This is identity at the center. If it has anything to do with
IAM, this is the go to podcast now your hosts Jim McDonald and
Jeff Stedman. Welcome to the Identity at the
Center podcast. I'm Jeff and that's Jim.
Hey, Jim. Hey, Jeff.
How are you? Not so bad yourself.
I'm doing great. You know, it's good.
Again, we're at the Authenticate conference and it's a really
cool conference. I mean you know it's not one of
the really big conferences we go to like Gardner Eidner Verse or
some of the vendor specific conferences.
However, like you'll see signage that say MFA is so 80s.
And I'm like, I feel like I'm still going around to my clients
saying make sure you have MFAI mean, I know it's old, but it's
kind of like I'm in between, right?
Because you better have MFA. But at the same time, it's this
passerless phenomenon. It's kind of like making it
passe. Well, passkeys are having its
moment in the sun right now, but at the end of the day you still
need to have some factor additional to.
Just a password, right? So MFAI think is still valid.
Lots of companies out there have spent the last couple years
investing in even just getting MFA off the ground, especially
with, you know, the pandemic and people working from home and
needing to do better authentication on that, which is
great. MFA still has a place in the
world. It's better than not having MFA.
But clearly the future is shifting towards passkeys and
Fido authentication. We've seen Google, Microsoft,
Apple. Yeah, so I don't want to poo poo
all over the MFA thing. It definitely feels like it's, I
don't want to say legacy, but we're approaching that.
It's kind of like, OK, SMS, right?
That was top of the line 10 years ago.
SMS is the best thing you can do now.
It's not even recommended. Is it better than nothing?
Yes, of course. But people aren't recommending
that you start with SMS now, They're starting with, hey, you
should be looking at pass keys for your.
I also think there's a difference between enterprise I
am and customer I am. I think that's probably the
biggest dividing line because usually customer I am is focused
on apps and and the web, whereas employee workforces.
I mean it can be anything from legacy green screens to VPNs and
and as well as you know apps that are either desktop apps or
web enabled apps of all generations so.
Those are different. They're captive audiences,
right. I mean your employee, your your
employer can say this is the way you're going to do that, right?
And you don't have generally speaking much of A choice within
those rails consumer side of things.
It's. How easily can I get you to
spend money with me, right, or give me data or whatever The
thing is right? So of course you need to have a
minimum threshold of security, but it is much more open to,
hey, let's look at it easier ways.
You know, the user experience is much more predominant now.
I think that's changing, thankfully, but I think that's
still sort of a general thrust between the two.
Yeah, absolutely. So I think the pesky's are a big
topic. You know how they fit into
authentication, especially customer I am is something that
we ought to explore And to that to that end we have a great
guest today. Yeah.
When you say explore, I think of the cowbell.
Let's explore the space. Let's explore the space of task
keys. Want to welcome to the show
Pedro Martinez. He's a business owner for
Digital Banking Authentication at Tallis Group.
Welcome to the show, Pedro. Thank you very much.
It's a pleasure. Yeah, Thanks for taking the time
with us. One of the things that we like
to do when we have someone on for the first time is to really
kind of learn their identity origin story.
How did you get into the world of identity access management?
Is it something that you chose or did it choose you?
No, basically 25 years ago I went to a job interview knowing
very exactly where I was going and I found myself working into.
And Identity and access company which at the time was called the
Schlumberger and and has been evolving name over time to the
point that today without having changed companies it's talents.
So I didn't know at the at the end but it happened to be a.
Very. A very lucky, I would say a very
lucky situation because it put me in the right place at the
right time because we are talking about this was 1998 when
I joined. And all the sudden it turns out
that this company that I interviewed for and they finally
hired me, their main business was to manufacture smart cards,
smart cards for either banking, so for payment cards at the time
that we were starting with the transition from.
Max drive towards cars with a chip and at the same time we
were having the the big roll out worldwide of GSM technology with
SIM cards and so you there was a point in the where where you
essentially would be walking down the street and you will
heat a stone and you would have a.
