Kathy Collins — From AOL to Award-Winning Cuisine to High-Stakes Hacking
Recorded live at the 2025 Sunshine Cyber Conference in Tampa, Jack Clabby of Carlton Fields, P.A., and resident cybersecurity expert Kayley Melton, Executive Director of Operations at the Cognitive Security Institute, sit down with Kathy Collins, Security Consultant at Secure Ideas. Kathy shares her extraordinary journey, which began at the AOL help desk, took a flavorful detour through award-winning kitchens, and ultimately landed in the high-stakes world of penetration testing.
Kathy explains how the intensity, precision, and discipline of her 15 years in fine dining prepared her for the unpredictable demands of cybersecurity. She recounts a particularly memorable physical pen test involving a rainy golf cart getaway—and a very unimpressed police officer.
The conversation highlights Kathy’s passion for community building through events like BSides Jacksonville, where she encourages newcomers to dive in and get involved. In the Lifestyle Polygraph segment, Kayley throws Kathy two horror-themed questions with bite: which movie soundtrack best scores a pen test, and which fictional villain she’d trust most on an engagement. Fava beans and a nice Chianti may follow a successful test.
Cyber Florida
