Software

C-Suite Talk Fav Tech: Raffaele Mautone, Duo Security

Posted by IDG Connect
on September 01 2016

Name: Raffaele Mautone

Job title: CIO

Company: Duo Security

Industry: Security

Location: Ann Arbor, Michigan USA

Years’ of experience: 16

What is your favourite personal gadget?
My mobile phone. It’s amazing to me. I can do anything globally on this small device.

Do you have a favourite piece of personal software?
Sonos. The days of having to wire a bunch of speakers in your home and hiding all of those wires are over and frankly took days to complete. Now, by picking up my phone, I can turn on all 8 speakers in my home. I think this is the coolest thing I’ve seen and it only took an hour to configure, compared to several days of wiring. Picking up my phone and having it all configured in an hour is the coolest thing I’ve seen. I love that I can play and listen to any of the different music platforms (Pandora, iTunes, iheartradio) on one device too!

What was the first piece of technology you got really excited about?
Touch Pads. I watch my 3 year old daughter pick up items quickly that would of taken years or were not available on a traditional PCs previously. She has access to puzzles, word and picture associations, colours, places, etc. all at her fingertips. She only has an hour a day but to watch how quickly she is learning is truly amazing.

What device improves your life most at work?
Duo. No really it’s the reason I joined! The technology changed the way I looked at security after 11 years in this space. Having the ability to enable employees with two factor authentication and have them love it is very rare; if non- existent in the security space. Now with our Platform software we can help IT organisations keep the devices up-to-date without any agent on the user’s device. Making it easier to allow BYOD, which is what users want now, as the personal and business worlds blend.

What software keeps you most productive at work?
Slack. It’s quick and easy to chat with colleagues in real time. The days of sending an email and waiting hours, days and weeks isn’t effective in a fast-paced organization or world.

Is there any technology that has become extinct that you would like to resurrect?
None that I can think of. I’m pretty certain it’s extinct because they didn’t evolve with the times or missed an opportunity suggested by customers. One of the biggest mistakes is not listening to your customers or thinking another company many not come along quickly with a better option.

Is there any technology you would personally recommend that you don’t think enough people know about? (Hardware or software, work or personal)
I sound like a broken record but I really do promote Duo to my friends, family and other security experts. It’s great to take out my phone and show them how easy it is to two-factor authenticate. I like seeing their reactions, when I ask them what they use, most often it’s a token. I feel like it’s an injustice for users to have to leverage outdated technology when Duo is easier, more cost-effective and loved by employees.

Do you think anything about your personal use of tech would surprise your colleagues?
I have everything in the cloud; even for my personal life. Recently I looked at my photos on Verizon and thought how did I take more than 15K pictures in three years? Now I have a digital library for my family, so all of my pictures are in the cloud and won’t get lost over time.