2023 Program - Melbourne

Still a tech at heart, Alannah Guo has a diverse background in offensive cybersecurity including in security engineering, pentesting, red teaming and physical security. Leveraging her extensive experience and passion, Alannah founded Airglow Security where she and the team have helped numerous organizations across various industries fortify against cyber threats.

Meg Tapia is a seasoned national security practitioner with expertise in intelligence capability, technology, and foreign policy. She excels in providing sound advice on high-risk issues and engaging senior stakeholders across cultures. As Managing Director and Founder of Novexus, Meg integrates commercial perspectives, strategic thinking, and policy insights to solve complex national security and commercial challenges. She leverages her unique blend of expertise and experience to drive real impact, prioritising open communication, trust, and evidence-based advice.

Meg’s extensive experience includes National Intelligence Lead at Accenture and key positions in the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade, including diplomatic postings in Afghanistan, Vanuatu, and Papua New Guinea. Committed to fostering inclusion and innovation, Meg actively engages as a conference moderator and speaker, hosts the ANU Women in National Security Podcast, and mentors in the Prince's Trust and AWSN. Meg's exceptional leadership has earned her accolades including the Australian Operational Service Medal and NATO Medal for her service in Afghanistan and Federal Government awards.

Michael Collins is a seasoned cyber security expert with over two decades of industry experience. Collins’s experience covers multiple countries, from the United Kingdom to New Zealand, and includes work in both small and medium-sized enterprises, and Fortune 50 global corporations. Michael has significant expertise in scaling cyber security capabilities within financial services customers, and presently serves as CISO for Judo Bank. Collins is frequently engaged for expert advisory services, and serves as a security adviser to Boards and startups. Michael holds a Postgraduate Certificate in Strategic Planning, GIAC Certified Security Leadership and is certified in Systems Thinking, Systems Mapping and Systems Leadership. Michael gives back to the industry by mentoring the next generation of cyber security experts, and regularly shares his thoughts via the Cyber Cognition™ blog.

Anu brings 20+ years experience in industry, consulting and technology. She was recognised in the Power 100 Global Women in Security by the SIA from USA in 2022 and a global thought leader. She is passionate about helping bring diversity into Cyber & Tech. Anu is a Managaing Director who leads the national Cyber strategy practice at Accenture in ANZ

Maurits Lucas is Director of Product Marketing at Intel 471, where he specialises in bridging the gap between technology and business. Maurits has held various roles in Cyber Threat Intelligence over the past twelve years and is a subject matter expert on the cyber underground, presenting his research and providing his thought-leadership to distinguished audiences around the world.

Twice invited to the White House to brief the Obama Administration's national cyber security leadership on an industry wide anti-botnet scheme he pioneered in Australia, Peter Coroneos is an author and recognised authority on cyber policy. He has longstanding leadership credentials in the cyber and technology sectors. He currently serves as global ambassador of the Paris based not-for-profit, Cybersecurity Advisors Network. As CEO of Australia's Internet Industry Association (from 1997-2011) he pioneered initiatives to support a safer, faster, fairer and more trustworthy internet for all Australians. The 2010 icode anti-botnet scheme whose development he led, reached near ubiquitous coverage in Australia. The Obama Administration subsequently urged the development of a parallel program which, by 2012, had covered approximately 276 million US internet users. Peter was also government appointed leader of industry delegation to Washington as part of the US/Australia bilaterals on critical infrastructure protection. Peter is also an accredited Integrative Restoration (iRest) teacher and practitioner of this and related disciplines since 1977. He is qualified in science, education and law. In 2022, he founded Cybermindz.org, a not-for-profit and the world's first dedicated mental health support program for cyber teams. It delivers peer informed, military proven protocol for the restoration and prevention of burnout––currently one of the biggest challenges facing cyber security teams and the organisations who rely on them.

Marco has over 10 years experience working across the information security space. Over those years he has worked with customers on large and small projects across the full spectrum of cyber security services for many of Australia and Asia’s leading organisations. Marco’s work has covered designing, implementing, and maintaining security programs for customers to help them understand the risks they face.

Over the years being involved in the security community has been incredibly rewarding and the desire to build a better and fairer security consultancy led to the co-founding of Tanto Security. Marco’s responsibilities at Tanto include commercial and customer management to help the team deliver advanced offensive security services from pen testing to end to end Red Teaming to organisations across Australia.

Jeff has more than 25 years’ experience in IT Security, and during that time has worked for international software vendors, boutique consulting firms and national system integrators, working with customers across the Public & Private sectors around Australia to use technology more effectively to address business challenges, and make the most of opportunities, whilst keeping themselves safe from threats.Jeff enjoys working with customers in both back office and customer facing roles, and in his current role with Microsoft he helps customers adopt a Zero Trust philosophy to deliver safe and secure distributed work environments for their users, whether they work from home or the office.

Xiufang (Leah) Li (PhD) is a lecturer and former program manager in the School of Media and Communication at RMIT University in Australia. Prior to her current position, Leah has worked at different universities in Australia and China, including Macquarie University and as an Associate Professor at Guangzhou University. She holds a doctoral degree in International Communication and Media awarded at Macquarie University. Her primary research areas are Strategic Public Relations and Digital Communication. She is an invited reviewer for a multiplicity of world leading Q1 journals. Her recent work can be found in Public Relations Review, European Journal of Cultural Studies, Global Media and China, Media International Australia.

Gavin has spent 30 years in the APAC IT industry working in operations, project management, solution architecture, IT security and management positions.

Gavin is currently the A/NZ Technical Director for Swimlane. He has previously held Engineering Management roles at Palo Alto Networks and F5 Networks assisting in the development of both businesses within the region during their critical growth phase.

Gavin’s a firm believer that effective security is a blend of people, process and technology and his focus is on delivering outcomes with this in mind.

With a combined corporate experience spanning over two decades, the Founders of Growth Intel saw a gap in the way organisations & individuals approached self-development & upskilling. This was the catalyst for the creation of Growth Intel.

We bring hands-on expertise in training, coaching, consultancy & communications. Together with this background, Growth Intel’s approach is rooted in core values of trust & empathy, emphasising a human-to-human connection.

Growth Intel’s driving force is the belief of community & paying-it-forward, where one person’s success can propel others towards their own.

Anushkar, Chief of Program, spent most of her corporate life in Fintech, enabling sales teams & leaders. Recently, she embraced the added role of “Momager” to a little human, providing her with unique perspectives that draw parallels in the complexities & demands of leadership & motherhood.

Chris Hockings is the CTO for IBM Security Asia Pacific. He represents the IBM global security strategy and vision to the geography, and in doing so engages with leaders across government, industry and partnerships. Chris has been a leader across all facets of software, including global research and development, support, service and market engagement. He is an IBM Master Inventor, a title that reflects a sustained contribution to IBM Security's patent portfolio. Chris is also a certified information systems security professional (CISSP).

Joanne Knight is an Identification Consultant in the Digital Public Service Branch, Department of Internal Affairs, Te Tari Taiwhenua (New Zealand).
She is currently responsible for the maintenance of New Zealand’s Identification Management Standards suite. She was also lead editor of ISO/IEC 29003 – Identity Proofing an international technical specification.
Her experience and observations enable her to be at the leading edge of thinking in identification management practice and the standards that support this. She promotes new approaches to identification through her very successful Identification Masterclass series.
Day to day Joanne provides identification advisory services to government which includes education, risk assessment and advice on the design of identification processes. She is also a strong advocate for identification as an independent practice, rather than a subset of security.

Melissah Dawson is an Assistant Director at the Australian Signals Directorate in the Entry Level Programs Development team. She is passionate about careers in cyber security and believes with the right information many more professionals would be able to identify cyber as a sector of choice for job seekers.

Melissah facilitates the ASD Work Experience Program and ASD Internship Program, and has worked with school leavers, early entrants, graduates and mature workers at the start of their cyber careers.

Bernadette Smyth CPA MAICD B Com B Fin is the Founder and Principal Consultant. She is a CPA qualified finance professional, adult educator and Company Secretary who has worked in Australia, the UK and Europe. Her work experience spans across financial and management accounting, analysis and reporting, corporate governance and management roles in a range of different sectors.

Passionate about mental health, Bernadette has completed ASIST and Accidental Counsellor training through LivingWorks. She has been pivotal in leading the implementation of fit for work models in both small business and the for purpose sector.

Speaking from lived experience, Bernadette is acutely aware of the challenges in ensuring the health, safety and wellbeing of staff in the workplace, and broader community. She believes that organisations of all sizes have the ability to incorporate fit for work into their business operations to ensure sustainability of human capital and business outcomes.

Rebecca Kerlett represents the Cyber Security Response Coordination Unit, which works collaboratively with the ACSC and affected parties in the wake of serious cyber incidents.

Currently working as a content creator and researcher at Phriendly Phishing, Bec Caldwell brings with her a unique blend of expertise in cyber security, project management, writing and marketing. After obtaining technical qualifications in cyber security (Cert 4 Cyber Sec, ISC2 CC, TryHackMe Threat Intelligence and more), she continues to whet her appetite for learning by researching and training in a variety of cyber subjects. She combines a growing technical prowess with a rich background in her former life as a writer (stage, screen and corporate) and actor. Her study of the human condition through her script writing, keen passion for cyber intelligence, AI, and social engineering, with her adaptability, makes her a compelling new voice in the field.

Keyur Lavingia is an accomplished Cyber Security Leader with over two decades of experience in managing large and complex program initiatives, mentoring global teams, and aligning information security objectives with business strategy. He is currently serving as the Associate Director (Deputy CISO) of Cybersecurity and Identity at RMIT University, where he is responsible for uplifting global cybersecurity and identity capabilities for all RMIT entities in Australia, Europe, and Asia. Keyur has a proven track record of defining cybersecurity strategies, developing business cases, and delivering strategic outcomes. He has developed, implemented, and operationalized annual enterprise security strategies, elevating security maturity three-fold within a five-year period, and led the strategic delivery of all Identity and security aspects of the University’s ERP program (Workday). Keyur holds a Bachelor of Commerce with Accounting and Statistics, a Diploma in Systems Management, a Certified Information Systems Manager (CISM - 2015), and a Certified Information Systems Security Professional (CISSP -2001).

Sophie is CEO of Modern Methodologies an IDAM consultancy business providing services across Federal Government, State Government and Private Sector.