A licence for a for a mobile operator popping out, popping
out the floor. It was there were licences
coming out all the time in each country around Europe and later
on it was around here. So it was, it was a boom of
telecom and and it was, it was a happy moment to get into that
kind of market that all the way until now changing a lot over
the years because that was very hardware centric at the time.
Around cars, the manufacturing, the personalization it was, it
was not just manufacturing cars. The the main, the main value
that we were bringing was the fact that every single SIM card
or banking card that was leaving our factory was personalized.
It was charged with a specific unique credentials to be
associated. So that was what was making.
We were making millions, but each of one was coming out as a
different product, already personalized from the factory at
the time. So that evolved a lot and over
time it, it turned more towards software and and back end
services than the actual development.
So today it's a mix. We still do SIM cards, we do
banking cards, but we do a lot of back end solution, server
solution, solutions for securing digital banking, digital
payment, tokenisation. Etcetera, etcetera.
So that that was it was purely by chance.
I didn't know what I was getting into and am I 25 years late?
That's how I feel like a lot of people in the space sort of just
ended up in it. You have a title of business
owner, at least I introduced you as business owner for digital
banking authentication at Tallis Group.
I got two questions. First question is what does
business owner for digital banking authentication mean?
You know, what do you do? And then tell us a little bit
about Telus Group because I think it's it's a large company
that people who prefer maybe people aren't familiar with
bring us up to speed on that. So well, first of all business
owner means that my role today is not technical.
I have a responsibility which is worldwide.
It's not a specific to a region and I I I basically I'm
following all the. Opportunities that we have for
business related to these type of solutions of authentication
for digital banking with customers and with our sales
teams around the world. I am not frontline, not normally
with customers. I am.
I am obviously our sales teams. Our sales teams are.
I am called on occasion to to help, to assist, to have
conversations and particularly with the topic of passkey that
I've been exposed a lot over the last 1618 months.
We have been very proactive in going and talking with customers
and I have been and we wanted to gather as well a lot of feedback
we were sharing with them what we knew and they were they were
coming back. So business owner means that I
follow the business not not at a deep technical, just following
the opportunities and helping our.
Our regional teams to to sell, to sell our stuff, yeah.
And Telus Group is a French company.
I didn't know much about Schlumberger, but I just
pronunciation leads me to believe that was a French
company. Well, nothing to do because they
were completely different companies.
I'll I'll just to as you as you mentioned Schlumberger,
Schlumberger, I don't know if I'm pronouncing it well, I don't
know if I but. The origin of that company is
American, it was a couple of and the name of Lamborghinis
probably is probably I think that it was to German or German
origin brothers that the family name and it's a it's an American
company Oilfield services as the main business.
But they had a division that was working on something completely
different and it was the business that I was talking
about. Smart cars, smart cars,
technology now. And that's what that's what I
joined over time. There was a point where we, we
went through an IPO and we became an independent company.
Just this division, there's so, so much it continues to to work
and do a lot of great business around all field services,
engineering, services, very, very impressive.
And we became an independent company under the name of
Axalto. Then we merged with our first
competitor which was, I'm talking about my my Origin that
we merged with our main competitor.
We became Gemalto at the time as a result of that and and we were
the number one provider for, for all these kind of of products.
So now Talas. And now Talas acquired us about
five years ago. And Talius is a big is a big big
company French multinational with working with divisions
around aerospace, around defence and also around civil services.
And we have joined as a as a as a division within Talius around
cybersecurity. Our the name of our division is
is is DIS Digital Identity and Security.
And yeah, we we we bring that that aspect of for for security
always with the aspect of security but very centre on on
the digital life And so for those who are not very familiar
are is supposed to be the work that you do in Europe.
I'm sorry, are most of your customers in Europe?
No, no, no, no. We we are.
I mean, I if I talk, I. I'm going to talk about the DIS,
the digital identity and security.
We are a very multinational, very multinational company.
Even the part that related to Gemalto, remember that we were,
we were, we were working with banks and with telcos and with
governments, because I talk about banking cards and SIM
cards, but we also were were providing electronic passports
and electronic IDs, for example, as well as equipment for reading
them. To to governments, to telcos, to
banks. All around the world, All around
the world. We are.
