Ep. 045 - Plot Twist: I Wrote a Book | Kristin King & Securing What Feeds Us
She’s back. And she brought a book.
After a quieter stretch on the feed, Kristin King returnsto the Bites & Bytes Podcast with a solo episode to announce what she’s been building behind the scenes: Securing What Feeds Us: Cybersecurity in Food and Agriculture, published by Wiley and available for pre-order now, with an official release date of September 29, 2026.
In this episode, Kristin breaks down what’s inside the nearly 500-page book, from precision agriculture and operational technology to aquaculture, agroterrorism, food science innovation, and the human layer that runs through all of it. She makes the case for why food and agriculture deserve the same cybersecurity attention we give to the power grid or financial sector and explains who this book is really for (spoiler: it’s anyone who eats).
She also talks about where the podcast is headed next and makes one clear ask of the community that helped get her here.
Here are the “Securing What Feeds Us: Cybersecurity in Food and Agriculture” book Pre-Order Links:
📘 US Pre-Order Link (Amazon):https://www.amazon.com/Securing-What-Feeds-Cybersecurity-Agriculture/dp/1394391005#detailBullets_feature_div
📘 UK Pre-Order Link (Amazon): https://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/1394391005?ref=cm_sw_r_ffobk_cp_ud_dp_MFWDKT09AMPZSA86K9NH&ref_=cm_sw_r_ffobk_cp_ud_dp_MFWDKT09AMPZSA86K9NH&social_share=cm_sw_r_ffobk_cp_ud_dp_MFWDKT09AMPZSA86K9NH&bestFormat=true
📘 Barns & Noble: https://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/securing-what-feeds-us-kristin-king/1149440985
⭐ If you prefer to order from a local bookstore, you can give them the ISBN. ---------------
Episode Key Highlights
00:01:49 The Book Announcement: Securing What Feeds Us
00:04:52 The Foreword: Dr. Darren Detwiler
00:09:20 The Gap Between Two Worlds That Needed a Book
00:11:30 Who This Book Is Really For
00:14:03 Food Is Critical Infrastructure
00:15:43 The Real Stakes: Ransomware, Precision Ag & Agroterrorism
00:23:06 Food Science, 3D Printing & theFuture of Food
00:25:38 Resilience Over Compliance
00:28:38 The Quote: Mainstream Urgency
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📘 Sign up for early updates, exclusive previews, and news about Kristin’s book, “Securing What Feeds Us: Cybersecurity in Food and Agriculture,” here.
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🎤 Book Kristin Demoranville to Speak
To invite Kristin to speak at your conference, corporate event, webinar, or workshop, visit the website and submit a request.
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🎤 Bites and Bytes Podcast Info:
Website: Explore all our episodes, articles, and more on our official website.
Merch Shop: Show your support with some awesome Bites and Bytes gear!
Substack: Stay updated with the latest insights and stories from the world of cybersecurity in the food industry.
Socials: TikTok;Instagram;LinkedIn;BlueSky
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🛡️ About AnzenSage & AnzenOT
AnzenSage is a cybersecurity advisory firm specializing in security resilience for the food, agriculture, zoo, and aquarium industries. AnzenSage offers practical, strategic guidance to help organizations anticipate risks and build resilience. Learn more about their offerings at anzensage.com.
AnzenOThelps organizations understand and prioritize operational risk faster, without slow or static assessments. Subscription access is available, including a student option. Learn more at anzenot.com.
Listen to full episode :
Episode Guide:
00:00:22 Welcome Back & Where Have I Been
00:01:49 The Book: Securing What Feeds Us
00:02:12 Thank You to the Community
00:02:40 What Writing This Book Actually Took
00:03:45 What's Inside: Nearly 500 Pages
00:04:37 The Book is Done & Available for Pre-Order
00:04:52 The Foreword: Dr. Darren Detwiler
00:06:24 The Ask: Pre-Order & Why It Matters
00:06:55 AnzenOT Sponsor Segment
00:08:10 Why I Wrote This Book
00:08:39 The Food System is More Connected Than You Think
00:09:20 The Gap Between Two Worlds
00:11:30 Who Is This Book For?
00:13:54 Why This Actually Matters
00:15:43 The Real Stakes: Ransomware, Precision Ag & Agroterrorism
00:17:18 Inside the Book: The Sector Tour
00:19:26 AnzenSage Sponsor Segment
00:20:20 Primary Agriculture & Precision Farming
00:21:16 Beverage Industry, Aquaculture & Seafood
00:22:16 Animal Feed, Agro-Environmental & Vertical Farming
00:23:06 Food Science & Innovation
00:23:41 The Threat Landscape
00:24:27 Misinformation, Agroterrorism & Food Safety Culture
00:25:02 Looking Forward: Regulations, Resilience & Call to Action
00:26:07 What's Next for Bites & Bytes
00:27:11 The Final Ask & How to Connect
00:29:47 Book Details, Release Date & Pre-Order Links
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Transcript
00:00:22 Kristin King
Welcome back to the Bites Bites podcast.