Sophie's expertise in cyber strategy and enterprise architecture has earned her a reputation as a highly respected leader in the industry. She is often referred to as a "CISO whisperer" for her ability to effectively communicate and provide guidance in relation to all things cyber – especially IDAM. Sophie has worked with clients across various sectors, including Federal and State Government, Banking, Retail, Telco, and Education, providing thought leadership and strategic advice with stakeholders. Her deep technical expertise in digital identities, particularly in the areas of workforce, business partners, and customers, sets her apart from others in the field. Sophie has worked in senior thought leadership roles on large projects for Home Affairs, ACIC, Department of Employment & Workplace Relations, NSW Transport, Cenitex, Attorney Generals Department, People’s Choice Credit Union and many more.

Andrew is an AISA member and volunteer since 2013 and has held positions at most levels within AISA from committee member to current board member.

Andrew is a Senior IT Professional with over 30 years experience that specialises in cyber security. He studied and passed the CISSP certification in 2007, values it immensely, and maintains the certification as 'a member in good standing' to the current day. In 2019, as part of the AISA partnership with ISC2, Andrew successfully completed his training to become an ISC2 instructor.

To date, at the time of submission in April 2023, he has successfully co-delivered over 10 x CISSP instructor led course for AISA/ISC2.

Ben, a company award-winning and driven cybersecurity product manager, is dedicated to cultivating security awareness and fostering a robust security culture. He is currently completing his Master of Cyber Security, with postgraduate studies in Cyber Security (GradCertCyberSec) and Cloud Computing (GradCertCloudCompVirt) already under his belt. In addition, he is studying a Graduate Certificate in AI.

Ben also boasts an array of certifications in Cyber Security, Artificial Intelligence, Machine Learning, Product Management, and more.

With a passion for learning and contributing to enterprises, society, and personal relationships, Ben is eager to embrace the rapidly advancing future. His blend of commercial and cutting-edge technical expertise, along with his talent for leading teams toward profitable outcomes, gives Ben unique insights into issues facing Australian companies today.

Ben hails from Brisbane, Queensland where he lives with his partner Nicky and Siamese cat, Vida.

Mahshid Sadeghpour has recently been appointed as an ECDF at RMIT University. Mahshid's PhD thesis was on Privacy-Preserving Biometrics. Her research interest includes statistical image analysis, biometric template protection, privacy-preserving machine learning, pattern recognition, and computer vision. In 2022, she was selected to receive the Young Scientist Research Prize by the Royal Society of Victoria for the research she conducted during her PhD project. Mahshid has developed “the first privacy-preserving retinal recognition system” and generated “the first large-scale high-quality synthetic retinal image dataset” using statistical and data-driven generative modelling. Mahshid is a member of IEEE (since Jan 2016), Biometrics Institute (since Aug 2018), AustMS (since Feb 2019), and the Royal Society of Victoria (since May 2022). She is interested in lecturing, mentoring, consulting, and supervising students.

Keira Paterson is passionate about security "for the rest of us".

She has been a software developer and co-founder for 7 years, but came to tech after a career in community organising, public sector policy and people-management.

She works as a software consultant and in her won time runs an organising platform for community groups and a conference social app.

Her former career focused on building people's skills and confidence, and advocating for solutions that left no one behind. Coming to the tech world from that base means constantly working to bend technology into a shape that is fit for ordinary human consumption.

She's a privacy and security enthusiast, and currently focused on how to reconnect technologists and users for everyone's benefit.

Glenn Goodwin is the Executive Director - ICT at the Victorian Chamber of Commerce and Industry (VCCI). He sits on ACSC and RMIT cyber security industry advisory boards, and led the business through its adoption of ISO27001 and ACSC ISM certifications. Glenn was instrumental in the development of VCCI's Cyber Security and Scams Policy Position.

Sekar Langit is a Cyber Security Consultant in the financial services sector. She advises on security controls and system designs for IT project development and acquisition, as well as ensuring compliance with data protection regulations. Sekar has a background in network engineering and broad experience in cyber security, including governance, risk, and compliance, identity access management, and network security.

In her spare time, Sekar is a passionate student of language and culture, and loves to explore Canberra’s trendy brunch scene.

Julia Wulf-Rhodes combines a strategic lens with experience in security operations to consider cyber security problem solving through a variety of perspectives. Specialising in strategic cyber security consulting, Julia has a diverse background with exposure to a variety of business units including security operations, cyber security strategy development and incident response.

Julia is an emerging leader in the cyber security industry and is an advocate for women in cyber security and technology, supporting peers in the industry to challenge traditional barriers which may restrict diversification in the cyber security workforce.

Ben leads WTW’s cyber and technology risk insurance team in Australia and New Zealand. His work focuses on helping clients understand their data security exposure and tailoring responsive resiliency and insurance solutions. Ben has over 14 years of experience as an admitted solicitor specialising in technology risk, insurance, data privacy, incident response and dispute resolution. In addition to his role at WTW, Ben sits on numerous advisory bodies, is the Vice President of the Australasian Society of Computers and Law, and guest lectures at 5 universities on topics including Insurance, Cyber and Technology Law, Information Security and Data-Governance.

Josh Fourie is the co-founder and CTO of Decoded.AI, a SaaS platform to align AI systems with enterprise risk requirements like regulatory compliance and cyber-security. Josh has led research grants for pioneering AI projects for the Australian Department of Defence, Science & Technology. He is a noted speaker, researcher and contributor in the AI community where his work explores a post-modern theory of AI development that better aligns AI systems with society without compromising production speed. Prior to Decoded.AI, Josh worked in building cryptographically secure AI systems for high-security applications and strict regulatory environments. You’re most likely to find Josh in the AI community talking about the importance of thinking of AI not as a collection of techniques but as a cultural practice of ceding decisions to autonomous systems that actively co-shape us.

Vikas Anand currently leads SOC Incident Response team for APAC and MEA region in Mastercard. Vikas Joined Mastercard in April 2020 as a Senior Incident Responder and worked on that role for 1 year, before getting promoted to Manager, Incident Response. Vikas has developed Incident Response Playbook, contributed to multiple cyber incident category playbook as well as runbooks for SOC team. Vikas has invested considerable time and effort to mature the SOC Incident Response team in Mastercard and has helped improved incident response KPIs and Key Metrics since joining Mastercard.

Before Mastercard, Vikas spent 9 years at Saudi Business Machines and 2.5 years in IBM and had led cyber security project teams in the telecoms, financial services, and government sectors. This has included designing, developing, and implementing solutions for Security Operations and Network Operations Centers.

Vikas has 17+ years of security products and services experience and has proven expertise in deploying solutions and providing architecture and design elements for implementing Security Operations Center Solutions and Services. In addition, Vikas has developed advanced relationship management skills with ability to lead cross-functional operations and delivery teams. Vikas has also previously developed proof of concepts, technical and financial proposals for SOC, ITSM, and NOC solutions.

At Joseph Banks Secondary College, Liz’s role leading Pathways, Partnerships and Innovation involves leadership of a whole school approach to STEAM education and development of the Western Australian Space Science Education Centre, opening in late 2023.

Our STEAM Approach includes a focus on the Sciences, Cyber Security and Space in partnership with Industry and Tertiary Institutions, through the provision of a broad based 21st century curriculum to ensure students have flexible pathways into diverse post-secondary opportunities.

Liz is an experienced educational leader, having worked in leadership roles in a range of metropolitan schools in Perth, Western Australia. Liz works as an instructional leader to link and integrate current research about how people learn with classroom practice.

Liz has led professional development in curriculum design, best practice teaching and learning, whole school literacy, leadership development and coaching practices to build and sustain capacity within schools to develop high quality teacher practice and to improve educational outcomes for students.

Sarah is a Senior Cloud Security Advocate working at Microsoft. She has lived all over the place but currently calls Melbourne home. Sarah has been working in cyber security since before it was cool, holds numerous industry qualifications and has co-authored a few Microsoft Press technical books. In 2019, Sarah won the Security Champion award at the Australian Women in Security Awards. She is an active supporter of both local and international security and cloud native communities and a co-host of the Microsoft Azure Security Podcast. Sarah spends most of her spare time speaking at security conferences in various parts of the world, eating hipster brunches and high teas and spending a disproportionate amount of her income on her dogs.

Quang Cao serves as regional manager for Blancco in the ANZ region.

He started his career with Blancco in Finland, went through 4 different offices and currently bases in Melbourne. Having worked with Blanco’s clients in various industries in Europe, Japan, ASEAN, and Australia, Quang understands the operational, financial, and cultural nuances of driving global cyber security, and privacy policies.

You can find Quang supports banks, enterprises, data centers and government agencies, etc. in the region with his knowledge and experience of data sanitization and compliance learnt from countries he has been through. In his free time, Quang volunteers as IAPP KnowledgeNET Melbourne Chapter Chair to raise privacy awareness in Melbourne and Australia.

Elliot Dellys (IRAP, PCI QSA, CIS LA, CISSP, CISM) is the founder and Chief Realist (CEO) of Phronesis Security, finalist for 2023 Cyber Security Consulting Company of the Year and Australia's first B.Corp cyber security company with a mission to do ‘cyber security for good’.

Previously, Elliot worked for the Australian Signals Directorate and a global managed service provider, where he led the Strategic Consulting division across the Europe, Middle East and Africa region.

Elliot has guided organisations large and small through cyber transformation programs, including a successful ISO 27001 certification program for the world’s leading motorsports racing company, the accreditation of a fleet of Commonwealth aircraft, and as the virtual CISO for Australian and international critical infrastructure providers.

Elliot is also an established industry commentator, with regular appearances on TV, radio and major print news discussing issues ranging from privacy law reform to ransomware legislation, national security strategy, AI risk and high-profile data breaches.

Elliot is also an industry-recognised information security content publisher, with articles appearing in ACS, Computerworld, CSO, Australian Cyber Security Magazine, CRN, ITWire and InfoSecurity Magazine.

Steven is a cyber security professional with a career spanning over twenty years of experience across a range of client industries including finance, energy & utilities, resources, transport, manufacturing, government, health, education, technology, media & telecommunications.

A Director at Deloitte within the Risk Advisory division's Cyber & Strategic Risk practice, Steven is a Senior Security Architect by trade and has also held various leadership and technical positions at Computer Associates, CGI, Fujitsu, Dimension Data, and Zimbani.

Pragmatic in his approach to cyber and information security, Steven is a security leader focused in building trust and nurturing the next generation of practitioners. In providing business-driven and outcome-based value to manage risk effectively, Steven has contributed to the improvement of cyber risk management across many ASX-listed companies and some of Australia's largest organisations in: security architecture & strategy, managed services, incident response, and technical solutions & controls.

A Deakin University alumnus, Steven’s post-nominals include: CISSP, CCSP, SABSA SCF, and CDPSE.Steven is currently the Board Secretary of the ISACA Melbourne Chapter and volunteers as the IT Officer for his local early childhood education institution.

