Software security in the age of AI: McKinsey interviews Red Hat CTO Chris Wright

By McKinsey & Company · Thu, 29 Oct 2026 14:43:00 +0000.

The email is a notice from McKinsey & Company (“Digital” subscription list) introducing a piece titled “Securing software in the age of AI: Red Hat CTO Chris Wright.” The body of the message is very sparse, containing only the headline, a short standfirst and links to other content, so this summary is limited to what the email states.

According to the standfirst, Chris Wright, described as an open-source veteran and Red Hat's CTO, explains why AI-driven vulnerability discovery is forcing a “reckoning” in software security, and how the industry can emerge stronger from it. The call-to-action button invites readers to “improve software security with AI.”

The email includes no direct quotes from the interview, figures, concrete examples or technical details from the full piece, which is hosted on McKinsey's website rather than in the body of the message.

The “Also Consider” section recommends two related pieces: “Beyond the copilot: Scaling the agentic product development life cycle” and a conversation with Kara Sprague, CEO of HackerOne, on how AI is reshaping cybersecurity.

For industry context, the use of AI models to find vulnerabilities in code at scale is broadly one of the most debated trends in cybersecurity, as it affects both those who defend systems and those who attack them, and open source is one of the areas where the impact is most visible.