So you're working with like some really large clients and this
idea of passwordless. I mean we've relied on the
password for so long and I've heard you make the statement
passkeys will replace the password.
I'm wondering why you say that and what kind of reaction you
get when you say that to these big organisations that you work
with. So that's that's that's actually
it. It it all started well, it all
started last year. We have been working, we have
been members of the Fido alliance since very early on.
We are board members and we have been participating actively
leading leading WAR groups. We have contributing to it and
we have been building products and certifying our own products
as as Fido products. But it is a technology that we.
Always consider that he had promise and we were following
and we were coming with products.
But it was last year in May when Apple, Google and Microsoft did
something that to my knowledge, because I haven't been able to
find any president of that, did something unique, which was to
issue a joint PR. The three of them.
That was the moment where we said, OK, this is even bigger
than. We thought it would be, it was
we, we we really saw that this was going.
We knew that everybody had been working and had been doing all
the plumbing that would be necessary for this technology to
succeed. But sometimes that's not enough.
No. But when we saw that level of
commitment and that level of commitment from the three of
them, we said OK, well, so here there is something big that is
going is, is, is really going to happen and we decided that we
needed to. Start to evangelise a little bit
to take the opportunity. It was, it was, it was not the
time yet to take an action from from customers last year.
But it was an opportunity for us to go see our own customers and
and share information with them that we believe they would find
valuable because what we were convinced is that they weren't,
they didn't know what was coming.
So even if there was this announcement.
People was not processing visa. What is irrational at the time
you read? Sorry, it sounded irrational
because you if you haven't had time to observe the idea.
Yeah, or or or you just don't, you know, I mean, we have been
depending on passwords for as long as there is Internet.
It has come to a point and nobody likes them.
Nobody, Neither the service providers nor the end users.
Nobody likes to use passwords. And yet we have come to accept
that it is what it is. It's always been like this.
It gets to a point, except everybody that is working here
on a solution. Everybody that is out of this
bubble. It has come to a point that they
just accept that they have to manage 50 or 60 or 7 different
passwords, that every time that they are going to a login that
they have not visited in three or four months there a standard
login user experience is going to be going through the password
recovery mechanism. We have come to accept all that
as as just the way things are, no and and even even our
interfaces in companies. Anyway, we we thought that we
needed to go on, we needed to to share information and to see the
reaction as well. And and we started to go out and
we started to plan our most beloved customers and and and to
see them. And when we started to do these
meetings indeed we we said we want to grab their attention and
we are going to start by by by by poking a little bit and and I
will start with a slide that was saying flat out and this is
going at customers that I don't normally see.
It's not like they know me. I mean, they they just see.
A weird guy that is coming with her with her with her the the
typical contact which is the salesperson for that account or
or anyway and and and and along comes these these weird guy you
know and and he sits in the room and and he comes out and comes
out with a slide and start by saying passkeys are going to
kill password. It is inevitable, and it's going
to happen fast. And the reaction was as
expected. You could, you could see it.
I mean you would be in the room and maybe there were 5-6 people
depending on on the gathering and the customer and all the
sudden you would see a one guy typically security architect or
so that would lean back on the chair and cross there and cross
there. They didn't have to.
Say anything. It was the body language.
Yeah, yeah. They didn't say anything.
No, but. But that was somehow intended.
It's a way to be you. It was creating a little bit of
attention and then and then from there you you want.
I wanted them no to to challenge that that statement.
But when you go through it, the question was, OK, I understand
you who you don't believe. Why would you believe it?
I mean you have always seen these and it has never, it has
never happened. When you go through that and you
start to explain them that, well then I was explaining why are
they why it is inevitable that this is going to happen.
And then I was starting with the lamest argument possible.
Which was to tell them because they are great and they were
kind of kind of laughing well, but they are great.
Let's see. They are really great because
they are clearly providing, compared to passwords, they are
clearly providing a much better user experience.
And you could expect rolling their eyes, yeah, the better
user experience, OK. They provide a much better
security and you can get into actions and you can start to
talk there about they cannot be fished.
They cannot be subject to a massive data leaks that begins
to touch ground because they have seen them.