An avid supporter and member of the Geelong Football Club, he is passionate about good food and drink in particularly wood-fired cooking surrounded by family and friends, and enjoys unwinding with his library of films and home theatre alongside his children.

Dr. Jessie D. Jamieson is a mathematician and senior research engineer at Tenable, Inc, where she assists with research efforts and drives the innovation of decision support analytics for the organization. She is the author of numerous scientific articles, and most recently led Tenable's data analysis effort concerning continued prevalence of Log4j vulnerabilities.

During her graduate studies, she held internships at the NASA Goddard Space Flight Center and Oak Ridge National Laboratory, the latter of which being where she first endeavored into cybersecurity by cooperating with the lab's SOC to develop machine learning solutions for rapid case classification. After receiving her PhD in Mathematics from the University of Nebraska, she moved to the Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory (APL) where she worked for nearly four years in support of a number of tasks focused on military and civilian cyber operations, strategy, and data driven decision making, including efforts supporting the APL COVID-19 Decision Support Center. While at APL, she taught numerous courses to APL staff and students in the STEM outreach program concerning critical thinking with data, to include courses all about data driven decision making.

Eric is a seasoned security professional with 20+ years experiences in security architecture and solution delivery. Eric leads the Accenture Security Architecture Domain and is responsible to ensure all aspect of security and privacy are appropriately embedded into technology solutions delivered. As an innovative security solution architect, Eric's has successfully demonstrated security value to both technology and business stakeholders though many high profile engagements such as securing various Whole of Government Digital Services, embedding cyber security into the technology environment for a next generational smart airport.

As a cybersecurity pioneer with over a decade of experience in network and cloud security, I have a proven track record of success. In my most recent role, I led Telstra cloud security team for four years, with a primary focus on designing and scaling secure solutions in public cloud environments by leveraging industry standards, best practices, and cyber security risk frameworks.

During this time, we successfully implemented cloud security hygiene solutions, Continuous Compliance, Container and Kubernetes exercises, and IaC security using the DevSecOps paradigm and agile methodology.

I have recently transitioned to a new role, I am now the Managed Security and Services lead, where I oversee a diverse range of cybersecurity solutions for various clients.

In addition to my professional accomplishments, I have been recognised as a diversity game changer, actively working to change the gender balance in the traditionally male-dominated cybersecurity industry.

Ken is the author of securitypatterns.io, a popular website providing information and resources on how to write and apply security patterns and best practices (ranked #1 on google when searching 'security patterns'). An experienced security expert with over 18 years of experience across government and private sectors. Currently director and practice lead at Patterned Security, a professional services company for cybersecurity strategy, architecture and design.

Dr. Michael Cohen has over 20 years of experience in applying and developing novel incident response and digital forensics tools and techniques.

He has previously worked in the Australian Department of Defence as an information security specialist, at the Australian Federal Police specializing in digital forensics, network and memory forensics. In 2010 he joined Google, where he created tools in support of the incident response team.

In 2020, Mike has joined Rapid7 to support and develop Velociraptor, an advanced open source endpoint visibility tool.

Running the Services and Security Operations team at Cythera, Ben leads a team of security analysts, incident responders and consultants.

Ben has spent 20 years in the IT and cyber security sector throughout Asia Pacific, delivering best of breed solutions to clients across a range of sectors and geographies. Before co-founding Cythera, Ben worked for class-leading vendors including F5 and Palo Alto Networks, in systems engineering and security architecture roles.

Fiona Long MBA, CISM, ISO27001 Lead Auditor, IRAP Assessor. Fiona is the CEO and Founder of Cyber Security Consulting and InfoSecAssure. Fiona has worked in information security for 25 years, from helping lead the charge in developing online banking security for the banking system to Head of Cybercrime for one of Australia’s largest data management companies. Fiona is the CEO of a boutique consultancy firm specialising in cyber security and more recently founded a cyber security software company which was a part of Australia’s only cyber security accelerator program in 2023.

Fiona was the first female in NSW to become an endorsed IRAP assessor and is a keynote speaker at cyber security events around the world. Fiona recently spoke at the world’s largest Cyber Security Conference, RSAC 2023.

Fiona brings a wealth of experience and is passionate about removing the fear and doubt surrounding cyber security and providing advice and tools that empowers and engages individuals and businesses so they can achieve their business goals.

Nigel Hedges is a Fellow of The Australian Information Security Association (FAISA) and Member of the Australian Institute of Company Directors (MAICD). He has two masters (MBA 2013, Cybersecurity 2019) and several industry certifications (CISA, CISM, CRISC, CGEIT, CISSP, CCSK, ITIL F, COBIT F, CSX F, ISO27001 LA & LI. ) He provides CISO-level leadership in an enterprise setting, and enjoys strategy, program development, operations and building & developing an engaged, capable and resilient team.

Gordon Draper is the Host of Cyber Consulting Room Podcast and Cyber Consulting Room Meetup Network. He has over 20 years experience in IT, Engineering and Cyber Security and has been CEO of Fort Safe Cyber Consultancy. He has helped Banking and Finance with their Offensive and Defensive Cyber Security. He also previously helped to start up CyberMarket.com

As a dedicated cybersecurity leader with a deep passion for leveraging technology to address everyday challenges within the realm of cybersecurity. With over a decade of experience in IT systems and security, my journey has encompassed roles in system administration, analysis, offensive security testing engineering, and leadership. I maintain a light-hearted approach and am always up for a conversation on all matters related to cybersecurity. I firmly believe that tackling intricate challenges should always be an enjoyable and engaging experience.

I am not only an avid learner but also a committed educator, striving to enhance the security posture of organizations of all sizes. I firmly believe in the strength of our industry when knowledge is freely exchanged between seasoned experts and newcomers. This belief is the driving force behind my commitment to sharing my wealth of experience and insights with the community.

My dedication to this mission extends to my peers, where I advocate the value of a collaborative approach. It is through this collective effort that knowledge continually flows, enriching our community, particularly here in Australia and around the world.

Fadzayi is an Application Security Consultant and Penetration Tester at CyberCX in Perth Australia. She is also a co-host of the WestCoast Cyber podcast. She comes from a software engineering background in which she specialised in FinTech for close to a decade, assisting financial institutions to build user experience-driven software. In 2018, Fadzayi Founded DIV:A Initiative, a non-profit initiative dedicated to empowering young girls between the ages of 8 and 18 years from South Africa's disadvantaged communities with coding skills, in order to address the industry’s gender imbalance.

Robin Doss is Professor of Cyber Security and Director of the Deakin University Centre for Cyber Resilience and Trust (CREST). At CREST, he leads a team of 150+ multi-disciplinary researchers working with industry, business, and government to advance cyber security technology, strategy, policy, and governance. In addition, he also leads the Development of Next Generation Authentication Technologies theme for the Cyber Security Cooperative Research Centre (CSCRC). He boasts an extensive research publication portfolio (200+ publications) and in 2019 was the recipient of the Cyber Security Researcher of the Year Award from the Australian Information Security Association (AISA).

Reece is a Security Technology Specialist at Microsoft, helping organisations solve challenges including cyber threats, data security and governance.

Brenton has been in the IT managed services business for over 10 years. As the founder of Uptake Digital, he is known for his cloud-first and customer focused approach, and has helped dozens of clients navigate the difficult waters of digital transformation and cloud adoption over the years.

As an early adopter and advocate of cloud technologies, Brenton was quick to recognise the changes and challenges they would bring to the fundamental nature of IT service delivery, particularly for his small and medium business customers. It was this foresight which has enabled him to grow Uptake Digital from a one-man-band into a successful and sustainable MSP.

Brenton differentiates himself from his peers by his approach to SMB cybersecurity. Where other MSPs see "security" as little more than an extra bundle of products they can sell with a mark up, Brenton understands that his customers need more than bells and whistles - they need a partner and trusted advisor that can identify and manage risk every day.

Dr Fabian Horton is senior-level lawyer and risk analyst with over 20 years experience across various practice areas. As a risk manager he advises on high-value commercial and legal risks across a variety of portfolios. As a lawyer, his practice includes privacy, data protection, technology contracting, and cyber law. Through his involvement in the legal profession, Dr Horton have built a solid reputation as a thought-leader, in technology, cyber, and ethics. Dr Horton is the chair of the Australasian Cyber Law Institute. A not-for-profit think-tank. He is the Foundation Chair and current Executive Member of the Technology and Innovation Section at Law Institute of Victoria, and he is a member, of the Futures Committee of the Law Council of Australia.

Jed is a Principal Consultant at CyberCX, based in Christchurch NZ. He helps people to understand the challenges and opportunities of building modern IT in complex organisations.

His background includes working as a software developer, IT ops lead, and security do-it-all-person, and so has practical advice grounded in experience.

I am a passionate Cyber Threat Intelligence Analyst, who spends his days sifting through the noise of the internet to help various organisations globally. Helping them understand their risks and potential impacts that arise from the ever evolving threat landscape.

I got my start in Cyber as an Incident Responder with the Victorian Government, through my journey I learnt the importance of Cyber Threat Intelligence and the vital role it has to play in preventing and preparing for a cyber incident.

Jacqueline Jayne (JJ) serves as a Security Awareness and Culture Advocate for the APAC region for KnowBe4, the provider of the world’s largest security awareness and simulated phishing platform.

She has mastered the art of communication and influence with 25+ years of experience as a conduit between people and technology. Previously, JJ led a successful cybersecurity education and awareness program that changed behaviour and created a security culture.

Her insights on the human condition and how to engage at all levels in this space are invaluable.

Paul McCarty is a serial technical entrepreneur who founded his first startup in 1997. Paul’s latest startup is SecureStack which he founded in 2017 here on the Gold Coast.  Paul was recently named one of the He is very active in the startup scene and in addition to mentoring and advising startups, he also runs two cyber security meetups and is a frequent speaker at cybersecurity and startup events.

Ashley is the IAM Strategy Practice Lead for Canberra-based scale-up Modern Methodologies, where she heads up delivery of IAM and PAM strategies, service design and risk assessments for medium-to-large enterprises. She is a talented security professional with over a decade of experience in federal government, working on cyber and national security programs and delivering IT innovation projects to uplift enterprise capability. Ashley is a gifted problem solver and has a keen eye for innovative solutions that reduce risk, enhance efficiency and enable businesses to focus on the work that is truly important to them.

