Zach(ary) Eikenberry

Our next speaker ran public schools for seven years before he ever worked in cybersecurity. Today he is the founder and CEO of Hook Security and the author of Psychological Security. Please welcome Zach Eikenberry.

Zach(ary) Eikenberry is the founder and CEO of Hook Security, the security awareness training and phishing simulation platform built for MSPs and SMBs. A former educator who founded and ran three public schools, he is the author of Psychological Security: How Human Behavior Shapes Modern Cyber Defense (2026).

Zach(ary) Eikenberry is the founder and CEO of Hook Security, the security awareness training and phishing simulation platform built for MSPs and SMBs. Hook's PsySec methodology replaces fear-based training with psychology and humor, and trains more than 250,000 employees every month. Before Hook, Zach founded and ran The NEXT Schools in Greenville, South Carolina, growing them to more than 900 students, and gave a TEDxGreenville talk on the model. He is the author of Psychological Security: How Human Behavior Shapes Modern Cyber Defense (2026) and co-hosts the Two Stones One Bird podcast.

Zach(ary) Eikenberry founded Hook Security in 2019 after a career in education. He founded and ran The NEXT Schools (2011–2018) — two public high schools and a middle school in Greenville, South Carolina, built around entrepreneurial learning — growing them from no funding to more than 900 students and 60 staff, and delivered a TEDxGreenville talk on the model. Before that he worked in federal contracting and co-founded a contract-management SaaS company. Born in Lafayette, Indiana, he holds degrees in philosophy and economics from Purdue University. He is the author of Psychological Security: How Human Behavior Shapes Modern Cyber Defense (2026), co-hosts the Two Stones One Bird podcast, and is a member of InfraGard.