00:00:24 Kristin King
I am your host, Kristen King.
00:00:27 Kristin King
And yes, I am still here.
00:00:29 Kristin King
And I know, I know, you may feel like you just accidentally wandered into a podcast graveyard.
00:00:35 Kristin King
You've checked your feed, you've seen my face and other places and thought, wait, did she just drop off the face of the earth?
00:00:43 Kristin King
And honestly, fair, completely fair.
00:00:46 Kristin King
I have not put out a lot of episodes this year, but I'm here.
00:00:51 Kristin King
I'm alive.
00:00:52 Kristin King
I'm caffeinated to a degree that my doctor would probably not endorse.
00:00:57 Kristin King
And I have what I think is a genuinely excellent excuse.
00:01:00 Kristin King
And I don't say that lightly because I definitely hate excuses.
00:01:04 Kristin King
So today, we're going to do something a little different.
00:01:08 Kristin King
No guests, no interview, just me, this microphone, and probably a very strong cup of coffee within arm's length or the water I should be drinking that my doctor wants me to drink.
00:01:20 Kristin King
Because today, I want to talk about something that has consumed, pun fully intended, the last stretch of my life.
00:01:28 Kristin King
Something I've been building for a long time, something I'm ridiculously and almost embarrassingly proud of.
00:01:35 Kristin King
We're going to talk about the book.
00:01:38 Kristin King
Wow.
00:01:38 Kristin King
Yep, the book.
00:01:40 Kristin King
It's real.
00:01:41 Kristin King
It exists.
00:01:44 Kristin King
Hi, this is Kristen in the present.
00:01:47 Kristin King
I forgot to give you the title of the book.
00:01:49 Kristin King
The book title is Securing What Feeds Us, Cybersecurity in Food and Agriculture.
00:01:55 Kristin King
Now back to the episode.
00:01:59 Kristin King
It's almost in your hands, and I cannot wait to tell you everything about it.
00:02:04 Kristin King
So grab your coffee, your tea, your snack of choice, a beverage, an adult beverage, and let's get into it.
00:02:12 Kristin King
But first, seriously first, I need to say thank you.
00:02:16 Kristin King
Thank you to everyone who stuck around.
00:02:19 Kristin King
To everyone who sent a DM asking if I was okay, to everyone who shared an old episode, who left a review, who tagged a friend and said, you have to check out this podcast, that means everything.
00:02:31 Kristin King
I see it, I feel it, and it generally kept me going on the days I was staring at a blinking cursor at midnight, wondering what on earth I was doing.
00:02:40 Kristin King
Writing a book is, look, I want to be honest with you, because that's the kind of thing that we do here.
00:02:48 Kristin King
Writing a book is not like anything I've ever done professionally.
00:02:52 Kristin King
And I say that as someone who has built programs from scratch, who has walked into rooms where I was the only person talking about cybersecurity in the food industry, maybe even the only woman, and had to explain why that was a real thing and not just something I made-up.
00:03:08 Kristin King
Writing this book required a different kind of energy.
00:03:11 Kristin King
It required me to take every conversation I have literally ever had, every case study I've ever researched, every, wait, have you heard about what happened to that food company or this particular incident, type moment, and turn it into something organized, referenced, useful, and readable.
00:03:30 Kristin King
And maybe a little bit of humor as I could fit it in, and my editors are loud, all at the same time.
00:03:37 Kristin King
And I want to be clear,
00:03:38 Kristin King
This was not a very quick project.
00:03:41 Kristin King
It was not a, I'll knock out this over a weekend situation.
00:03:45 Kristin King
This book is nearly 500 pages, covering everything from precision agriculture and operational technology to misinformation warfare and agriterrorism.
00:03:56 Kristin King
Definitely went deep in this one, really deep.
00:03:58 Kristin King
And doing that work right, citing things properly, telling real stories responsibly, and making sure the content was going to help people, that definitely takes time.
00:04:09 Kristin King
And also, I haven't done citations since college, so that was a nice bit of learning.
00:04:14 Kristin King
So yes, the podcast went a little quiet, and I made a conscious choice, split my attention and shortchange both, or do the book right and come back to the show with something worth talking about.
00:04:26 Kristin King
So I chose the book.
00:04:27 Kristin King
And now I get to come back to the show with the book.
00:04:29 Kristin King
So that's where I've been.
00:04:31 Kristin King
And I think we're going to agree it was definitely worth it.
00:04:35 Kristin King
Okay, so let's get into the good stuff.
00:04:37 Kristin King
The book is done.
00:04:38 Kristin King
It's in its final stages of production.
00:04:41 Kristin King
And it is right now, as you're listening to, available for pre-order.