Ashley has a Master of Science in Global Governance and Diplomacy from Oxford University and had her thesis on Cyber-Intelligence and Diplomacy published in Secret Diplomacy (Routledge, 2016). Ashley is also an active member of the Australian Women in Security Network (AWSN) and is keenly interested in supporting and empowering young women to take on - and thrive in - security-related careers.

Lawrence leads the solutions engineering team for Snyk in Asia Pacific and Japan. He leads a team of technologists who help grow the overall APJ business and evangelise Snyk’s products and solutions across the region. Prior to Snyk, Lawrence was the senior director of solution architecture for Elastic’s APJ business and before that he spent 6 years at Pivotal Software in various leadership roles such as Head of Platform Architecture APJ for their Cloud Foundry product, started and ran the Pivotal Labs business in Australia and Field CTO. He has extensive experience in open source software, distributed systems and modern cloud native development and what it takes to secure those types of environments. In Lawrence’s 20+ of years experience, he has worked with successful high growth software companies that have either IPO’d or have been acquired, so he knows what it takes to build a business at scale.

Queen is a cyber security consultant who loves lifting heavy things. Queen recently completed her Doctoral research with a thesis examining information security strategies in relation to users’ security behaviour. Queen enjoys conducting ethical phishing campaigns and delivering ‘bite-size’ security awareness sessions. As a previous Business Analyst and IT Project Supervisor, Queen understands the importance of delivering practical and timely solutions to enhance business processes.

Danny is a Partner in KPMG’s Cyber Services practice in Brisbane, and leads their National and APAC Identity capabilities.

Danny moved to Australia to lead the APAC Delivery team for Cyberinc (specialising in Identity and Access Management and Cyber Security implementations) who were acquired by KPMG in 2018.

With a strong reputation for Delivery excellence, Danny is focused on the development of strategic partnerships and has extensive experience building technical capabilities.

Asrar is a lead auditor in information security, whose role includes governance, strategy, and compliance. She implements best practice approaches to Infosec in small and medium-sized businesses, including supporting small businesses to implement the Essential Eight framework and Australian standards for the Department of Education Skills and Employment Information Security Management (DESE ISM). Her area of expertise is in cloud-based storage models, ensuring data confidentiality, availability, and integrity, while emphasizing people, technology, processes, and physical security to prevent data breaches.

Asrar regularly conducts sessions on cyber hygiene for businesses and conducts social engineering exercises to identify areas of concern. She also provides training to individuals, staff members, and organizations on safe online and digital practices, as well as cyber safety and information security. Asrar is an alumna of the University of the Sunshine Coast and the University of Southern Queensland. She currently works for Quality Management Australia and the Sunshine Coast Tech Industry Alliance and is a lecturer at the University of the Sunshine Coast, delivering courses in Cyber Security, Cyber Ethics, and Foundations of Computer Security.

Chris leads Accenture’s Crisis Response and Intelligence team across the Growth Markets region, working primarily with enterprise clients to deliver high impact incident response, crisis response, threat intelligence, and incident preparedness services. With a solid technical background having started his career in Cyber Forensics, Chris has spent more than a decade helping government agencies and corporations around the world prepare for and deal with the aftermath of major business impacting cybersecurity attacks. He has also built and led Cyber Defence teams to protect Australia’s national critical infrastructure in an operational capacity.

Joanne Pizzato is a respected leader in the field of DevSecOps and is the Practice Head of Application Security at Wipro Shelde. With over 15 years of experience in IT, Joanne has honed her skills in leading an experienced Australian-based team of consultants to deliver effective application security strategies for a diverse range of organisations in the financial, communications, enterprise and government sectors.

Joanne has a Bachelor of Computer Science (Honours) from Macquarie University in Sydney, Australia, and holds a Certified Information Systems Security Professional (CISSP). She has also previously worked as a lead software developer at two financial institutions. Her passion for innovation and deep expertise in application security allows her to provide informed insights, which are invaluable to anyone looking to improve their application security program.

Zoe is a highly skilled and experienced professional in the critical infrastructure space, currently serving as a Director at PwC. Throughout her career, she has focused on working with both foreign and local interlocutors to identify opportunities to secure critical infrastructure, using her extensive knowledge and expertise to safeguard these vital assets. Zoe's academic background includes a master’s in international law and legal studies, as well as a Bachelor’s in Political Science and Government. This educational foundation has provided her with a deep understanding of the complex legal and political dynamics that impact critical infrastructure, giving her a unique perspective on the challenges and opportunities facing the sector.

As a lead practitioner at PwC, Zoe is responsible for developing and implementing strategies to help clients protect their critical infrastructure. She is highly skilled at identifying vulnerabilities and threats, and she uses her expertise to develop customized solutions that address the specific needs of each client. Zoe's work in the critical infrastructure space has earned her a reputation as a trusted and reliable expert in the field. She is known for her ability to build strong relationships with both clients and stakeholders, using her communication skills and diplomatic approach to navigate complex and sensitive situations. Throughout her career, Zoe has demonstrated a deep commitment to public service and a strong sense of social responsibility. She is passionate about using her skills and expertise to make a positive difference in the world, and she is widely respected for her professionalism, integrity, and dedication to excellence.

Tim Bishop has seven years industry experience, working within penetration testing, security operations teams and leadership positions within the cyber security discipline. Tim began his career penetration testing within major government departments and implementing and running detection programs for a large Canberra based utility. Tim’s experience within security operations involves creating, implementing, and analysing alerts and engaging with customers to perform incident response, alert tuning and upkeep. Tim is passionate about engaging with customers to perform detection engineering around specific threats to an organisation, and when he’s not doing that he’s pursing his love of 2am incident response for clients.

Tim has been a member of Emergency Services for over eight years and is a Leading Senior Operator. Qualified as an In-Water Flood Rescue technician, with a passion for working in Incident Management Teams, Tim has been deployed throughout NSW in a volunteer capacity assisting the community during times of crisis.

Rob has 10 years of experience in cyber, with a variety of roles during this time including leading SOC teams, threat hunting, and incident response. Prior to beaching the cyber sector, Rob served in the Royal Air Force as a IT & Communications specialist operating in the UK, Mediterranean, and Middle East. Rob thrives on developing and teaching cyber professionals, with interests in packet analysis and OSINT.

Mark is an IT and Security professional with extensive experience in security strategy, industrial control systems security, enterprise architecture, cloud security and full life cycle development experience.

In addition to his passion for protecting critical infrastructure, Mark also has a deep interest in data and machine learning.

Stefanie Luhrs is a lawyer that specialises in cyber, incident response and IT liability. She regularly works on cyber claims involving data breaches, regulatory investigations, recovery actions and incident response. She has acted as breach coach, privacy counsel and coverage counsel in a range of incidents including high profile data breaches, ransomware and business email compromise incidents. She has also advised clients in relation to their privacy compliance, cyber incident readiness and resilience.

With long-standing security domain expertise across the financial, government and telecommunications industries, Stefan helps organizations adopt cloud solutions with a focus on managing Security, Identity, & Compliance risks.

Stefan started his career as consultant at Atos, a global leader in IT and consulting services, and held various senior technology roles at leading technology companies such as Cisco, AWS and Google.

Today, as an experienced Cyber Security Architect , Stefan articulates strategy for C-suite executives and technology leaders and delivers guidance on their investments in cyber security based on business strategy, risk assessment, enterprise architectures and deployment of technology solutions.

As Director of Solutions Engineering, Leonardo works hand in hand with customers and partners across Asia to increase their cybersecurity posture with LogRhythm’s technology.

He began his career in cybersecurity 20 years ago, starting with perimeter defense before evolving into network-based security, content-based security, computer forensics, penetration testing, data security and cloud-based security.

Despite taking on many roles like sales engineer and security consultant, Leonardo’s main interest would always be protection against cyberthreats. He firmly believes the most crucial base of protection against cyber threats lies in SIEM, UEBA and SOAR technologies.

Leonardo graduated from Trisakti University with a bachelor’s degree in Electrical Engineering, and a master’s degree in Business Administration from Arcadia University, and holds CISSP, CISM, CISA, CRISC, CDPSE, GSEC, GCIH, GCIA, GCFA, GCED, GREM, GCPM, GPEN, GWAPT, GCDA, CEH, CCSK certifications.

Corch grew up with the movie WarGames and childish dreams of one day being a master hacker. Fast forward 40ish years and he has been working in computer security almost as long as anyone really cared about it. Starting out as a humble firewall administrator, he has only gone further down the rabbit hole since then.In 2015, after many years spent as a sysadmin, engineer, and consultant, Corch established Shogun Cybersecurity in a hopelessly doomed attempt to bring enterprise cybersecurity capability to the SMB market. The hard lessons he learned along the way have given him a unique understanding of why many accepted "best practices" for cybersecurity fail in an SMB context.Corch now works for organisations large and small helping them to solve the cybersecurity problems that keep them up at night.

Corch (he/him) has spent his entire career working in infosec, watching the industry develop into a people-paradoxis that simultaneously cries out for more people but drives or keeps them away with gatekeeping and exclusive behaviour. He has become passionate about breaking down these barriers to make cyber a field in which anyone can participate and feel welcome.

Skye Wu is currently an associate director in cyber security at KordaMentha. She has over 15 years of experience in cyber security, digital forensics, electronic discovery and internal investigations. Skye began her career as a Digital Forensic analyst for the Victoria Police assisting police investigations with digital forensic analysis and presenting evidence in court. She also has experience in the consulting world, using digital forensics, electronic discovery and investigation skills to help clients through various challenges.

Skye joined Telstra's Cyber Security in 2014, in her time there she helped to build an open source intelligence capability and a threat discovery capability that takes a proactive stance on identifying and managing business risks that are unknown and unseen by security detections or controls.

Glenn Maiden is the Director of Threat Intelligence Operations at Fortinet’s FortiGuard Labs Australia and New Zealand.

Glenn has more than 25 years’ experience in different roles across the technology sector with a solid background in defence, intelligence, national security, and government affairs.

Glenn’s role with FortiGuard Labs focuses on identifying and sharing threat intelligence to help organisations protect against current and emerging threats.

Laura Lees has over 20 years of experience in the technology, security and risk management industries with a focus on financial services. She is currently based in Singapore as Sector Senior ISO for APAC/EMEA for a multinational bank. Previous roles include Country ISO - Aust/NZ at Citi, Head of Information Security – APAC at Link Group, Senior Manager Cyber Strategy and Governance at IAG, Senior Manager Strategy and Architecture, and BISO team lead at Westpac. She has covered Consumer and Institutional Banking, Markets, Superannuation, Share Registry and General Insurance. 

