From military to cyber, from poverty to protected: Real stories, real impact

Behind every firewall is a human being. Behind every policy is a story. We recently hit the road and attended the National Cyber Security Show (NCSS 2026) in Birmingham, we stopped looking at screens and started looking at people. In Part 2 of our NCSS Special Edition Series, Jay and Warren sit down with four extraordinary voices who are redefining what cybersecurity really means - and who it's really for. From a 21-year military career to the frontline of security culture. From digitally excluded children to the IT teams burning out to protect 30,000 UK schools. These are the stories the industry doesn't put on its keynote slides. 🔥 WHAT YOU'LL DISCOVER (The Unfiltered Truth): - 📉 The Frontline Reality Check: Raw market insights from the trenches. What is paralyzing leaders today, emerging trends, and why the future of defense is human-centric resilience. - 🛑 The Silent Burnout Epidemic: The extreme mental health toll on the exhausted, under-resourced IT teams tasked with defending the UK's 30,000 schools. - 🧸 The True Cost of Digital Poverty: The intersection of cybersecurity and child safety, proving why true digital defense means nothing if it leaves the digitally excluded behind. - 🚫 Toxic Culture vs. Human Defense: Why spending millions on AI and firewalls completely fails if your workplace is paralyzed by a culture of blame. - 🔮 The AI Threat & The Human Solution: As global threat actors weaponize AI, discover why your absolute ultimate defense will always be human connection. - 🚀 Breaking the "Coder-Only" Myth: The untapped, non-technical career pathways and why empathetic relationship builders are exactly what the market is starving for. 🔹 Liz Murray - Chief of Staff, SASIG Events Following a successful 21-year military career, Liz moved into the private sector in 2018. Despite having initially said “not a bank and not Cybersecurity.” her first role was in cyber at HSBC. Liz subsequently held impactful roles in financial services, cyber-vendor and retail enterprise organisations, deepening her cross-sector expertise in education, leadership behaviours, and humanfactorsled security. Liz now serves as Chief of Staff for the Security Awareness and Special Interest Group (the SASIG), driving resilience and risk discussions across cybersecurity best practice, mental health and wellbeing, cyberincident preparedness, safeguarding vulnerable people online, diversity and inclusion, and STEM career development. 🎁Learn More: https://www.thesasig.com/ 🔹 Michael Tarbard (Every Child Online) – CEO & Founder tackling digital poverty head-on. Michael's giving refurbished devices and online safety support to disadvantaged children and young people across the UK—while building national partnerships that connect families to education and opportunity. His challenge to transformation leaders? If your strategy doesn't reach the digitally excluded, you're building for a shrinking market. 🎁Learn More: Https://everychildonline.co.uk 🔹 Dolores Ruzafa - International Security Advisor - Xygeni Passionate about People, with nearly 40 years in the IT world - starting with Seagate, then Dell, Symantec, Kiuwan, Testrail, Ranorex, Preemptive and now the very best Xygeni. The one thing that she has seen constant is People – Dolores reminds us that “We all need the human touch” - and that is her strength. Dolores listens and connects so that you can share your concerns and together find a solution. 🎁Learn More: https://xygeni.io/ 🔹 Michael Coffer With over a decade of experience, Michael is a trusted strategic partner helping organizations drive security innovation and navigate emerging threats. While he and his team at Heimdal work relentlessly to keep threat actors out of enterprise environments, Michael’s primary mission is defending the UK Education Sector. He champions the critically under-resourced and under-staffed IT teams tasked with protecting the next generation across 30,000 schools.