00:04:45 Kristin King
I'll say that again because it gives me the chills and I'm going to try not to cry, but you can pre-order the book right now.
00:04:52 Kristin King
A real thing that I wrote that exists in the world with a real cover and a foreword by one of the most respected names in food safety, Dr.
00:04:59 Kristin King
Darren Detwiler, is out there waiting for you.
00:05:03 Kristin King
Dr.
00:05:03 Kristin King
Darren, if you're listening, thank you.
00:05:05 Kristin King
Truly, having your name and your voice at the front of my book means more than I can probably express in this podcast episode.
00:05:12 Kristin King
He has spent decades fighting for food safety, and he understood immediately why cybersecurity belongs in that conversation.
00:05:19 Kristin King
And I am truly honored, my friend.
00:05:21 Kristin King
Now, details.
00:05:23 Kristin King
You want details.
00:05:24 Kristin King
Where can you pre-order it?
00:05:26 Kristin King
I'm going to put the links in the show notes.
00:05:28 Kristin King
I'm going to post them everywhere.
00:05:30 Kristin King
I'm going to be slightly obnoxious about it for the next few months.
00:05:33 Kristin King
And I'm definitely not going to apologize for it.
00:05:36 Kristin King
When you write a book, you get to be obnoxious about it.
00:05:39 Kristin King
That's the rule, right?
00:05:40 Kristin King
I didn't make that role, though.
00:05:42 Kristin King
I'm just choosing to follow it.
00:05:44 Kristin King
And I want to say something before I give you the ask.
00:05:47 Kristin King
And I definitely want to say something here.
00:05:49 Kristin King
When people started sending me their pre-order receipts, when they send a message saying, I got it, I pre-ordered it, I cried.
00:05:56 Kristin King
For the first 48 hours of the pre-order launching, I cried at every single one of those messages.
00:06:03 Kristin King
And it wasn't just that you spent the money, it's that you believe in what I'm doing.
00:06:08 Kristin King
You showed up,
00:06:09 Kristin King
You said that with your dollar and your time.
00:06:13 Kristin King
Yes, this matters.
00:06:14 Kristin King
And to my Bier Isaac family specifically, you definitely know who you are.
00:06:19 Kristin King
You are all ridiculously amazing human beings.
00:06:22 Kristin King
Thank you, generally so much.
00:06:24 Kristin King
So here's my ask, my one ask.
00:06:27 Kristin King
If you have any interest in this topic, please pre-order.
00:06:30 Kristin King
Pre-order numbers matter enormously for a book's visibility and success.
00:06:34 Kristin King
It tells publishers, retailers, and the algorithm gods
00:06:38 Kristin King
that this content matters.
00:06:40 Kristin King
It helps get in front of more people, and getting this content in front of more people is generally the whole point.
00:06:46 Kristin King
So pre-order, link, show notes, everywhere.
00:06:50 Kristin King
Let's go.
00:06:55 Kristin King
that nagging feeling, that one that says your operations might be more exposed than you realize, but a full-blown assessment feels out of reach?
00:07:03 Kristin King
Traditional OT, cyber, physical assessments are expensive, time-consuming, and let's be honest, you get a point-in-time report that's outdated the moment something changes.
00:07:14 Kristin King
That's not risk management, that's just a snapshot.
00:07:16 Kristin King
That's exactly why we built Anzone OT, designed by practitioners who've been in your shoes.
00:07:22 Kristin King
It's one of the first subscription-based platforms for continuous quantified OT cybersecurity risk management.
00:07:28 Kristin King
Not just monitoring or threat detection, but actual risk modeling built for your facilities.
00:07:34 Kristin King
Whether you're managing a processing plan, a distribution center, a zoo, or even a utility.
00:07:39 Kristin King
Anzone OT gives you a living picture of your operational risk posture that evolves as your facility does and turns that intelligence into actionable, prioritized tasks so you know exactly what to fix first.
00:07:52 Kristin King
Subscription plans start at prices that might actually surprise you, in a good way.
00:07:57 Kristin King
Visit AnzoneOT.com to explore plans and see how continuous, facility-focused risk management finally fits your reality.
00:08:05 Kristin King
AnzoneOT, risk intelligence that evolves as fast as your operations do.
00:08:10 Kristin King
All right, let's talk about the book itself.
00:08:13 Kristin King
And I want to start here with why.
00:08:16 Kristin King
Because when I tell people I wrote a book about cybersecurity in the food and agricultural industry, there's a very specific reaction I get.
00:08:23 Kristin King
It's a face.
00:08:24 Kristin King
You know the face.
00:08:26 Kristin King
It's a, that's a thing face.
00:08:29 Kristin King
And I have seen that face A lot.
00:08:31 Kristin King
I've been seeing that face for years.
00:08:33 Kristin King
And that face, that face is exactly why I wrote this book.
00:08:37 Kristin King
Here's the thing.