Anthony leads placement of cyber and technology insurance for WTW’s Australia and New Zealand practice. His work specialises in tailoring insurance products to organisations unique risk exposures. Anthony has over 8 years’ experience working both within the legal service sphere, and as an insurance professional specialising in general, financial, and cyber liability.

Anurag Khanna is a Manager with CrowdStrike Services where he leads Incident Response and Consulting services in Asia Pacific and advises organizations when they are in midst of security incidents. Anurag is also a SANS Certified Instructor. Over years Anurag has led multiple breach investigations and incident response engagements involving advanced adversaries for a wide range of industries. He has helped organizations develop cyber defence capabilities to protect against and respond to attacks. He is among few cybersecurity professionals to have the GIAC Security Expert (GSE# 97) credential.

Ben is an accomplished information security executive with over 20 years of international information security experience. Due to his many years of providing strategic C-level/board advice, he is able to apply technical threats into appropriate business contexts to determine overall risk to organisations. During this time Ben has been required to manage complex environments that requires balancing local and global organisational policies, domestic regulations, national security requirements, export control and international trade control restrictions, and applying the process, people and technology to ensure successful compliance.

Ben maintains his strong passion for the technical aspects of information security and recently has been focusing on creating new business opportunities by working across the breath of the global organisation's capabilities while teaming and supporting small innovative start up technology companies.

Ben speaks regularly at international, interstate and local conferences, seminars and round tables.

Vivienne is an experienced cyber security consultant with capability in delivering comprehensive cyber risk management and governance services to clients. She has worked with government agencies, large private organisations, startups, scaleups and global cloud service providers, helping them to uplift their security postures whilst complying with industry standards and frameworks such as the Australian Government's Information Security Manual (ISM), ACSC Essential Eight, AESCSF, PCI DSS, and ISO 27001. Vivienne has also developed cyber resilience strategies and policies that consider her clients' business goals, risk profile, and regulatory requirements. To enhance clients' cyber awareness, she has conducted user awareness training, phishing simulations, and social engineering tests.

Vivienne's consulting experience in EMEA and Australia has required her to lead complex engagements, manage client relationships, and keep senior management informed of potential scope creep, new issues, scheduling, and resourcing requirements.

She holds a Bachelor of Commerce Honours degree in Financial Analysis and Portfolio Management and a Bachelor of Commerce in Management Studies with a focus on Economics from the University of Cape Town in South Africa. Additionally, she holds various information security risk management and governance industry certifications and serves on the Board of Directors for ISACA Sydney Chapter.

John Macpherson is a crisis response expert and leads Ashurst Risk Advisory's cyber response team working with clients to prepare for, and respond to, high impact cyber incidents. As a strategic advisor to Boards and leadership teams in Australia and internationally, he supports them in their recovery from acute crisis. Alongside the Ashurst risk and legal teams, he has advised on many of the high-profile cyber-attacks in Australia and the UK.

Throughout a 20-year career in international security and crisis management, John has been retained to assist clients recover from high impact incidents and critical issues affecting operations and reputation, including ransomware attacks and cyber breaches, CEO misconduct and corporate governance failures, environmental disasters, regulatory enforcement and cross-broader corruption, intellectual property theft and corporate espionage.

John has extensive experience advising clients on the successful implementation of risk, compliance and business operations in challenging, high-risk markets. He has held leadership roles in China and Asia Pacific and brings expertise in managing complex reputational, social, geo-political and regulatory risks throughout Asia. He is also a leading expert in managing the risk of unlawful state-actor detention and regulatory interference in opaque nation states.

Sajeeb Lohani is the Head of (Director) Cybersecurity at Bugcrowd and a Sessional lecturer at the University of Melbourne. Sajeeb holds OSCP and OSWE. Constantly passionate about contributing to and improving open source security software, Sajeeb is a core contributor and co-developer of Interlace, a popular open-source project used for organising and automating penetration testing workflows. Sajeeb is also ranked within the top 40 of Bugcrowd and #2 in DVuln.

Sajeeb gives back regularly to the Melbourne cyber security community and is the founder of the Monash Cyber Security Club. Additionally, Sajeeb regularly presents at local meetups, and conferences. In addition to this he mentors at the Australian Women in Security Network (AWSN) workshops. Sajeeb also runs initiatives which attempt to responsibly disclose security issues within open source software projects, with the vision of making the world of software ‘more secure’.

Sajeeb is also an active Bug Bounty participant and is proud to be listed in the hall of fame for Amazon, Yahoo, Github, Atlassian, Netgear, Okta, Spotify, AT&T, US Defense, and many more. Recently Sajeeb was invited to an exclusive Bug Bash event for Okta, where he notably placed second among a field that included some of the most talented hackers in the world. Sajeeb has also presented in many renowned conferences including DevSecCon Seattle, Bsides Perth, RuxCon, OWASP NewZealand, and many more.

With a combined corporate experience spanning over two decades, the Founders of Growth Intel saw a gap in the way organisations & individuals approached self-development & upskilling. This was the catalyst for the creation of Growth Intel.

We bring hands-on expertise in training, coaching, consultancy & communications. Together with this background, Growth Intel’s approach is rooted in core values of trust & empathy, emphasising a human-to-human connection.

Growth Intel’s driving force is the belief of community & paying-it-forward, where one person’s success can propel others towards their own.

Tuyen, Head Learning Facilitator & Coach, value for life-long learning & curiosity in the intricacies of human behaviour has taken her from the field of banking & finance to people development. Her deep connection to her Australian-Vietnamese heritage & passion for cultural immersion have led to her work experience in four continents (so far!).

Jasmin Ranjit, She/Her is a Security Analyst at Judo Bank and a dedicated professional with several years of experience in cyber defense and a concentrated education of master’s and bachelor’s degrees in cyber security and Networking. She emphasizes learning the rapidly evolving threat landscape and implementing effective defense mechanisms. Her passion for defense stems from her belief that safeguarding critical data and securing systems is not just a responsibility but a necessity in today’s interconnected world.

When she is not on her computer, you can find her indulging in cuisines from around the world and trying to replicate the aroma and taste in her kitchen.

Susie Jones is CEO of Cynch Security, an Australian-owned and managed cyber startup that offers software-as-a-service cyber solutions designed specifically for micro and small business owners, especially those working in large supply chains. Her last role prior to Cynch was Head of Cyber Security Business Solutions at Auspost. Susie is an expert at translating complex cyber security and risk content into non-technical language for business leaders across all industries. As a leader at Cynch, she and her team have supported over 1,000 SMBs across Australia to improve their cyber resilience, and built what they call "cyber fitness".

Mingcan Cen received a B.S. degree from the Guilin University of Electronic Technology in 2011, He has rich working experience in R&D in enterprises. He is currently pursuing a Ph.D. with the Faculty of Science, Engineering and Built Environment (SEBE), Deakin University. His research interests are in the areas of information security, and cyber security

Louis Cremen, stands as one of the foremost cybersecurity instructors in the ANZ region, earning him a distinguished position at Lumify. With a consistent commitment to teaching and knowledge sharing, Louis has significantly influenced the professional upskilling journey of countless cybersecurity professionals and has been pivotal in the continual growth of the cybersecurity training and educational initiatives within Lumify.Renowned for his expertise, Louis leads training for several prominent certifications, including CISSP, CISM, CRISC, CISA, CEH, Security+, CC, and CSSLP. Through Lumify's programs, he's empowered professionals from ASX 100 corporations, Federal and State Governments, Defence sectors, local law enforcement agencies, and numerous SMEs.His outstanding contributions to the field were recognized when he was honoured with the "EC-Council Instructor of the Year" award. Beyond training, Louis' diverse experience spans working with both local and international government bodies and businesses. As a seasoned security professional and software engineer, he's been instrumental in introducing products to the market and fortifying the software development life cycle against threats.Recently, Louis further augmented his multidisciplinary expertise by completing a Graduate Certificate of Neuroscience, demonstrating his commitment to continuous learning and holistic understanding of complex systems.

Stephanie Park is a cybersecurity professional. Her area of specialisation is in information security governance, and she is passionate about simplifying complex information and making it accessible for all to apply, especially within the organisational context. Stephanie also holds the following industry certifications – CISSP, CISM and SABSA SCF.

Ashish is currently working as "Security Leader" in APJ ProServe@AWS where he's helping Public Sector clients secure their digital and cloud initiatives. He leads teams focusing on designing, architecting, and delivering secure cloud solutions. Over last 18 years, Ashish had great opportunities and enjoyed playing pivotal roles such as Practice Manager for India/ME/Africa, Architecture Lead for ANZ, and Technology Program Manager for US with Global consulting giants. Ashish has hands-on security architecture, engineering, and strategy experience from global Fortune 500 companies. He has a solid base of knowledge across security domains such as digital identity, cloud security, security automation, vulnerability management, etc. He has deep understanding of security best practices, regulations, and security engineering tenets.

Jaya Baloo is an information security professional with more than 20 years of experience leading and contributing to secure network architecture. As Chief Security Officer (CSO) at Rapid7, Jaya leads the effort to evolve and mature the company’s internal security program, engages with customers as well as with the wider security community, and collaborates across all Rapid7 teams to develop and showcase security best practices.

Before joining Rapid7, Jaya was CISO at Avast. Prior to Avast, she held the CISO position at KPN, the largest telecommunications carrier in the Netherlands, where she established and led its security team to create world class best practices in strategy and policy. Jaya has also been a faculty member of Singularity University since 2017, where she regularly lectures.

In 2022, Jaya received an honorary doctorate from the University of Twente for her inspiring leadership and significant contributions to technological advancement in the field of cybersecurity. Jaya sits on the advisory boards of the NL’s National Cyber Security Centre, PQCrypto, and the EU QuantumFlagship’s Strategic Advisory Board. She serves on the audit committee of TIIN Capital, a cybersecurity fund, and is also a board member of the RvT of the Dutch Broadcasting station, the NOS. Recognised within the list of top 100 CISOs globally, and ranking among the top 100 security influencers worldwide, Jaya has spoken widely at high-profile conferences such as RSA, TEDx and Codemotion on topics including lawful interception, VoIP & mobile security, cryptography, and quantum communications networks. Her expert commentary has also been featured in numerous publications, including Inc. Magazine, The Sun, Financial Times, and Wired UK.

Outside of work, Jaya enjoys scuba diving, horse riding, and is still trying to find time to finish her PPL (private pilot’s license).

Magda is a leading technology lawyer who specialises in cybersecurity, data and technology law. She deeply understands emerging issues, new technologies and threats, including the macro legislative and political environment, the vendors and key players, commercial and contract models, and their limitations.