Either they have suffered them themselves or they have seen
nearby bombs dropping to them. And then you can tell them I
need and and as a third argument of why they are great because
they can reduce your cost very significantly.
The cost of the password research represent one of the
biggest 'cause that you have related to customer care, so
that is quantifiable. OK, they are great, but that is
not enough. What is the second big reason
why it's inevitable is because and that's where where you you
come out with APR and you say look at the level of
commitments. This is something unprecedented,
these guys, Microsoft, Google, Apple and the industry behind
them, because the Fido alliance with everything that comes
behind these guys have declared publicly.
That they are committed to end with passwords.
This begins to be this begins to be something you've got to think
if all of your Apple, Microsoft, Google, Amazon services start
using passkeys. It becomes ubiquitous.
Everybody gets used to doing it. Who's listening to this podcast?
Who isn't used to doing MFA? Because at one point in time,
that was almost unheard of. They're going to send me a
message to my phone and I've got to enter that.
You know, it was, it was new. Well, now everybody gets it.
You see that pop up? Check your phone for message or
for a one time password, etcetera.
The same thing's going to happen with passkeys, right?
Yeah we are going to get used because we are going to see it.
But but there are two two aspects and this sometimes is it
it gets especially talking and that's what a different you you
said Microsoft, Google, Apple and Amazon.
Obviously they are big must as as service providers but we have
to make the difference with Microsoft, Google and Apple
because the other reason that brings to say that this is
inevitable is that day three they hold the platforms for all
the. End user communication devices,
whether they are computers, tablets or or or phones that we
all use, you have there practically 100% of the market.
And if they three are telling we are going to make this happen we
are going to do everything that is necessary at the level of our
devices and at the level of the operating systems for this to be
enabled. That is a big thing and indeed
they did the announcement that announcement that told us wait
this is going to happen and over the next that was the 5th of May
actually that's password they of 2022 and over the 5-6 months
that followed they they they were true to their to their
commitment because by the end of 2022 you had you had you had
Windows, you had you had Android, you had iOS you had Mac
OS equipped for passkeys natively.
Yeah, all along. So you're drawing the
distinction on Google, Microsoft, because they have the
devices. Next level down might be Amazon,
eBay, TikTok, you know, does anybody not think this is going
to happen? Is anybody thinking this is not
going to happen? Well, it depends.
I mean if you, if you think well, OK, so so there is, there
is, there is, there is banks, there is certain industries and
in particular the banking industry that because that was
the second part of the conversation that we were having
at that table with those with those customers, no, even with,
with with the person that was leaning back on the table.
The first part of the conversation was to tell them
this is going to happen, this technology is going to thrive.
The second part of the conversation was, well, is this
fitting well for financial institutions?
And there things were getting complicated.
And in part, besides sharing information with them, we also
wanted to get their feedback to see how they see it, because at
the beginning there was quite some, quite some, quite some
doubts. Why is that?
At the same time that Google, Apple and Microsoft said we are
going to we are going to enable this technology and make it
natively, they also came out with a notion of synchronisation
of of pass keys. All the work that had been done
at the Fido Alliance to build the pass keys was always under
the consideration that a passkey was bound to a device.
Passkey is created on one device, you create that
credential and that credential. Once it is created it it creates
a unique link between a service provider, a user and and then a
specific device and so it becomes a possession factor, a
possession factor for a multi factor authentication.
However, the moment that you enable synchronisation, which is
great from for for more than one reason for one side because it
simplifies the user experience, you don't need to create a
passkey for every single device that you have.
You can just create one passkey on one device.
And if you have multiple devices on the same my myself, I I use
Apple devices. I've got to say, I have a Mac, I
have a tablet, I have a. Fanboy.
You're a fanboy. Well done.
Hey, it. Works and they're good.
Device I like we all, we all, we all have our.
He said he stares at his back book.
Anyway, The the The thing is that it's great.
I mean that's synchronisation, it simplifies life and it also
solves an an everlasting issue related to a strong
authentication which is the which is account recovery.
