As an independent security consultant, I’ve been entrusted with guiding clients through some of the most difficult phases of transforming their security posture. I’ve been lucky enough to work with prominent organizations such as The United States DoD, VISA, Bank of America, Verizon, and Microsoft.

While others in my field may have the typical pedigrees from high-level institutions, that was not my path. When I was 16, my computer science teacher challenged students to hack the “new impenetrable” firewall at Grays Harbor Community College. I succeeded, leading to FBI involvement and eventually my position at IEEE Security and Privacy Council.

Under the mentorship of Art Rathjen, a Boeing Chief Electrical Engineer and designer of TCP/IP, I began my first official position with Microsoft at age 18, overseeing outages at MSN.com. Since then, I’ve had a lifetime’s worth of experience in business IT security and risk.