Inside Walmart’s AI security stack: How a startup mentality is hardening enterprise-scale defense

VentureBeat recently sat down (virtually) with Jerry R. Geisler III, Executive Vice President and Chief Information Security Officer at Walmart Inc., to gain insights into the cybersecurity challenges the world’s largest retailer faces as AI becomes increasingly autonomous.

We talked about securing agentic AI systems, modernizing identity management and the critical lessons learned from building Element AI, Walmart’s centralized AI platform. Geisler provided a refreshingly candid view of how the company is tackling unprecedented security challenges, from defending against AI-enhanced cyber threats to managing security across a massive hybrid multi-cloud infrastructure. His startup mindset approach to rebuilding identity and access management systems offers valuable lessons for enterprises of all sizes.

Leading security for a company operating at Walmart’s scale across Google Cloud, Azure and private cloud environments, Geisler brings unique insights into implementing Zero Trust architectures and building what he calls “velocity ...