According to several current and former Yahoo employees who talked to TechCrunch on the situation of anonymity. The business has laid off or lost via attrition 40 to 50 individuals out of a total of 200 personnel in the cybersecurity team since the beginning of 2024.
There are other teams impacted by the layoffs besides the Paranoids. Yahoo’s chief technology officer, Valeri Liborski, announced changes to the company’s core services and enterprise productivity in an email addressed to staff members this week. Liborski was hired in September.
The email to staff, which was also obtained by TechCrunch, said
“This was a very difficult decision and one I have not taken lightly.”
According to the sources, the Paranoids’ offensive security team, also known as the “red team,” which simulates cyberattacks to find network vulnerabilities before outside hackers do, was completely fired this week. The cybersecurity team has also been affected by at least three rounds of layoffs this year.
When TechCrunch contacted Yahoo on Thursday, the company confirmed the layoffs, which included firing its red team. Yahoo spokesperson Brenden Lee said
“Yahoo’s security program has matured significantly over the past seven years and is widely recognized as a world-class, industry-leading operation. As part of this evolution, we’ve made strategic adjustments, including transitioning offensive security operations to an outsourced model,”
“This change reflects the sophistication of our program and enables us to concentrate resources on critical security priorities, maintaining the highest standards of protection for our users and platforms.”
According to Axios at the time, the corporation as a whole let go of around 1,600 workers last year, or over 20% of its whole workforce. Yahoo will “go on offense” and invest in other areas of its business, according to Yahoo CEO Jim Lanzone, who told Axios that the layoffs will be “tremendously beneficial for the profitability of Yahoo overall.”
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