00:08:39 Kristin King
We live in a world where we have more connected devices in our food system than most people realize.
00:08:45 Kristin King
Your food, the stuff that's in your refrigerator right now, pass-through systems involving GPS-guided tractors, automated processing lines, temperature-controlled cold chains with IoT sensors, cloud-connected distribution software, and point-of-sale systems that talk to supply chain platforms.
00:09:04 Kristin King
And to use that overdone phrase, from farm to fork,
00:09:08 Kristin King
There are digital touchpoints everywhere.
00:09:11 Kristin King
And where there are digital touchpoints, there is an attack surface.
00:09:16 Kristin King
This is not a scare tactic.
00:09:18 Kristin King
It's just reality.
00:09:20 Kristin King
And here's the thing that keeps me up at night, and I mean, it literally keeps me up at night, is the people managing cybersecurity in most organizations often don't have deep domain expertise in food and agriculture.
00:09:31 Kristin King
And the people with that deep expertise in food and agriculture don't often have cybersecurity backgrounds or any knowledge at all.
00:09:38 Kristin King
There are two worlds that need to be having a conversation.
00:09:41 Kristin King
And for a long time, they weren't even in the same room.
00:09:45 Kristin King
I've been fortunate enough to have had a foot in both worlds.
00:09:49 Kristin King
And I keep waiting for someone to write the book that brought them together.
00:09:52 Kristin King
A book that didn't just give them generic, here's what ransomware is, cybersecurity 101 content, but actually walked you through what it looked like when a food processing plant goes down and what it means when precision agriculture sensors get compromised.
00:10:08 Kristin King
What happens to cold chain when distribution companies get hit?
00:10:12 Kristin King
And what the actual human cost is when a food system fails?
00:10:17 Kristin King
Nobody wrote it.
00:10:18 Kristin King
And then Wiley Publishing came to me and asked if I would.
00:10:22 Kristin King
Honestly,
00:10:23 Kristin King
How do you say no to that?
00:10:25 Kristin King
You just don't.
00:10:26 Kristin King
So of course I said yes.
00:10:27 Kristin King
And here we are, just a year later, with a book set to publish for September 29th, 2026.
00:10:33 Kristin King
Yes, that is the real date.
00:10:35 Kristin King
You can put it in your calendar and you can tell your friends.
00:10:37 Kristin King
And look, I want to be clear about something.
00:10:40 Kristin King
This topic isn't just about hackers and exploits and making things sound scary.
00:10:46 Kristin King
It's also about the incredible innovations happening in the industry.
00:10:50 Kristin King
the precision agriculture technology that is generally transforming how we grow food, the food science breakthroughs that require sophisticated digital infrastructure, the sustainable tech that's trying to solve climate-related agricultural challenges.
00:11:05 Kristin King
This is an industry that is changing so fast, and that change has enormous implications for security.
00:11:13 Kristin King
This book is not a doom and gloom siren.
00:11:16 Kristin King
It's a comprehensive look at what we've built,
00:11:20 Kristin King
what we're building and the risks that go with it, and most importantly, what we can do about it.
00:11:26 Kristin King
That's what every page is built around.
00:11:30 Kristin King
Okay, so Kristen, who's this book for?
00:11:32 Kristin King
I get this quite often, actually.
00:11:35 Kristin King
I'm going to answer that in two ways.
00:11:37 Kristin King
The official answer and the real answer.
00:11:40 Kristin King
The official answer is, this book is for anyone working at the intersection of food, systems, and technology.
00:11:46 Kristin King
That includes cybersecurity professionals whose client or employers are in the food and agricultural space.
00:11:52 Kristin King
It includes food safety leaders and quality managers who need to understand cybersecurity risk.
00:11:59 Kristin King
It includes operations and IT leaders and food companies who are being
00:12:03 Kristin King
asked to care about security now and need context.
00:12:06 Kristin King
It includes regulatory and compliance professionals.
00:12:09 Kristin King
It includes ag tech entrepreneurs and investors.
00:12:11 Kristin King
It includes academics and researchers.
00:12:13 Kristin King
It includes government and policy folks thinking about critical infrastructure protection.
00:12:18 Kristin King
That's the official answer.
00:12:19 Kristin King
The real answer is this book is for anyone who eats and is curious about how fragile or resilient the system that brings that food to them is.
00:12:29 Kristin King
Because here is what I've learned in all the years in this space.
00:12:34 Kristin King
The moment you make something relevant to someone's life, not abstractly relevant, not this could theoretically affect you someday, relevant, but this is about the food you ate for breakfast this morning, relevant, the conversation changes entirely.
00:12:50 Kristin King
People get it.
00:12:51 Kristin King
They lean in.
00:12:52 Kristin King
They start asking questions they didn't know they had.
00:12:55 Kristin King
And that's what I wrote this book to do.
