# Kevin Nanns

Kevin Nanns creates practical tech explainers and short videos about networking, cybersecurity, and IT careers, drawing on experience moving from teaching into networking.

- Profile: https://b2binfluencer.marketing/creators/kevin-nanns/
- LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/kevinnanns
- LinkedIn followers: 271,467
- Median of last 9 posts: 44 reactions, 3 comments (checked 2026-11-02)
- Topics: artificial-intelligence, cybersecurity
- Based on 11 dated posts, latest 2026-10-07

## Summary

Kevin Nanns is most useful for plain-language networking, cybersecurity, and IT career explainers with practical examples.

- Best for: A cybersecurity awareness company wanting short TOTP versus passkeys explainers for non-technical employees.
- Not for: A campaign needing polished product demos or guarantees that passkeys eliminate account compromise.
- Check first: Ask for current audience demographics and comparable TOTP and passkey video performance data.

### Takeaways

- TOTP apps and login services use same secret and current time to generate codes.
- Phone can be offline, but its clock still needs to be accurate.
- A sponsored Cisco post draws line at routing changes requiring human judgment.

## Main ideas

- **Explain the mechanism, not just the rule**: Kevin Nanns argues that people can follow security if a post shows what is actually happening underneath. Rather than telling readers that authenticator codes are safe, the TOTP piece describes the secret key the app and the login service both hold, the 30-second window each code covers, and why a phone with no signal can still produce a working code when you sign in on a connected device. The reasoning is that a reader who understands the mechanism can also spot where it breaks, which is why the same post names a phone clock that drifts far enough to generate a code for the wrong time window. Posts on passkeys and text-message codes follow the same instinct: point at which login codes hold up against a fake login page rather than repeating the advice.
- **Trust in automation should be decided task by task**: Kevin Nanns's position is not pro- or anti-automation; it is specific. The argument is that what you hand an agent depends on the consequence of a mistake, so a tired human working at 2 a.m. is a worse bet for some changes and a fine one for others. The post states a personal boundary rather than a general rule, and closes by asking readers where their own line is.
- **Open with a blunt question and let the audience answer it**: Many posts begin with 'Be honest' and a question the reader can answer about their own habits: how old the office Wi-Fi password is, how much battery a phone really gets in a workday, whether anyone still switches Wi-Fi off to save power. The question does the work of a headline, and the posts then ask for a specific workplace anecdote rather than a general opinion. Where a video exists on the subject, the post points at it and asks what actually changed things for readers.
- **Niche material travels further than it feels like it will**: Kevin Nanns argues that people sit on odd, in-joke ideas because they assume only a narrow audience will get them, and that the assumption is often wrong. The case rests on audience numbers for deliberately narrow material rather than on a general claim about what audiences want.
- **What you actually do all day beats recycled content**: Reading their own numbers across seven accounts, Kevin Nanns concludes that posts about the job and behind-the-scenes work outperform reposted short video, and that older job-focused videos keep earning subscribers long after publication. The reasoning is that the audience has been signalling a preference and the posting plan had not caught up.
- **The path into a technical career is usually accidental**: Kevin Nanns treats the moment someone gets into a field as worth collecting from others and offers their own as an example, on the reasoning that readers who came from another background recognise themselves in it. The post is a request for other people's stories rather than a claim about how careers should be planned.
- **Civic information is usable by ordinary people if you say where it lives**: The argument in the data-center post is that anyone can find out who is building nearby and what the operator has committed to, provided they know which public body keeps which record. Each step names a specific document, which makes the post usable rather than just readable, and the explanation stays neutral on whether the project is welcome.
- **Recommend a tool, then tell people what could go wrong**: When Kevin Nanns points at software, the caution comes attached rather than in small print. The pattern is a measured problem, the exact fix, and one plain warning, which keeps the recommendation attached to its limits instead of reading as a blanket endorsement.

