Member Contribution • Weekly CISO Podcast Pick

This Week’s Pick by David B. Cross (CISO, Atlassian)

Series curated by the CISO Platform community. Spotlighting practical listens for security leaders and their teams.

Why MFA no longer stops modern phishing

Most enterprises have deployed MFA. Attackers adapted. Authentication proxy attacks allow adversaries to let MFA succeed while stealing session tokens in real time. The user logs in successfully. The attacker logs in too.

Featured session — Chris Merkel (Senior Director, Cyber Defense)
Delivered at BSides • Focus on real-world MFA bypass, token theft and identity defense.
Session excerpt • Authentication Proxy Attacks
⏱ ~14 min read Focus: MFA bypass • token theft • detection • response • hunting

Why this matters to CISOs

  • MFA success does not mean safety. Attackers steal session tokens after MFA completes.
  • User awareness breaks down. Login pages are real, branding is real and sessions look normal.
  • Encrypted email is abused. Trusted secure-message systems are now delivery vehicles.
  • Soft resets fail. Password changes alone do not invalidate stolen tokens.
  • Identity is the new perimeter. Detection and response must shift accordingly.

Copy-paste takeaways for your team

  • MFA proxy attacks allow full user login while stealing session tokens.
  • Successful MFA can still represent account compromise.
  • Encrypted email platforms increase attacker credibility.
  • Token replay enables multi-day access without reauthentication.
  • Correlation beats single alerts for detection.

Standout ideas from the session

  • Phishing-resistant MFA matters. Not all MFA stops token theft.
  • Security awareness has limits. Expecting users to catch this is unrealistic.
  • Attackers use SaaS tooling. These are commoditized, not elite techniques.
  • Conditional Access is the new firewall. Powerful but easy to misconfigure.

Try these in the next 7 days

  1. Log review: Correlate MFA success with unusual access behavior.
  2. Session revocation drill: Validate you can fully invalidate tokens fast.
  3. Email review: Audit encrypted messaging configurations.
  4. CA policy check: Re-evaluate Conditional Access logic and inheritance.
  5. Attack simulation: Test MFA proxy attacks internally.
 

About David B. Cross

David B. Cross is Chief Information Security Officer at Atlassian. Before Atlassian he held senior security leadership roles at Microsoft, Google and Oracle and began his career in US Navy aviation and electronic warfare. His work focuses on building engineering centric security programs, scaling security operations and helping the next generation of practitioners build meaningful careers.

 

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Atlanta Chapter Meet: Build the Pen Test Maturity Model (Virtual Session)

  • Description:

    The Atlanta Pen Test Chapter has officially begun and is now actively underway.

    Atlanta CISOs and security teams have kicked off Pen Test Chapter #1 (Virtual), an ongoing working series focused on drafting Pen Test Maturity Model v0.1, designed for an intel-led, exploit-validated, and AI-assisted security reality. The chapter was announced at …

  • Created by: Biswajit Banerjee
  • Tags: ciso, pen testing, red team, security leadership

Panel Discussion: Top Breaches in Cyber Security in 2025