00:12:57 Kristin King
I want IT directors at a regional dairy co-op to read it and see their exact challenges reflected back at them.
00:13:04 Kristin King
I want the food safety manager at a processing plant to get to the sections on food safety culture and cybersecurity and say, yes, this is exactly the conversation I've been trying to have with my team.
00:13:14 Kristin King
I want the grad students studying agricultural policy to land on the content about digital equality and small farm technology and say, I didn't know that was a field I could even go into.
00:13:24 Kristin King
I want people to feel seen because the work they're doing matters and it deserves a book.
00:13:33 Kristin King
I also wrote this book for a version of me 10 years ago.
00:13:37 Kristin King
The person just starting to figure out that these two worlds overlapped, looking for a resource that connected the dots.
00:13:44 Kristin King
That person deserves better than having to place it together from conference proceedings and obscure white papers.
00:13:52 Kristin King
This book is for that person too.
00:13:54 Kristin King
So let me spend a few minutes on why this matters.
00:13:57 Kristin King
Really matters, because I want to move past the, oh, that's interesting response and get the, okay, this is serious response.
00:14:03 Kristin King
Food is critical infrastructure.
00:14:07 Kristin King
I should probably create a t-shirt.
00:14:10 Kristin King
And I'm not saying that's a talking point.
00:14:12 Kristin King
Most of the international community recognizes the food and agriculture as critical infrastructure.
00:14:17 Kristin King
And the US alone is one of the 16 formerly designated critical infrastructure sectors.
00:14:22 Kristin King
sitting right alongside energy, water, and financial services.
00:14:25 Kristin King
This is not a fringe position.
00:14:28 Kristin King
Food is in that list.
00:14:30 Kristin King
And yet, when we look at how much attention cybersecurity and food and agriculture gets compared to, say, the power grid or the financial sector, the gap is significant.
00:14:40 Kristin King
We talk endlessly about protecting the grid.
00:14:44 Kristin King
And there's no hate to my fellow people who work in energy.
00:14:48 Kristin King
We pour resources into financial security, but somehow the sector responsible for feeding billions of people gets comparatively less attention and fewer resources.
00:15:00 Kristin King
Now, why is that?
00:15:02 Kristin King
A few reasons, I think.
00:15:04 Kristin King
Part of it is that food and agriculture is highly fragmented.
00:15:08 Kristin King
There are 10s of thousands of farms, processing distributors, retailers.
00:15:12 Kristin King
Many of them are small and mid-sized.
00:15:14 Kristin King
There's no single food internet you can put a perimeter around.
00:15:20 Kristin King
Part of it comes down to the industry's history.
00:15:23 Kristin King
It runs on physical machinery rather than IT systems.
00:15:26 Kristin King
So traditional cybersecurity frameworks don't always translate clearly or cleanly.
00:15:33 Kristin King
And part of it, honestly, is just visibility.
00:15:36 Kristin King
We haven't had enough people loudly saying, this matters for long enough.
00:15:41 Kristin King
Let me give you a sense of the stakes.
00:15:43 Kristin King
When a food processing facility is hit with ransomware, and this has happened multiple times, including some major names,
00:15:53 Kristin King
The impact isn't just financial.
00:15:55 Kristin King
Yep, production stops, products don't ship, cold chains can fail, there's potential food safety risks, and depending on the size of the company, you can start to see ripple effects in regional supply.
00:16:09 Kristin King
When precision agricultural systems are compromised, so like the GPS systems,
00:16:15 Kristin King
the sensor networks, the automated irrigation and fertilization systems, you're looking at a potential crop damage, wasted inputs, and in worst case, food safety issues that don't become visible until something has already moved through the supply chain.
00:16:29 Kristin King
And then there's the topic that honestly took me down some dark research rabbit holes, agroterrorism and ecoterrorism.
00:16:39 Kristin King
The deliberate targeting of food and agricultural systems as a weapon.
00:16:43 Kristin King
This isn't science fiction, unfortunately.
00:16:45 Kristin King
This is documented history.
00:16:48 Kristin King
And it is something that the food industry and the security community needs to take more seriously and together.
00:16:54 Kristin King
The world runs on food.
00:16:56 Kristin King
I mean, it also runs on Dunkin', but that's a New Englander in me.
00:17:00 Kristin King
But it does run on food.
00:17:02 Kristin King
And food runs on increasingly sophisticated technology and sophisticated technology that needs to be secured.
00:17:11 Kristin King
Those 3 things are not separate.
00:17:13 Kristin King
They're in the same sentence.
00:17:14 Kristin King
That's why this matters.
00:17:18 Kristin King
Okay, let's talk about what's actually inside the book, because I want to give you a little bit of a taste, and the pun is definitely intended.
00:17:24 Kristin King
We're here for all the food puns, of what I was working on with the book.
00:17:29 Kristin King
So as I said, it's nearly 500 pages.