She advises on a range of matters spanning cybersecurity, incident management, data, privacy, risk advisory, software licensing, infrastructure, product innovation and commercialisation, digital transformation, outsourcing, telco law and corporate governance. Magda is known for her expertise in supporting technology commercial transactions across their lifecycle, data collection and retention processes, data protection compliance, contract and policy reviews, and cyber incident response. As well as her law firm career, Magda was formerly the Legal Business Partner, Networks & IT, at Telstra. She has also worked as an in-house legal advisor in a number of Australian Government agencies. Her in-house experience in private enterprise and government roles have influenced Magda’s outcomes-focused and commercial approach to legal issues. Her clients know they can rely on her to tailor ‘best-fit’ legal services to mitigate the issues that keep executives awake while addressing the pressures in-house teams face.

Samantha Lengyel is the co-founder and CEO of Decoded.AI, a SaaS platform to continually assess the robustness and trust-worthiness of AI systems during development. She leads a team on a mission to redefine AI as a cultural practice of ceding decision-making to autonomous systems that co-shape us and to provide the tools needed for a future enabled by that technology. Sam is the youngest female founder to have taken a company through APAC's premier cyber accelerator, CyRise, has secured both state and federal funding for their work, is an alumni of the Griffin Accelerator and Canberra Cyber-Security Business Accelerator and was awarded the Australian Women in Security The One to Watch in IT Security in 2022.

Merill Fernando is a Principal Product Manager in the Microsoft Entra Identity product group in Microsoft Security. In his role he helps some of Microsoft's biggest customers define their identity strategy and deploy Azure Active Directory. Merill is also the author of the Microsoft’s Essential Eight multi-factor authentication white paper.

In his spare time, he works on some popular open-source app including [cmd.ms](http://cmd.ms/), idPowerToys and Graph X-Ray. You will usually find him hanging out on twitter @merill

As Director, Critical Infrastructure Reform and International Engagement, Shilpa Maniar is responsible for leading reforms to the Security of Critical Infrastructure Act 2018. She's also responsible for leading the CISG’s efforts to build secure and resilient infrastructure with Australia’s international partners, leveraging existing forums such as the Critical 5 and Quad, while deepening bilateral engagements.

Patrick Kean is an accomplished cybersecurity professional and the current manager of cybersecurity at RMIT University. With over a decade of experience in Information Technology, he possesses extensive knowledge and expertise. Patrick's passion lies in security architecture and defensive security, specialising in security operations, network security, and identity and access management.

Patrick has a bachelor’s degree in technology and holds the ISC2 CISSP certification.

Reuben Koh is a Director of Security Technology & Strategy at Akamai Technologies where he provides deep thought leadership and advisory in helping clients align security strategies with their core business initiatives and digital transformation processes. He also works with Fortune 1000 enterprises and business partners across Asia Pacific & Japan in providing cybersecurity guidance and expertise, especially in domains such as Web Security, Zero Trust, SASE, XDR, Network Security and Security Operations. With close to 20 years of experience in IT, Reuben previously held prominent leadership roles with industry leaders such as Symantec, CA Technologies, VMware and Cisco. Reuben also holds various industry certifications such as CISSP, CISA, CCNP, CISM and ITIL.

Pramiti is a highly experienced professional with over 20 years of expertise in Cybersecurity. She has a deep understanding of both on-premises and cloud-based solutions and has successfully implemented and managed various IT operations throughout her career.

Pramiti specializes in data security and privacy, possessing an in-depth knowledge of the latest tools and techniques. She has contributed significantly to developing IT strategies, designing and delivering effective solutions, and providing exceptional pre-sales support.

Pramiti holds several industry certifications on Security & Compliance including Certified Information Privacy Manager (CIPM) from the International Association of Privacy Professionals.

For the past 5 years Pramiti has been one of Microsoft's leading Compliance experts helping enterprise organizations in Australia craft their Data Security and Privacy journey.

Peter is a deep thinking business leader and researcher who completed a Masters in Cyber Security at Edith Cowan University (Online) in 2023. Peter links strategy from various disciplines to prompt discussion and new thinking whilst tapping into the tried and proven strategies of the Telecommunications and IT Industries and applying them to new threats and capabilities developing in the Cyber Security domain. Peter completed his Capstone Project, Five Quick Wins for Boards, discussing strategies that could assist Boards and Senior Management demystify the complexities of Cyber Security.

Shane Laffin has recently taken up a new role as the CISO of global business, Dulux but has been a cyber executive for over a decade at a publicly listed Australian company and a payment gateway. He is a very active member of the cyber security community, sitting on executive advisory boards and working as an industry advisor for organisations like CyRise. He specialises in building talented cyber security teams to deliver ambiguous cyber security goals.

Lynore is a Security Analyst at Flight Centre with eight years of diverse cybersecurity experience across various industries. She is skilled in conducting security assessments, shaping security policies, and fostering inter-departmental collaboration for optimal security outcomes. Lynore stands out for her proactive approach to pre-empting and addressing security threats and ensuring alignment with business goals through her excellent communication skills.

Lynore is also a notable figure in promoting diversity and inclusion in cybersecurity. She was distinguished as South Australia's first Indigenous ICT Traineeship graduate and is a fervent advocate for the inclusion of women, especially First Nations women, in IT. Lynore is an active industry speaker and mentor, passionately driving diversity in cybersecurity, which she believes is a cornerstone for innovation. Her tireless efforts in advocating for women and creating inclusive spaces make her an influential figure in the field.

Olivia Conlon is a recent Cyber Security and Criminology graduate. She is currently working as a Cyber Security Specialist at Avertro. She has experience in comprehending customer use cases from a range of different industries to assist in incorporating governance, compliance, and risk components that they can convey to their boards.

Jay Hira is a leading voice in cyber security, advocating fresh approaches, greater diversity and inclusion, and a Zero Trust mindset across the industry.

Jay has spent 16+ years of experience at the forefront of the international cyber security industry, helping financial services businesses strengthen their cyber resilience capabilities, fostering customer trust and enabling growth.

One of his biggest passions is explaining cyber security to audiences at all levels, believing everyone deserves to be safe online.

Antonio Deliseo is an experienced board member and cyber security professional. With over 35 years of experience, Antonio has a proven track record of successfully managing complex network infrastructure and ensuring the safety and security of systems and infrastructure.

Antonio is experienced in developing and implementing cyber security strategies for critical infrastructure, NFPs and cloud solution vendors. Antonio is highly knowledgeable in the latest technologies and best practices for protecting against cyber threats. He has a deep understanding of the importance of balancing security, Governance and Risk, and Efficiency, and is dedicated to finding innovative solutions that meet the unique needs of each organization.

Antonio is a Fellow of the Australian Institute of Company Directors and holds a bachelor's degree in physics and a master's degree in cyber security. He is an active member of several professional organizations, including ICS2 and ISACA.

David Bushell is an accomplished Cyber Security professional with a passion for keeping data and systems safe from threats. Graduating from Edith Cowan University with a Bachelor of Computer Science, David spent a number of years as a SOC analyst, where he performed threat hunts on some of Australia's largest and most well-known organizations.

More recently, David joined Seamless Intelligence as a Threat Hunting Lead. In this role, he leads a team threat hunting and monitoring across a range of Australian and international enterprises. His many technical and SIEM certifications further underscore his expertise in the field.

Melanie Hanson is an IBM Security Network Detection & Response (NDR) software engineer. She has been involved in developing a Network Threat Analytics application that leverages machine learning to determine network behavioural patterns and detect anomalous behaviour in the traffic. She won the prestigious 2022 AISA Cyber Security Rising Star award which recognises an individual with less than 3 years experience who has made significant contributions to the industry.

Phil has more than 20 years’ experience in engineering and cybersecurity technical management, with both operator and leadership roles within enterprise security operations teams in financial services and higher education. Previous roles include time as a practice lead for security operations and incident response at Suncorp Group and Team Leader for Security Operations at AusCERT, where he assisted the Australian Red Cross Blood Service with their 2016 data breach.

He has also helped to establish threat intelligence sharing groups for different markets, including state government agencies and higher education, and prior to moving into cyber security he worked in biomedical engineering and human factors. His diverse background brings unique insights into the field of cyber security operations and incident response.

Phil currently works at Cydarm Technologies, adding his significant experience and expertise to their cyber response management platform which provides capabilities that cover a comprehensive set of needs for security operations teams.

As a Senior Cyber Investigation Specialist at Group-IB’s Global HQ in Singapore, Jennifer Soh is driven by her passion for fighting cybercrime. Jennifer has over 8 years of experience in various cybersecurity domains, including threat intelligence, digital forensics & incident response.

Before joining Group-IB in 2021, she served as a Digital Forensics and Incident Response team lead at one of Singapore’s government agencies.

As an integral member of the Group-IB Asia-Pacific cyber investigation team, she has successfully conducted joint investigations with INTERPOL and other law enforcement agencies. Jennifer contributed to Operation Falcon led by INTERPOL to take down members of a prolific Business Email Compromise syndicate. She also assisted in the INTERPOL-coordinated Africa Cyber Surge Operation to combat cybercrime by identifying cybercriminals and compromised infrastructure on the continent.

Jennifer is passionate about inspiring more young cybersecurity enthusiasts to pursue their dreams in the field. She is dedicated to providing career guidance to help young talents kick-start their journey in cybersecurity. Her extensive experience, expertise and vision make her an invaluable asset to Group-IB’s team.

Jennifer holds certifications for CISSP, GIAC GSEC, GIAC GCIA, GIAC, GCTI, GIAC GCFA, and AWS Certified Solutions Architect – Associate, and was one of the Top 30 Finalists for Women in Security ASEAN Award 2022.

Ben Archie is Senior Intelligence Consultant at Recorded Future with a comprehensive background in intelligence and national security. Ben is responsible for the enablement and success of Recorded Future’s public sector clients. Prior to joining Recorded Future, Ben worked as a senior intelligence analyst for the Australian Government where he worked on a variety of missions, including cybercrime.

Deepayan Chanda is a seasoned cyber security professional, architect, strategist and advisor, and a strong intent to solve cyber security problems for enterprises. Driven by nearly 25 years of diverse security domain experience and create a balance between security and business goals. Had previously worked with large financial organizations and product based organizations. Demonstrating strong leadership skills in delivering security projects and solutions along with significant contributions to the industry as a mentor to cyber security start-ups, and authoring books

Andrew is a cyber security architect with Microsoft Security Enterprise Services. This is a global team of cyber security specialists with extensive skills and experience in guiding customers on rapidly recovering from a cyber attack and modernising their security strategy. Andrew has over 25 years of IT industry experience, including 20 years at Microsoft. In that time, he's had various roles including as a software developer, solution architect and enterprise support engineer. His current focus is Active Directory security, Azure Active Directory security, privileged access management and security control frameworks.

