November: A Cognitive Kill Chain / The Future of Cyberwarfare
As 2025 draws to a close, prepare for a thought-provoking finale. This month’s talks feature not only the technical trials of cybersecurity, but also an intersection between the intellectual and the existential - the convergence of technology and the mind.
Live and in-person at TMU + Live-Streamed on Discord
Date: Wednesday, November 26th, 2025
Time: 6:00 PM
In-Person Location: DCC 208 Classroom at TMU's Daphne Cockwell Health Sciences Complex - 288 Church Street
Registration: Not required
Live-Stream: Although TASK is always best in-person, we will steam live again on Discord @ https://discord.gg/aXfY76xgVJ.
Topic: A Cognitive Kill Chain: The Psychological Impact of LLMs
Speaker: Christine Smoley
Large Language Models (LLMs) represent one of the largest and fastest technology adoptions in human history, with ChatGPT alone having reached 700-800 million weekly active users in August 2025 following its launch in November 2022. While concerns over the cognitive impact of technology can be traced as far back as Socrates, who considered the potential of the written word to stunt the human capacity for memory, the use of LLMs for synthesizing information, problem solving, and content (including code) generation, among other uses, presents a new form and level of cognitive outsourcing with nuanced consequences.
To frame this discussion of the impact of LLM use on human cognition, this talk will present an overview of the similarities and differences between artificial and biological neural networks in order to identify which cognitive functions are "offloaded" during the use of LLMs. It will then survey the findings from current research on the impact of LLMs use on human cognitive abilities, as well as the significance and potential consequences of this shift for learning, perception, and behaviour, before identifying defensive countermeasures to reinforce cognitive autonomy.
Christine Smoley is currently the Head of Information Security at OrderGrid. Starting as a Security Engineer overseeing an internal Bug Bounty Program, she works primarily in the startup space, establishing and optimising Information Security Programs with a bias for building over buying. Coming from an academic background focused on Phenomenology, Christine has spoken at Bsides and RSA "DevSecOps Days," and been part of the teaching team for the University of Toronto’s Cybersecurity Bootcamp.
Topic: Emerging Tech., Burnout, and the Future of War
Speaker: Alana Stasz
I spent years studying cyberwarfare, emerging technology, and the quantum computing market, only to meet the mother of all burnouts. For three years I was severely allergic to most food, and largely immobile for almost a year, among numerous other debilitating symptoms. It was in that time that I realized - if chronic stress could leave me totally incapacitated for so long without actually dying, what’s stopping adversaries from weaponizing the same mechanisms to disable entire teams, departments, or even societies en masse - all while remaining just outside the scope of international law’s protections?
Fast-forward three years later, and the international law community has reached similar conclusions. Across defense, academic, and non-governmental circles, discourse is emerging around the idea that the human mind may represent the next dimension of warfare - one that could succeed the fifth domain of cyberwarfare as the sixth domain: cognitive warfare.
This talk examines the real nature of risk in the cybersecurity industry and what it truly means to be a hacker - tinkering with the unconventional and probing undocumented methods to solve complex, often invisible problems. Increasingly, it’s not only about knowing the nature of computers but mastering the nervous system and hardening the psyche. I will discuss why burnout is business risk - a significant source of loss for individuals and organizations alike - and why it also stands to emerge as a major threat to national security.
Alana Stasz is an experienced cybersecurity consultant, researcher, educator, mentor, and international public speaker. With a background in healthcare governance, penetration testing, and leading innovative R&D initiatives, she is experienced in both executing highly dynamic low-level operations as well as supporting strategic governance objectives. Currently, she is focused on disseminating information on the impact of burnout in the cybersecurity industry, building emerging technology education, and examining the relationship between technology and warfare. Additionally, she serves on the TASK Steering Committee, focusing on digital marketing.
Outside of the cybersecurity industry, you can often find Alana studying sustainable investment, pondering how esoteric concepts manifest themselves in business leadership, and creating eclectic art and music while sipping tea alongside her cats.
We look forward to see you all there!
The TASK Steering Committee