00:17:31 Kristin King
I am clearly an overachiever for my first book.
00:17:39 Kristin King
Hi, we're Ans and Sage.
00:17:42 Kristin King
And if you're in food production, agriculture, and even running a zoo or an aquarium, you need to talk.
00:17:48 Kristin King
Because let's be honest, your operation relies on a lot more technology than most people realize.
00:17:54 Kristin King
Rain dryers, hatchery controls, life support systems for animal habitats, all connected, all critical, all often overlooked when it comes to cybersecurity.
00:18:04 Kristin King
That's where we come in.
00:18:06 Kristin King
At Anson Sage, we help industries that grow, feed, and inspire the world manage cybersecurity and operational risks.
00:18:13 Kristin King
Without the fear tactics, the fluff, or the 200-page audit, you'll never read.
00:18:18 Kristin King
Whether you're producing milk, processing seafood, or running life support systems, we focus on what matters.
00:18:24 Kristin King
Keeping your operations safe, your people protected, and your business running, even when things go sideways.
00:18:30 Kristin King
And hey, we know not everyone on your team speaks cyber.
00:18:34 Kristin King
And because not everyone on your team speaks cyber, we've
00:18:36 Kristin King
We've created a free resource library at anzensage.com.
00:18:40 Kristin King
Inside, you'll find sector-specific infographs built for teams in agriculture, seafood, zoos, and aquariums.
00:18:47 Kristin King
They're clear, practical, a little witty, and designed to help frontline teams understand their risks without needing a translator.
00:18:54 Kristin King
No logins, no e-mail required, no catch.
00:18:57 Kristin King
There's usable tools that make cybersecurity stick.
00:18:59 Kristin King
If you're responsible for keeping food moving, animals safe, and systems online, Anzensage is your partner in real-world resilience.
00:19:07 Kristin King
Visit ansandsage.com to download your free infographs, book a consult, or just learn more about how we're helping critical infrastructures secure what matters most.
00:19:16 Kristin King
Ans and Sage, helping the industries that grow, feed, and inspire the world manage cybersecurity and operational risks.
00:19:26 Kristin King
All right, let's talk about what's in the book.
00:19:30 Kristin King
Since I said it's nearly 500 pages, there's a lot of ground to cover.
00:19:35 Kristin King
And I want to give you a real sense of it, not just the back cover version, the actual tour of the book.
00:19:42 Kristin King
The book opens by laying the foundation, not just what cybersecurity in food is, but why we should have been paying attention long before now.
00:19:53 Kristin King
There's a real history in there.
00:19:54 Kristin King
We go back further than most people expect, because you can't understand where we are with food technology without understanding how we got there.
00:20:03 Kristin King
from the first time a human figured out fire made dinner safer, to the moment a programmer wrote the first line of code that told a bottling line what to do.
00:20:13 Kristin King
The context matters, and I think it will generally surprise people.
00:20:17 Kristin King
Then we get into what I think as the sector tour.
00:20:20 Kristin King
And that is where the book does something I haven't seen done before.
00:20:23 Kristin King
We go sector by sector through the food and agricultural industries.
00:20:28 Kristin King
And for each one, we look at how it works, what technologies are running through it, and what has actually happened when those systems are attacked, not just hypotheticals, real incidents.
00:20:38 Kristin King
So in primary agriculture, we cover traditional farms, your grain cooperatives, your livestock operations, your chicken houses.
00:20:46 Kristin King
We cover precision agriculture, ag tech, because modern farming is generally a technology operation.
00:20:53 Kristin King
GPS graded tractors, drone fleets, variable rate spreaders, and yes, all of that has been targeted.
00:21:01 Kristin King
We cover food production and processing, distribution and cold chain, food service, which includes everything from your local restaurant to your school lunch programs to hospital cafeterias, and yes, all of them have had incidences as well.
00:21:16 Kristin King
We cover the beverage industry.
00:21:18 Kristin King
I want to just name a few names because people are always surprised.
00:21:22 Kristin King
Molson Coors,
00:21:23 Kristin King
Brown Foreman, that's Shaq Daniels, Campare, Duval, beer, wine, and spirits, all hit.
00:21:30 Kristin King
Your wine is not safe, I'm really sorry to report.
00:21:33 Kristin King
I don't make the rules, I'm just telling you.
00:21:36 Kristin King
We go into aquaculture, which is fish farming, for anyone who just went, wait, what?
00:21:42 Kristin King
And it's one of the most technologically sophisticated and under-reported parts of the whole conversation.
00:21:49 Kristin King
New Asian salmon operations running underwater cameras, AI feeding systems, remotely operating vehicles, a three-year growing cycle, and ransomware groups have absolutely found it.
00:22:01 Kristin King
We cover seafood and fisheries more broadly, include GPS spoofing on commercial fishing vessels, and the traceability systems trying to combat illegal fishing.