Monica is a Security Consultant with Accenture. She is experienced in cyber risk and compliance, specifically for Federal Government.

Monica is particularly interested in emerging vulnerability management tooling and growing shift towards cyber resilience. With her knowledge and experience in cyber risk and compliance, she is particularly interested in how these tools impact current risk and compliance frameworks.

Murray is an industry-recognised information security expert providing advice across the spectrum, from the boardroom to the basement across the region's elite corporate entities to government agencies. Murray is frequently invited to present at conferences, workgroups and seminars and asked to provide expert comment for editorials and publications. He has presented on security topics at leading conferences locally, regionally and internationally. A Cyber Security Thought Leader, Murray is called on to advise and educate business executives, boards and practitioners on approaches to dealing with current and emerging cyber threats.After leading Sense of Security from startup to acquisition, Murray now serves the Executive Director for Cyber Capability, Education and Training at the regions leading firm - CyberCX - focusing on developing the cyber skilled workforce across all roles including leadership and cyber practitioners.

Asher is your typical, Cyber Security Nerd, comfortably hidden in a corner someplace. As a youngster it was all night in front of a green screen. Somewhere along the way that green screen disappeared as his professional career emerged. Asher has always worked and consulted in the Security realm. His ventures have taken him across a plethora of verticals including Cyber / Banking / Realestate / Government / Tourism / Media / Arts / Retail / Healthcare / Transport / Construction / Logistics.

Given Asher has never worked in sales and is a little shy, Comfortable presenting, he has stood in front of a crowd in a lecture theatre or two, as well as the occasional boardroom. Come and listen to what he has to say as a seasoned nerd talking about his idea of a fun weekend or two.

Ward van Besien is a Principal Product Manager in the Identity & Network Access Engineering team at Microsoft. He is part of the customer experience team, and in his role he helps customers accelerate their adoption of cloud services and Azure AD. This involves providing identity architectural guidance to customers, work with engineering teams throughout the whole engineering cycle and training customers and partners on Microsoft's identity products and services.

Rosemary Driscoll is the Director of the CyberCX Academy. Before joining CyberCX, Rosemary worked in the Federal Government's national security community for over fifteen years, principally in intelligence and policy roles. Rosemary headed the Attorney-General Department’s Outreach Branch, where she was responsible for the organisation's foreign interference, counterterrorism and protective security briefing program.

Rosemary leads the CyberCX Academy, an industry-led initiative that is achieving major success recruiting and training the next generation of cyber security professionals. Rosemary is passionate about increasing diversity in the cyber security workforce.

Rosemary will be joined by:

Annaliese FitzGerald, Manager of the CyberCX Academy and the project lead for CyberCX's All-Women Academy Cohort, launching in July 2023.

Ailie Hoolihan, An Academy Associate from the first cohort of the Program who undertook a career change from nursing to cyber.

A representative (to be confirmed) from the All-Women Cohort launching in July to speak about their experience coming into cyber.

Elena Sitnikova, PhD, BE (Hons), CSSLP, SFHEA is an Associate Professor in cybersecurity and networking at Flinders University. She is a global leader in cutting-edge research in Critical Infrastructure protection with a current focus on intrusion detection for Supervisory Control and Data Acquisition (SCADA) systems cyber security, cyber-physical systems and industrial IoT (IIoT). Given the increasing number of cyber-attacks globally, Elena’s research explores systems resilience and the use of artificial intelligence in the analytics of abnormal data that may affect critical systems. Her contribution in the field is demonstrated through the numerous awards, including the Spitfire Memorial Defence Fellowship and the recent Women in AI Award. Elena is among the first Australians to be certified in CSSLP - Certified Secure Software Lifecycle Professional, issued by (ISC)2 International Information Systems Security Certification Consortium. She is a recognised expert in excellence in higher education, holding a UK-based Senior Fellowship of the Higher Education Academy (SFHEA) and an Australian Office for Learning and Teaching (OLT) Team Citation award for Outstanding Contributions to Student Learning.

Guy is a security expert, leader, researcher, and TM Forum Distinguished fellow who brings a wealth of knowledge and experience from over 33 years of experience in security and GRC in both enterprise and telecommunications. Throughout his career Guy held management, product development, and development roles in both early-stage companies and large international corporations. Guy is a firm believer in collaboration and synergy as the keys to success and never lose sight of the principle of 1+1=3.In recent years Guy's passion in the area of GRC led him to start a PhD research in the area of AI/ML Ethics , specifically how could we automate and scale Ethics Auditing of AI System with the exponential growth of AI System adoption.

During the day, Guy heads the Security Technology strategy and implementation of the National Broadband Network in his role as GM, Enterprise Security Architecture at NBN Co..

Mona is the NSW Department of Education’s Cyber Awareness and Education Manager.

She is a qualified high-school teacher with over 17 years of experience in public education. Mona is passionate about the use of technology to better the lives of people and uses this approach in her daily practice. She has changed the way online safety education is delivered in school communities. Her work is making an impact, not just in NSW, but nationally with the Cybermarvel program. Launched in 2021, this program is in addition to the regular program of work that the role brings. Mona leads with passion and commitment and seeks to change lives for the better in the second-largest public education system in the Southern Hemisphere.

Katherine operated in the NSW Police Force for 25 years before moving into the private sector and academia. She has expertise in emergency & crisis response, threat management, counter terrorism, governance & compliance, and cyber operations. She specialised in counter terrorism for eleven years and developed expertise in covert cyber operations. In her role in a joint counter terrorism agency, she was involved in several operations detecting and disrupting terrorism or issue-motivated violence and extremist networks. Katherine has a master’s degree in security and strategic studies and has trained internationally as an investigation’s specialist, deploying to East Africa in support of international war crimes investigations. Since leaving the police force, Katherine has operated her own consulting and training firm specialising in the areas of cyber & physical security, crisis & threat management, and governance & investigations. She also works as a sessional tutor with one of Australia’s leading universities in their school of criminology teaching counterterrorism law, fraud & cybercrime, and other criminology units.

Katherine is passionate about public safety and empowering people and organisations understand and defend against risks affecting them.

Jennifer is the Head of Advisory Services - leading the cyber strategy and GRC capability at Skylight Cyber.

As an experienced cyber security consultant, she specialises in delivering pragmatic and risk-driven cyber security strategies, assessments and cyber risk management services to her clients. Jennifer has engaged with CISOs and cyber security teams to build their security organisations and successfully gain funding for their programs. She also has experience in getting into the weeds of cyber risk management to design, implement and run client's GRC processes and capabilities.

Additionally, in her most recent previous role at NSW Government, she has helped create the 2021 NSW Cyber Security Strategy and led the development and delivery of the first NSW government-wide training sessions for executives and senior management across all departments of NSW government.

Jennifer holds a Bachelor of Information Systems (Co-op) (Honours) from the University of New South Wales (UNSW).

Jade has always been passionate about the data protection, information, cyber security and privacy of individuals. Whilst completing her Juris Doctor, Jade travelled to Malaysia as a student, to understand the GDPR, the world of Privacy and how much work Australia has to do to catch up with the rest of the world. Since then, Jade is now an Australian Legal Practitioner based in Victoria, currently advising on property, finance, estates and commercial contracts. Jade also leads the Risk and Compliance Team at Purcell Partners, captivating her knowledge and passion of all things Cyber and Risk.

At LEXTECH Jade seconds her knowledge and expertise as the Legal Compliance team including advising on the requirements under the ISO27001 Standard, and completing internal auditing and overall Standard assessments.

Having recently travelled with the Better Business Summit as a Technology Partner with LEXTECH, Jade is opening conversations on what all types of businesses can be doing better to protect data and still deliver optimal client satisfaction, all within the scope of the law.

Learning from the leaders in our sector makes her life as a Solicitor all the more interesting, and sharing this knowledge is her SUPERPOWER.

I'm Australia's youngest-female registered trademarks attorney currently working in cybersecurity. I am the Founder and Managing Director of Dolman & Co. an intellectual property firm. My vision is to promote innovation and creativity in the STEM space with perspective to international militant threats at play. I developed Dolman & Co as the first female owned Intellectual Property firm in Australia. My specialties include licensing, copyright infringement, trademark registration, and privacy legislation.

Balaji Kapsikar Head of Technology and Cyber Risk at Funding Societies (Fintech). He is focusing on the new emerging Technology & Cyber security risks.

Balaji has completed his Master's in computer application and has 12 plus years of experience in Information security along with various Certifications like CISSP, CISM, CDPESE, ISO27001, and CEH(7-8 Years dedicatedly on vulnerability Management and pen-testing). In his experience, he has worked on various information security domains, Vulnerability Management, Application Security, Threat Modelling, Security Architecture Design & review, Supply chain security, Incident Management, Security Operations, Security Audits and Compliance, Cyber Security Awareness, Data Security, and privacy, Access Control, IT Security Policies & Procedures, GDPR, and cyber security maturity assessment, security review for merger and acquisition.

Balaji is passionate about helping various teams and trying to help Cybersecurity skilling, especially People who would like to move into Cyber security by Participating in mentorship programs in the Cybersecurity community.

• Speaker at AISA #Cybercon 2023- Australian Cyber Conference 20-22 March 2023 -Canberra on Topic Insider threats - Don't underestimate

• Speaker at (ISC)² SECURE Asia-Pacific Summit on Insider threats with remote and cloud work environment

• Awarded as receive recognition for Cloud Security Risk Champion2022 of the Year Award by Cloud Security Alliance

• Participated as Mentor in Global Mentorship for Cybersecurity ( GMFC) Program on Cloud and cyber security topics

• Participated as a Mentor in the ISC2 Mentorship program

• Mentored many folks on various Information Security / Cloud/ Risk Management related certifications, ex:- CISSP, CCSK, CCSP, CISM etc.

Upcoming events

•Received and accepted the Speaker for ” ISACA GTACS 2023 Conference on 24 August 2023 on the Topic “Effective Risk Management Strategies for AI-Driven Technologies in Singapore.

•Received and accepted the Speaker Invitation to Cyber Security World Asia 2023. 11-12 October 2023, Singapore

A former high school teacher turned cyber security advocate and awareness trainer, Simon began his cyber security career as the first security awareness trainer at Western Australia's Water Corporation. Since then he has gone on to work for organisations such as Cyber West, WA's Office of Digital Government, and is currently in the Business Operations team at ES2, Western Australia's largest independently owned cyber security consultancy.