You know if you lose your device then you need to again verify
your identity in order to create on a new device etcetera
etcetera. Having this backup, this is
fantastic, but you have lost the notion of device binding that
when you create a passkey. I create it on one device on my
iPhone, but all the sudden that I that passkey is going to flow
through iCloud and end up available on my iPad and on my
MacBook. Well, it's difficult to claim
that that that is a a possession of it's proving it's it's it the
possession factor. It's proving possession of what?
At most, it's proving possession or control.
It's really that I have control of my iCloud account, but not of
which. Goes back to password which goes
back to password. So, so in in that was something
and as we started discussing with with our banks we're
telling this is going to come, this is something that is
arriving but but what is, what is going to be your position of
that? We're talking about the
second-half of 2022. We're having these conversations
and some were surprised and were saying no, no, this doesn't
happen some and we were trying to form our own opinion and
there were discussings into the Fido alliance as well.
No, in the end, in the end we scratched our head a little bit
for a while. But over time as we had more and
more interviews and we mature our own position it it is not
that that complicated as that at least in our in our view.
We think because there is there is any bank that today is using
passwords even if it's partially because they require something
more than passwords to meet regulation.
But if they are using passwords as part of their authentication
policy, there is in our view, there is absolutely no doubt
that they should jump at the possibility of replacing those
passwords for sync passkies, for the passkies, even if they are
synced. Sometimes when we were having
this conversation, a customer would say no, no, but but no.
I mean this is how, how are we going to accept that the
credential, because the credential is ours, is between
me, the bank and my customer. How am I going to accept that
this credential that is mine now it's going to go on flow to an
iCloud or to a Google password manager and they would have to
tell them And how is this different to what happens today
already with passwords you have no control and that is already
happening because because today when a user is going to a
website on any of these if I go to my iPhone and I'm trying to
log in into into a certain account, I can I can choose to
to to save it into my kitchen. So that is already happening
with your credentials today. So you cannot consider that
there is a loss because that's already happening to you.
So don't don't look at it, don't compare pass keys with your
strong authentication solution. But are you using passwords as
part of your of your authentication policy at all?
If so, it's a no brainer. Replace as fast as you can those
passwords for pass keys and if you have a solution for a strong
authenticating OTP or whatever, whatever the solution it is that
you to meet compliance combined with those passkeys.
OK, it continues to work. You don't need to make any any
effort with that. You can do low assurance
authentication if you want through passkeys instead of
passwords. And then when you need to step
up because you want to sign a transaction, you want to make a
payment and and you need to do a higher authentication, apply
whatever you have as as as already as a stronger think
litigation mechanism and that works.
And over time what can happen that's going to be very easy to
implement because you just need to connect a back end and to do
a very minor standard modification into your web
services. No, just implement web often so
that you can be calling on passkis.
You don't need to do anything on the client side because the the
OS of the devices of the end users are already are are
already taking their. So it's super easy to add
passkey support to your web services and all the sudden you
will see how customers start doing less passwords and more
passkis and the more passkis they do and less passwords
that's risk that you are removing, risk of phishing that
you are removing. It's it's it's only benefits
that you have from the on that side.
And if you do just that you are doing yourself a favour later on
you can consider, well, I mean right now I'm having an
infrastructure for authentication of passkis based
on Fido and then I have another infrastructure in place for
legacy. Legacy for a strong
authentication. You can say, well actually I
don't need 2 infrastructures because I can use the fighter
infrastructure as well to do to do authentication.
That is 2 factor and that is acceptable from a compliance to
regulation standpoint. How can you do that using the
same back end, the same fighter back end that you have for basic
passkeys? Now you can reuse it if you
want. If you want to to remove the
old, the old infrastructure that you have for OTP, how well
ensuring that pass keys don't don't synchronise.
Now you were saying before that end users you you can't control
them in a in AB to C environment, you cannot control
them, you don't know which platforms they are using.
So as far as there is one platform that is applying
systematically synchronisation, well, those those you cannot.
Consider that you have a solution that fulfils all your
users like that. So you cannot count on the pass
keys that are managed by the platforms as your solution for
authentication. But you can implement Fido, you
can implement Fido and you can manage pass keys through other
means, for example through an SDK.
