Get to know our CISO: The fearless, fishy, phish-fighting David Lindner

There are multiple ways to cheat at ice fishing, Contrast Security CISO David Lindner assures me, because he is the kind of guy who will and who has stood out on a Minnesota river that’s frozen 5 feet deep in -65° F weather, exposed to whatever Minnesota skies wanted to spit at him, without a shelter, because they don’t allow shelters or cabins or tents or any such. 

Lord knows how many fish cheaters can smuggle onto the river within all that tomfoolery. 

To sneak in a live fish, you can steal onto the river under the cover of night and stick it in one of the tens of thousands of holes that volunteers in Minnesota drill into 5’ thick ice the night before the competition. Then you just need to line up around 7 a.m. so you can get your choice of holes, you dishonest but dedicated fishing creep, you. 

Alternatively, if you’re competing for the heaviest walleye competition in Ohio, you can stuff a fish full of lead weights and fish filets. Don’t ask me “Why fish filets,” which seem pretty lightweight. You’ll have to ask the two guys sentenced in May 2023 to 10-day jail terms, three-year suspensions of their fishing licenses and forfeit of a $100k bass boat, for cheating and unlawful ownership of wild animals. 

Then again, you can just stuff a fish up your coat sleeve.

And that, in fact, is the tactic chosen by somebody who cheated at an ice fishing competition in which Lindner participated many moons ago when he was living in the Big City, aka the Twin Cities of Minnesota. 

Lindner didn’t catch anything. 

Anyway, that was years ago. He got tired of the Big City and moved back to the Medium City, which is Waverly, Iowa — the town of about 10,000 where he grew up and begrudgingly went to college (Wartburg) after swearing he was getting out of town and going to the Big City. 

Don’t worry about him too much: Waverly has a river, the Cedar River, that runs right through it. The Cedar is home to:

• Black Bullhead
• Bluegill
• Channel Catfish
• Common Carp
• Green Sunfish
• Northern hog sucker
• Northern Pike
• Rock Bass
• Smallmouth Bass
• Walleye That Are Hopefully Not Stuffed With Lead Weights
• White Sucker
• Yellow Perch

When Dave came on the Code Patrol podcast as the latest star in our Get to Know You series of Contrast executive profiles, I thought I’d ask him CISO questions. Makes sense, right? Like, what makes you a good CISO? What do you wish people knew about your job? How could people make your job easier? How about we talk about your Clifton Strengths? Adaptability, Maximizer, Deliberative, Achiever, Analytical. That is so CISO, am I right?

“Boring,” he said. 

Fine, I said. Fine, just fine. 

So instead I asked him what his first-ever paying job was. 

I could tell you here, in this blog, but why spoil the fun? The only thing I will tell you is that it has to do with enabling corn to have sex.  

Have a listen!