel of credible practitioners sharing honest observations about AI's impact on AppSec — the Superhuman DAST triage anecdote and the SQL injection regression in Claude upgrades are genuinely useful signal. But it's a BSides panel doing panel things: broad strokes, modest specificity, nothing here that a careful reader of tl;dr sec or the Absolute AppSec back-catalog hasn't already absorbed.