00:22:10 Kristin King
That whole section was a rabbit hole I generally did not expect, and I was pleasantly surprised to learn about.
00:22:16 Kristin King
We cover animal feed and nutrition, which sounds less
00:22:19 Kristin King
It's dramatic until you understand that the software controlling feed mill formulations is life or death for the livestock depending on it.
00:22:26 Kristin King
We cover agro-environmental management, which gets into everything from smart beehives, yes, connected beehives are a thing, and yes, they can be compromised, to virtual fencing for livestock, which has currently been making the news, to the technology monitoring soil carbon for regenerative agriculture programs.
00:22:45 Kristin King
And that leads right into vertical farming and controlled environmental agriculture, which is growing in warehouses and shipping containers near you right now.
00:22:54 Kristin King
Singapore has a national incentive.
00:22:58 Kristin King
The Netherlands has greenhouses that produce more per square foot than most anywhere on earth.
00:23:03 Kristin King
And all of that runs on connected systems.
00:23:06 Kristin King
And then there's food science and innovation.
00:23:08 Kristin King
So think cultivated meats, precision fermentation, 3D food printing,
00:23:14 Kristin King
I have a section on 3D food printers.
00:23:16 Kristin King
And before you laugh, these are already being used in clinical settings for patients who have swallowing difficulties in outer space research and also in fine dining, of course.
00:23:29 Kristin King
And they are absolutely a cybersecurity concern because a manipulated recipe file is a real threat vector.
00:23:36 Kristin King
The future of food is digital.
00:23:39 Kristin King
and we're not securing it fast enough.
00:23:41 Kristin King
After the sector tour, the book shifts into the threat landscape.
00:23:44 Kristin King
And this is where it gets technical, but also really accessible.
00:23:48 Kristin King
Operational technology and industrial control systems, the PLCs and SCADA systems that run every production line, every pasteurizer, every fermentation tank.
00:23:57 Kristin King
We talk about cyber-physical threats.
00:24:00 Kristin King
What happens when a cyber attack doesn't just take down a server, but actually puts the product, people, and animals at risk?
00:24:07 Kristin King
Third party and vendor risk.
00:24:08 Kristin King
Insider threats, which in this chapter I wrote carefully because it's nuanced.
00:24:13 Kristin King
It's not always the disgruntled employee.
00:24:15 Kristin King
Sometimes it's just exhaustion and a bad habit.
00:24:18 Kristin King
And the human layer, which cuts across all of it.
00:24:21 Kristin King
Training, fatigue, decision-making under pressure.
00:24:24 Kristin King
We also cover some topics that don't get enough oxygen.
00:24:27 Kristin King
Misinformation and disinformation are weapons against
00:24:30 Kristin King
the food system, because manufacturing a fake recall or destroying customer confidence in a brand is an attack, even if nobody touched a server.
00:24:40 Kristin King
Agroterrorism and ecoterrorism are well-documented and real, and they deserve a serious conversation.
00:24:48 Kristin King
the intersection of food safety culture and cybersecurity culture, and the argument I make in the book, which I believe pretty deeply, is that those two cultures have even more in common than people in both rooms usually realize.
00:25:02 Kristin King
And then the book closes by looking forward.
00:25:04 Kristin King
Regulations, because the landscape is shifting fast, especially in the EU.
00:25:10 Kristin King
Digital quality for small and mid-sized farms, because the resource gap between a large enterprise and a family farm is ginormous, and that conversation needs to happen.
00:25:21 Kristin King
Sustainability and climate tech, because those systems are also an attack surface.
00:25:26 Kristin King
Global food system threats, cross-sector dependencies,
00:25:31 Kristin King
Who doesn't just operate in isolation from energy, water, transportation, or telecommunications, and we get into what that means.
00:25:38 Kristin King
And finally, how to build cyber-aware teams and why resilience over compliance is the only philosophy that's going to work long-term.
00:25:46 Kristin King
And then there's the call to action, because the point of it all is not to scare you, not to overwhelm you, but to give you enough to do something.
00:25:56 Kristin King
Whatever seat you're in,
00:25:58 Kristin King
whatever part of the industry you touch.
00:26:00 Kristin King
And that's the book.
00:26:01 Kristin King
Like I said, nearly 500 pages.
00:26:03 Kristin King
And I'm very excited for you to get your hands on it.
00:26:07 Kristin King
I want to take just a moment to talk about what it means for Bytes and Bytes going forward.
00:26:12 Kristin King
The short version, I'm back.
00:26:13 Kristin King
I'm really back.
00:26:15 Kristin King
The book is done.
00:26:16 Kristin King
My brain is fully returning to normal operating capacity, whatever that means.
00:26:21 Kristin King
I have a list of guests I'm dying to bring on.
00:26:24 Kristin King
Definitely have some recordings that are gold that I need to put out.
00:26:28 Kristin King
people working on some of the most interesting problems at the exact intersection of food technology and security.
