Studies, articles, and social media activism are just a start.

I would imagine everyone reading this, who partakes of social media to any degree, is getting worn down with the social media activists. Like everything, there are some that are effecting change and doing great work. They use the media to spread the message while helping to enact change in other ways. Basically, doing more than just ‘awareness‘. You can Tweet and Facebook and Tumblr all day long about “help our vets”, and the sentiment is great. But until you turn that effort toward people who can effect change (e.g. politicians), it’s not likely to actually help a veteran. Oh, and you do occasionally promote charities that help the veterans and donate yourself… right?

Yesterday, “Spouse-gate” happened at the ASIS / ISC2 Congress event. In a nutshell, a female InfoSec professional is a speaker at the conference, and her InfoSec professional husband joined her as a regular attendee, but via her “plus one” that the conference provides for. Each “plus one” in the eyes of ISC2 is the spouse, which by definition is the husband or wife. So imagine his surprise when he goes to the registration desk and finds the staff “utterly confused how [he] could be a spouse and asks [him] four times how [he’s] a spouse“. Did the meaning of spouse change sufficiently in the past years, that it is only applied to females? He explains several times that his wife is speaking, and he is her “plus one”, and they finally understand. Next, they give him a con swag bag and information regarding ‘spouse events’ which include shopping trips. The bag included two bottles of hand lotion, an empty photo album, shopping coupons, a magazine, and the business card for Jay Claxton, the Director of Loss Prevention at Marriott Vacation Club International.

I think it safe to say that the conference bag for spouses is a clear case of misogyny. Now, why am I posting about this? Peruse the bag contents and scroll down…

I have been an outspoken critic of ISC2 for many years. In the last couple of years, I have toned down that criticism considerably, for various reasons. The biggest reason is that one of the board members, Wim Remes reached out to me and prompted many discussions over a year. He made an effort to get my feedback on how ISC2 could improve in their process, public perception, and get back on track (my words) with their intended purpose of making the security industry better. When someone in a position to effect change reaches out and demonstrates they want to make things better, it is time to help them rather than continue to criticize the organization. In that time, Wim has done an incredible job working to change the organization from the inside. Sorry for the diversion, but I feel it is important to give credit to those working very hard toward bettering our industry.

At some point in the last year or two, ISC2 has taken on a very public “pro-woman” stance (scroll through their Twitter feed). They have collectively called for more equality in the workforce in our industry. In fact, within one hour of ‘Spouse-gate’ starting, ISC2 was Tweeting about women remaining underrepresented in InfoSec. It’s hard to understand how an organization can promote a great cause while also devolving to the base levels of misogyny that are a root cause of the inequality.

Social media activism can do great things. But many of the great things that can be done get lost in the noise of people blindly re-posting feel-good messages that ultimately do very little to do actual good, and concretely support the cause. If organizations like ISC2 want to help effect real change, they need to “be the change that [they] wish to see in the world.” In short, more doing and less grandstanding.