## Work to read

- [How TOTP codes work when your phone has no signal](https://www.linkedin.com/posts/kevinnanns_cybersecurity-mfa-totp-activity-7511893543817232384-uKmj)
- [The same TOTP explanation cut for Instagram](https://www.instagram.com/p/DeAZz8xiJ8B/)
- [Asking the audience which login method they use](https://www.tiktok.com/@adjacentnode/video/7694053913653218573)
- [The 'Be honest' hook](https://www.linkedin.com/posts/kevinnanns_wifi-networking-cybersecurity-activity-7523060523345666048-jN7M)
- [A sponsored post that argues its own case](https://www.linkedin.com/posts/kevinnanns_sponsored-networking-agenticai-activity-7521953203920228352-tItT)
- [Removing Apple Intelligence to reclaim storage](https://www.linkedin.com/posts/kevinnanns_macos-appleintelligence-mac-activity-7520489534392963072-hazt)
- [Finding out who is building the data center near you](https://www.linkedin.com/posts/kevinnanns_datacenter-networking-infrastructure-activity-7521592661422817281-MIDc)
- [A Halloween skit that sat unpublished for years](https://www.linkedin.com/posts/kevinnanns_networking-networkengineer-halloween-activity-7522477142350389248-pMFy)
- [Comparing seven accounts after three months](https://www.linkedin.com/posts/kevinnanns_creatoreconomy-socialmedia-career-activity-7521664445719166976-yNzk)

## Brand relationships

- **Cisco** (sponsor)
- **RemoveMacAI** (mention)

## Partnerships

The reviewed material documents one disclosed sponsorship: a LinkedIn post Kevin Nanns labeled as sponsored for Cisco Enterprise Networking, built around a Cisco and Omdia research finding about organizations letting AI make production network changes. A separate post describes how a sponsored video gets made, which shows sponsored video production is part of the working routine even though no second sponsor is named. No published rate card, media kit, sponsorship page, or verified partnership inquiry route appears in the reviewed material, so a buyer currently has to approach Kevin Nanns directly through the profile links rather than through an official program. The operational pattern that matters most is the format he actually used: a technical premise, a named third-party research source, a link, and a closing question that invites the audience to answer from their own environment. Buyers should expect to supply the technical hook, the citable research or product detail, and a destination link, and to accept a public sponsor label.

## Alternatives

- Tim Plumridge: Tim Plumridge is the stronger pick when the brief widens from how sign-in methods work to everyday awareness: phone scams, phishing, password habits, device updates. One supplied post is a first-person account of a call-centre scammer claiming to be from BT, ending in five plain steps (check who is calling, use strong passwords or passphrases, think before clicking or sharing, check links before clicking, keep devices updated) and a note about helping older relatives. Another looks at 2024 cyber predictions: AI-assisted phishing, deepfakes and audio manipulation, and a call to move away from perimeter security toward zero trust. If the client wants a UK voice speaking to non-technical or older employees about recognising an attack, this is closer to the ask than a mechanism explainer.
- Tom DiMercurio: Tom DiMercurio is the better choice when the client wants the cost of identity theft shown rather than the mechanics of login explained. The two supplied posts are a first-person account: a phone provider redirected both cell and home numbers, attackers opened and redirected cards and bank funds, two PayPal accounts approved over $5,000 in gift cards, and the writer ultimately paid a cybersecurity expert about $2,000. The posts name concrete steps taken, including a fraud alert, credit freezes with all three bureaus, wiping a desktop, randomising passwords up to 32 characters, and an RSA device for bank identity checks. For an internal awareness session or an executive-facing piece arguing that authentication failures have long tails, this lived detail persuades in a way that a code explanation does not.
- Caleb Markovich: Caleb Markovich only becomes the better choice if the same buyer decision is about field operations rather than employee sign-in. The two supplied posts argue that waiting for parts, not breakdowns, drives unplanned downtime (37% of it, by the post's figure), and that trust in a vendor shows in how few words are needed to get help at 2 a.m. If the cybersecurity awareness company also sells to fleet and operations buyers who care about service continuity and vendor dependence, this framing matches their world more closely than an authentication explainer does.

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AI-assisted summary of public posts. Audience demographics are not available. Engagement appears only where we checked recent posts. Method: https://b2binfluencer.marketing/methodology/