Top 15 Security Experts to Follow on Twitter
When it comes to finding out the latest and greatest news and announcements online, Twitter is still the go to place when it comes to application security. You have the opportunity to learn and engage with experts that you usually wouldn’t be capable of reaching out to, following their tweets and tagging them to gain their attention. The open source community thrives on this platform on everything from sharing knowledge about new developments and threats to memes of developer humor.
So you are probably asking yourself “who should I follow?” since there are so many profiles out there sharing great content and thoughts. Deciding who to follow you need to check their expertise, how active they are, and what they actually tweet about to decide if they are relevant. Once you know who to follow, we recommend you create Twitter lists per category of the expert. This will help you see many expert opinions or discussions on topics that matter most to you.
We have compiled a list of 15 AppSec and InfoSec experts, all of whom are opinion and thought leaders with a passion for making the internet a safer place. Don’t have time to follow them all? Follow our list here. Without further ado, here are our top experts to follow on Twitter when it comes to application security.
1.The Grugq – This security researcher is a crowd favorite when it comes to issues of opsec and infosec. With sharp and witty commentary, he earns a spot at the top of this list. He has a knack for pointing out the absurd and real concerns in the security space.
2. SwiftOnSecurity – This parody account originally was created to discuss the famous open source HeartBleed bug, but now it has grown to twitterfamous security levels. For those who like their security news delivered with just the right touch of fiery and mockery, this is a must-follow.
3. Kelsey Hightower – An active developer advocate at Google, Kelsey’s daily tweets consists of thoughts on open source, DevOps, and containers. This open source advocate shares his deep knowledge into security news via Twitter and at the many conferences he where speaks and attends.
4. Brian Krebs – One of the industry’s top names, Krebs is the go-to security reporter when the latest security breach breaks. Most of his tweets link back to his excellent blog, where there’s no shortage of links to other major news stories. Because as we all know, Krebs is just gonna Krebs.
5. Jessie Frazelle – With a passion for open source is like no other, Jessie travels in the open-source space for work and for fun. Check out her Twitter for entertaining security thoughts and a good bit of humor.
6. Jeremiah Grossman – Offering direct security advice and insight in his account for individuals, companies, and software developers, he is known for giving followers a deeper look into secure practices than many of the other accounts out there.
7. Troy Hunt – A Regional Director for Microsoft’s Developer Security team, Hunt is a well respected Aussie researcher is one of the top profiles to follow for staying up on the latest issues in security. He is also the man behind the “Have I been p0wned” site that checks pastes of database hacks for credentials, letting you know if your username and password have been compromised.
8. Window Snyder – With a security career spanning big organizations Microsoft, Mozilla, and Apple, her tweets cover her early interest in technology, Apple’s security evolution, and much more.
9. Jack Daniel – His real claim to fame is his work as a technology community activist. His tweets reflect his views on the industry with much of the curmudgeonly image that has come to be associated with Daniel over the years.
10. Libby Clark – A seasoned tech journalist, her tweets tend to be Linux and open source centric. From conversations on open source and IoT, Clark is a fountain of knowledge.
11. Tarjei Mandt – A specialist in vulnerability research, exploit development, and cyber security in general, his tweets mostly focus on sharing articles of the industry and retweeting other cyber security experts who happen to be on our list.
12. Parisa Tabriz – Google’s top secret weapon, charged with guarding the world’s most valuable brand. Her job is to hack into the most popular web browser on the planet and find flaws in the system before the black hats do. She’s very active on Twitter, so her followers gain a good deal of real-time information about cybersecurity.
13. Martin Mckeay – A security expert and blogger who is very active on Twitter, his longstanding blog and podcast have attracted a sizable following. He tends to tweet about cyber crime with a fair bit of security-based humor thrown in for good measure.
14. Jeff Atwood – Known for co-founding Stack Overflow, he blogs actively and discusses software programs and the people who use them. Follow him for entertaining stories on coding successes and follies.
15. Paul Irish – A front end developer at Google who’s passionate about making the web, and web applications, better. His main focus is building better tools for web developers. Follow him to learn about new and upcoming web and app development resources.
In our opinion, these are a few of the best application security Twitter accounts out there, but certainly not the only ones. There’s a lot to write about when it comes to AppSec and security in general, and this will continue into the future as the Internet eats up more and more of our world.
