SANS ICS Difference Makers Awards

The SANS ICS Cybersecurity Difference Makers Award honors a deserving individual who is making a significant positive difference by increasing awareness of the cybersecurity threats to critical infrastructures and working to mitigate them through technical and educational contributions to the community.

The 2020 SANS ICS Difference Makers Award Winner

The SANS ICS team is pleased to announce Kai Thomsen as this year’s recipient of the SANS ICS Cybersecurity Difference Makers Award – EMEA Region. Mr. Thomsen currently serves as lead DFIR analyst at premium automaker AUDI AG, playing a key role in establishing a modern cyber defense team at Audi that is responsible for protecting enterprise, ICS, and connected car infrastructure.

The SANS ICS team is pleased to announce Kai Thomsen as this year’s recipient of the SANS ICS Cybersecurity Difference Maker Award – EMEA Region. Mr. Thomsen currently serves as lead DFIR analyst at premium automaker AUDI AG, playing a key role in establishing a modern cyber defense team at Audi that is responsible for protecting enterprise, ICS, and connected car infrastructure.

Early in his career, Thomsen designed and implemented defensible LANS for enterprise and ICS environments in the steel industry at SMS Group, an engineering firm. The steel industry is also where Thomsen was introduced to Network Security Monitoring, Digital Forensics and Incident Response building security monitoring solutions for company and customer sites.

Thomsen continues to play an active role in the ICS community, speaking and teaching at security conferences like S4 Europe, CS3STHLM, ISF, Troopers, and SIGS SCADA. He chaired the SANS Automotive Cybersecurity Summit 2018 and SANS ICS Europe Summit 2018.