00:26:33 Kristin King
I have topics I want to completely jump into.
00:26:37 Kristin King
I have stories I want to tell.
00:26:39 Kristin King
And honestly, having the book out in the world is going to make the podcast even better.
00:26:43 Kristin King
Because now when I bring on a guest, I have a foundation, this shared vocabulary that we can build on.
00:26:50 Kristin King
And we can go even further in our conversations than we have before.
00:26:55 Kristin King
I'm also going to be honest with you.
00:26:57 Kristin King
I want to grow this show.
00:26:58 Kristin King
I believe in this topic.
00:27:00 Kristin King
I believe it deserves a bigger audience, and I think the book is going to help with that, but more people discovering the book means more people discovering the show and vice versa.
00:27:09 Kristin King
So here's what I'm asking.
00:27:11 Kristin King
If you've been a listener for any amount of time, this is the moment.
00:27:16 Kristin King
Share the show, share this episode, pre-order the book, and tell someone about it.
00:27:21 Kristin King
Leave a review, tag a colleague who works in food or in security or both.
00:27:26 Kristin King
Talk about it.
00:27:27 Kristin King
Talk about food and agricultural cybersecurity.
00:27:31 Kristin King
Be an ambassador for this content because this content matters to all of us.
00:27:38 Kristin King
And hey, if you're brand new here and this is your first episode, welcome.
00:27:42 Kristin King
You picked a great time to start the show up.
00:27:45 Kristin King
Appreciate you.
00:27:46 Kristin King
All right, my friends.
00:27:48 Kristin King
That is the overview.
00:27:49 Kristin King
And trust me, I could go for another three hours and still not run out of things to say about the book.
00:27:54 Kristin King
But for today, this is the big picture, the why, the who, the what, and the pleas for the love of all things good in this world, pre-order the next book.
00:28:04 Kristin King
But for today, this is the big picture.
00:28:08 Kristin King
The why, the who, the what,
00:28:11 Kristin King
And the please, for the love of all things good in this world, go pre-order it.
00:28:15 Kristin King
And honestly, I have a feeling a lot of the future episodes are going to be rifling on topics from this book.
00:28:22 Kristin King
So you'll be hearing more, a lot more.
00:28:24 Kristin King
And that's an implied wink-wink.
00:28:26 Kristin King
I wrote this book because I believe everyone should know how the food they eat and the food they feed their loved ones gets to their refrigerator.
00:28:34 Kristin King
and how it is or isn't protected along the way.
00:28:38 Kristin King
I believe cybersecurity in food systems is not a niche concern.
00:28:41 Kristin King
It's A mainstream urgency that just hasn't gotten mainstream attention yet.
00:28:46 Kristin King
And I believe that the people working in these spaces deserve a resource that sees them.
00:28:51 Kristin King
I hope this book is a resource.
00:28:53 Kristin King
I really, really, truly do.
00:28:55 Kristin King
Pre-order links are in the show notes.
00:28:57 Kristin King
You connect with me on LinkedIn, find me at anzonsage.com.
00:29:00 Kristin King
And if you have a question, a story, a topic you want me to cover, just reach out.
00:29:04 Kristin King
My e-mail is very visible everywhere.
00:29:07 Kristin King
I mean it.
00:29:08 Kristin King
I love hearing from the community and I will usually take a call.
00:29:11 Kristin King
Thank you from the absolute bottom of my heart.
00:29:14 Kristin King
Thank you for being here.
00:29:16 Kristin King
Thank you for caring about all of this stuff.
00:29:19 Kristin King
Thank you for listening, for sharing, for being patient with me, why I went away and wrote something I hope you'll love.
00:29:25 Kristin King
And now I'm ready to reenter society.
00:29:28 Kristin King
So be patient with me as I go back out.
00:29:30 Kristin King
All right, it's a wrap on this one.
00:29:33 Kristin King
Stay safe, everyone.
00:29:35 Kristin King
Stay curious, and I'll see you on the next one.
00:29:38 Kristin King
Bye for now.
00:29:47 Kristin King
while I was going through the edit.
00:29:48 Kristin King
But again, I didn't say the name of the book.
00:29:50 Kristin King
It is Securing What Feeds Us, Cybersecurity in Food and Agriculture.
00:29:55 Kristin King
The publisher is Wiley Publishing.
00:29:57 Kristin King
The book releases officially on September 29th, 2026.
00:30:02 Kristin King
The pre-order is available.
00:30:04 Kristin King
I will put the links in the show notes.
00:30:05 Kristin King
I'll also put the link to the UK pre-order because it is separate from the EU and the US.
00:30:11 Kristin King
So I hope you like it.
00:30:13 Kristin King
Let me know if you have questions.
00:30:15 Kristin King
Also, too, I want to let you know that I am going to be at a few conferences coming up this spring, but more coming on that later.