You can integrate A Fider functionality on your mobile app
as they do today in in many cases.
So the bank can use their own mobile app to they can add the
fider functionality into the mobile apps.
How important is that control for an organization to own that
portion of the authentication? So we talked about the platforms
owning quite a bit of it right now, Google, Microsoft, Apple,
but you just mentioned. A financial institution for
example wanting to incorporate the authentication into their
app in your in your dealings with that industry.
How important is that control where they want to have that it
is, it is. It is very important, I think
that they don't. They suddenly they don't want to
relinquish financial institutions in general of at
least of a of a medium sized to large size.
They they say these are my customers when it comes to their
to their service. These are my customers.
These are my credentials. This is a direct relationship
between between us. I have to be the master of of
that relationship and they. Want to only in full
authentication experience as much as they can anyway.
Yes, there are, I mean there are, there are in in most cases
that's the case. There are some regional cases,
there are some initiatives and we have some some very
interesting presentations that are there are some, some small
polls. For example in the Nordics, in
Northern Europe, there has been an initiative actually where
banks came together. There is a consortium of
entities that came together and created an entity to manage
identities which is which is called Bank ID.
The same concern that banks had with identity of the service,
you know, 10-15 years ago was like, oh, I can't put my
credentials up in the cloud. I need to have them on Prem and
control them. You know, the thing that I think
where you're getting with the argument of passkeys versus
passwords is people can use their iCloud to sync their
keychain, which is basically just the password.
But your password could also end up in some kind of password file
out on the the dark web, and it can be used by anybody but the.
The passkey can't because it's cryptographically signed and
it's not something that could end up in some kind of dark web
dump pass keys. So that is a risk that you
completely remove from the table.
Because pass keys are based on a symmetric cryptography, the fact
that they are based on a asymmetric cryptography.
What it means is that what you are going to be storing on the
server side, you need to have something on the server side.
But it's not the entire key, it's just half of the key.
So even if that would be if that server would be compromised and
those keys would be stolen, that on itself doesn't allow to
recover to recover all the. It doesn't break the security of
of that of that credential. So that is one of the massive
arguments why a a a bank or any service provider for that matter
that today is using passwords for authentication.
They may want to they may want to move away from them as soon
as possible into this because the the the question about the
data leaks it's I mean there is the finance the direct financial
loss but there is the the branding the branding laws is is
it's and it's a nightmare so so that on that on itself is is
quite a motivation. So folks, for folks who are
listening, it's 25 after three on Tuesday, you're going to be
presenting in like 25 minutes. So, one hour, yeah.
And one hour. OK.
We really appreciate you talking through this with us, but we
don't want to hold you back from that.
You need a little bit of time to catch your breath, maybe have
coffee or something. But thank you, Pedro.
I mean, this is really educational.
My pleasure anytime. Yeah, so let's end on a lighter
note here so you can get off and go and prepare and and psych
yourself up. We were talking before we hit
the record button that you're a soccer dad, you've got a couple
of sons. I think you said that are
playing soccer. Then the then the conversation
turned a little bit towards Messi, who has become a
phenomenon. He's already been a phenomenon
around the world, but. Unless you've been a die hard
soccer player, you probably just kind of were maybe passing
familiar. Now he's playing for Miami and
Florida of your soccer dad duties.
How do you see your sons and their journeys through the
sport? Are we are we looking at maybe
the next Messi somewhere in there or a different position?
No, no, no. We're we're, I mean still too
soon they will, they will do. They will do whatever they they
want. But for us it's just a matter of
keeping them healthy and and doing a team sport and and
getting into that. But to me what it it the only
thing is that now they playing soccer and then watching soccer
and then playing soccer because you have the the equivalent of
the NFL games. It's all soccer all the time.
All it's intensive but it's true that we were by tradition in the
family fans of Barcelona and now to and we had Messi.
We had the lack of have this guy in in in our team.
And to see the impact that now he's having in a country that
doesn't have the tradition of it's.
It's funny to see the the kind of craze that he's generating in
a country, in a country that that traditionally didn't pay as
much attention to to soccer and as as it was before.
So does that give a sense of? Pride when you see that
happening. Or is it a sense of loss because
he used to play? No, no, I'm.
I'm really happy for the guy because it's, you know, there
are great sports guys that are that are just great at at what
they do, but as a person, you don't.
You don't. I mean, he doesn't, he doesn't.
I mean they are too fond of themselves or they they don't
and you don't You don't see them as a role, as a role model for
example for your kids and this is a guy that has been it's he's
great in what he does. He's exceptional about any kind
of measure and he's a very humble very reasonable very
nice. He doesn't has outbursts or
anything like that and he he won the World Cup after have been
chasing it for many years in the late stages of his career.
And now to see him the kind of things he's doing, every time
that he does something that is remarkable, we we just get a
smile. No it's it's it's it's it's
happy to see him to see to see him thrive and to see the kids
obsessed with him as well. So the Barcelona?
Fans, Are they Florida MLS fans at this point?
Or Miami, I should say. Or you follow a player versus
A-Team? No, no, I would say that people
have sympathy for the for people from Barcelona have sympathy for
Miami now because Messi is in there.
And not only Messi mean, there were a couple of players, X bars
of players that went along as well.
So now now I it's a very rare thing to see because there was
no interest whatsoever in Spain about MLS here.
And then now you can have a conversation of what did Miami
last week which was unheard of before.
So it's amazing when a transcendent.
Player can do that or anything. Can see that occasionally with
maybe basketball player coming from some area of the world
right into. One league or another or
baseball was another one, which I know, Jim, you were just
chomping at the bit to to get into that one.
So I. Was in a conversation with
Denise and one of her friends and she sent a picture of a guy
that she's dating her her friend.
And she said I was like, he looks like somebody famous.
She's like, yeah, he looks like Victoria Beckham's husband.
David Beckham? No, she.
Said it right the the spice. Spice Girl, Right.
She was a Spice Girl, yeah. Anyway, but he.
Came over and played in the MLS for a while, but I think it was
more of like, you know, it got some attention.
But from what I understand now, Messi's over here.
Just like dominating, right? Which that's kind of cool.
I mean my Uber driver from the airport to the resort here.
He's like, do you want to listen to something or watch something?
I'm like, I don't care. And So what do you, what does he
put on? He puts on like this highlight
reel of messy, just scoring goals and winning championships
and stuff. And it was probably still
playing. After the 40, Yeah, he was.
Still going he's. Probably watched it hundreds.
Of times I guess. But yeah, I it's I used.
To play soccer when I was a kid and it's interesting see how MLS
has gotten. Progressively more popular over
the years. I mean it's still very much not
anywhere near you know NFLNBA, you know at hockey, baseball and
then you've got sort of MLSI think it's kind of after that.
But there was a just a genuine excitement when you, you know, a
player of that caliber comes over.
I was, I was concerned and he's OK.
He's going to come over. He's towards the end of his
career. What does that mean?
He's not going to be able to produce whatever guy comes out,
scores, goals left. I mean, he delivered right away
and it was like this shot of adrenaline that went through
MLS. It was the worst.
Team in the MLS this season the guy arrived and he played six,
seven matches and he won a title for them just to straight up it
was. I mean, they were expecting him
to make an impact, but they no one was expecting that he would
do that. Right off the bat, as he arrived
to them, it was, it was funny to.
It was funny to watch. It was funny to watch.
A real Cinderella, a Cinderella story.
We're going to go ahead and wrap it up for this conversation.
Thank you so much for taking the time.
My pleasure. I think we'll be recording
another episode when you're on stage, so we'll be simpatico
with you thinking about that. But it was great to meet you,
Great to have this conversation. I'll have some links in our show
notes so that people connect with you on LinkedIn if they
have any questions. So I have a link to the Telus
group as well so people can find out more about what goes on over
there. We'll have links to myself and
Jim on LinkedIn as well. We're on the web.
idacpodcast.com we're on Twitter slash X slash whatever it's
called. By the time you listen to this
at IDAC Podcast Mastodon at IDAC podcast at infosec dot exchange
Like, subscribe, share with a friend, share with an enemy, I
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and we'll talk with everyone in the next one.