Bianca is a CISO at the NSW Government Department of Planning & Environmental. She brings 20+ years of experience in leadership, innovation, technology and security. She is passionate about helping protect organisations bringing her industry and consulting experience - with a focus on communicating Cyber to all levels within organisations.

Paul Karan or 'PK' has a career that expands 20+ years in senior technology and cyber security positions across industries including mining, oil and gas, finance, space and defence for organisations such as Merrill Lynch, CBA, BHP, South32, Woodside, Amazon and Hancock Prospecting where he was the Chief Security Officer. PK takes a risk driven, business aligned, maturity phased approach to cyber security ensuring constant realignment to changing organisation goals and objectives. Outside of work he is a husband and has two teenage daughters that keep him on his toes. He enjoys tinkering with bikes and cars and keeping active with cycling, yoga and gym.

Louisa Vogelenzang is a passionate and optimistic cybersecurity leader, with 2 decades of cyber industry experience across Europe and The Asia Pacific Region.

In her current day job she is Head of Cybersecurity and BISO for APJ, at Global Human Capital Management Software provider-Ceridian, where she leads a cross functional cybersecurity team, reporting to the global CISO.Prior to Ceridian, her previous leadership roles have included Identity Theft and Breach Notification Practice at Kroll Cyber Risk Asia, Small Business and Enterprise Product Security at Telstra and the Victorian Security practice at Dimension Data.

Louisa really enjoys giving back to the cybersecurity community.

In 2017 she co-founded ‘Women Speak Cyber’ (now part of AWSN) which through sponsorship from ASD, provides professional speaker coaching for Women who have never spoken at a conference before. Louisa also co-hosts the Women Speak Cyber Podcast, with fellow Co-Founder Louisa Partridge.

Her other volunteer endeavours have included IDCARE, Co-hosting season 1 of The Cybersecurity Café podcast and sharing ‘Cybersecurity – the good news’ on LinkedIn during the global pandemic. Louisa is also stranger to AISA, having volunteered at AISA from 2014-2018, leading the Victorian Branch in 2017 and serving on the board from 2017-2018.

Emily is a dynamic GRC Advisor who embodies a true passion for the intersection of cyber security and GRC. With a remarkable journey navigating their professional path while embracing ADHD and ASD, Emily brings a fresh and invaluable perspective to the table.

Emily's expertise lies in harmonizing GRC practices with cyber security frameworks, crafting robust strategies that safeguard vital information assets. Leveraging her neurodivergent strengths, including out-of-the-box thinking and unwavering attention to detail, Emily excels at uncovering vulnerabilities and crafting innovative solutions.

Emily is a vocal advocate for neurodiversity, she firmly believes that diverse strengths enhance overall security. Her commitment to inclusivity is reflected in her active participation throughout her organisation and community, where she strives to stay ahead of emerging trends and expand their knowledge base. Emily’s greatest hope is that people embrace diversity, foster inclusivity and equity, bringing about pushing the boundaries of innovation in the ever-evolving world of cyber security and GRC.

Ninad is based in Melbourne, Australia and has worked across Australia, Singapore and India. He brings 13 years of experience within the cyber security field and has worked across in both consulting and financial services sector. He specialises in cyber security governance, risk and compliance management, with a focus on financial services.

Lai Ki Cheng, a Senior Intelligence Consultant at Recorded Future, has helped numerous companies in the Asia Pacific region enhance their security and risk management protocols through intelligence enrichment programs.

Cheng has extensive experience in security disciplines, including kinetic risk management, incident response, and security/intelligence management consulting. He has previously worked for Control Risk, Riskline, and Horangi.

Cheng's academic studies have focused on national intelligence and offensive operations through proxies. Additionally, he serves as a senior reservist commander in the 4th Singapore Armoured Brigade, an active military combat unit under the Singapore Armed Forces.

Jack Kerr is an investigative journalist and OSINT analyst whose investigations have been published by The New York Times, featured in Interpol briefings and informed federal anti-money laundering investigations. He recently won the European Centre for Press & Media Freedom IJ4EU Impact Award for a series of investigations into the global gambling industry. He builds investigative tools in Python to explore cyber, corporate and gambling intelligence to find out what is really going on.

Jacqueline Ryder is a Cyber Threat and Vulnerability Management lead in the Australian healthcare industry. She is passionate about building cyber threat intelligence functions for maturing organisations in the critical infrastructure space.

Jacqueline spent 12 years working for the Australian federal government in the Australian foreign service, pursuing Australia national security and economic prosperity goals in Australia and overseas. Jacqueline has worked across the Asia-Pacific region, including in Papua New Guinea and Thailand.

In addition to her extensive government cyber and policy experience, Jacqueline has also worked in the Australian cyber security start up community and received her Masters in Cybersecurity from Georgetown University in Washington D.C.

Andrew is the CEO of Untapped Talent, a for-purpose social enterprise focused on developing a sustainable neurodiverse employment ecosystem to increase opportunities for autistic individuals, thereby realising their untapped potential.

Andrew is also driving the Neurodiversity Hub community of practice initiative (https://www.neurodiversityhub.org) which is about working with universities and employers to facilitate neurodivergent university and college students become more work-ready and increase their chances of securing a job and commencing a career. A range of life skills training courses has also been developed for neurodivergents.

He also promotes the Genius Armoury platform to attract and identify an autistic cybersecurity talent pool through fundamental training in cybersecurity.

Mark Luckin leads Lockton Companies’ Australian Cyber & Technology Practice, providing clients risk advisory services and advising clients on the insurable nature of their associated cyber and technology risks. His experience encompasses advising small business to ASX top 50 companies.

In his role, Mark regularly advises boards, CEO networks, risk managers and HR leaders across three key phases: inform, improve and insure. Mark also has experience in managing over a dozen high-value cyber claims and provides advice on direct threat actor negotiation, regulatory and contractually driven reporting obligations and insurance response.

Prior to joining Lockton, Mark managed complex and litigated claims for one of the world’s largest insurers. He has also spent time working with a number of commercial law firms and Perth based Barristers.

As a cyber & technology specialist, Mark is often sought after for all aspects of a client's risk and insurance arrangements. Mark complements his cyber and technology expertise with knowledge and experience regarding Directors’ & Officers’ Liability, Professional Indemnity, Technology Errors & Omissions and associated risk areas.

Complementing his Bachelor of Laws and Legal Studies, Mark has 12+ years of combined legal and insurance industry experience. He is a regular contributor to the cyber and financial lines insurance area through both the regular publication of white papers and guest appearances on high-profile panels.

A dedicated and enthusiastic professional, Mark has been recognised across the insurance industry as an Insurance Business Young Gun and for his ongoing contributions to the cyber and technology industries by participating in various initiatives.

Mona is a psychologist who works with cyber and risk professionals on issues such as anxiety, low mood, stress and complex emotional issues. She approaches her work with compassion, integrity and professionalism. She applies a holistic approach and a number of modern therapeutic modalities in her practice.

Mona holds a Master of Clinical Psychology and a Bachelor of Arts (Psychology) from WSU.

She is a registered Clinical Psychologist.

Hugh has around 40 years experience covering the areas of software engineering, ICT, systems engineering, safety engineering and cybersecurity across the areas of Defence, telecommunications and transportation. He has written, presented and published a number of papers in the areas of systems engineering, safety and cybersecurity and is an accredited Independent Safety Assessor and has cybersecurity accreditation. Hugh’s more recent experience in Australia has been in the railway domain where he has rolled out cybersecurity in various projects.

Using a collaborative and risk-based approach, Dan assists the University to ensure our information assets, critical systems and people are adequately protected in our modern and complex digital world. He holds a Bachelor of Network Computing degree from Monash, a number of cyber security industry certifications and sits on two industry Executive Advisory Boards related to cyber security.

Pouya is a distinguished, Secure Digital Transformation evangelist driven by his passion for leveraging technology to create a better world. With a keen focus on human factors and culture in security, Pouya has emerged as a thought leader in the industry.

As the APJ Security Lead for AWS Professional Services, Pouya brings his exceptional expertise to the forefront, guiding public sector customers through their cloud journey.

Pouya is committed to ensuring that his customers can seamlessly achieve their business goals while meeting global and local security, compliance, and regulation requirements at scale. His expertise and insights are highly sought-after, making him a trusted advisor to senior executives in the industry.

Claire Healey is a highly experienced leader in Cloud and Data programs with a focus on secure cloud solutions and cyber intelligence. As a Director in the Deloitte Cloud & Engineering practice, she brings extensive knowledge and expertise in delivering complex enterprise solutions for both government and industry.

David Clarke (M.Av. (Human Factors), BA (Hons.) is the co-Founder, Director and Managing Partner of IHF Asia Pacific and is based in Perth, Western Australia.

IHF Asia Pacific is part of IHF which is headquartered in Edinburgh, UK, and includes IHF UK, IHF Cyber, IHF SaaS and SALT Training Services.

David has a combined 15 years’ experience working in high hazard and safety critical environments including Rail, Aviation and Energy. Commencing his Human Factors journey with British Airways in the UK, he has designed, developed and delivered bespoke Human Factors programmes and solutions to a diverse array of organisations in the UK, USA, Middle East and Australia. He has successfully assisted clients in recognising, understanding, and proactively managing Human Factors-related risks across Operations, Management and Technology. He firmly believes that people are an organisation’s most powerful yet vulnerable asset, and empowering employees with pragmatic and effective HF tools and techniques is a critical element in reducing this vulnerability.

Tammara is a cyber security analyst and a lawyer with experience in technology, privacy, and critical infrastructure law. She holds a post-graduate degree in Cyber Security and is completing her Master of Digital Technology Law and CompTIA Security + certification. Tammara advises clients on matters including damages for data breaches, privacy impact assessments, privacy threshold assessments, and algorithmic impact assessments of large government projects. She has advised on the Security of Critical Infrastructure Act for government and corporate entities.

Satwik is an engineering leader with 15 years of industry experience. He has worked with customers across various geographies in the US, UK, and Australia. His experiences span across working with development teams, platform engineering and security engineering. Satwik is passionate about building secure software applications using DevOps and DevSecOps practices. He has experience in streamlining complex SDLC problems through appropriate use of automation and security systems.

Satwik currently leads the security engineering chapter at ANZ Bank and has been working on building next generation of security tools and processes to be used by nearly 10000 developers to keep one of the largest global bank safe.

Sascha: Sascha Hess is a Director at IIS Partners. He is an accomplished security and technology executive and management consultant with over 23 years' experience in cyber security. Before joining IIS, Sascha served as the Chief Security and Operations Officer at Tyro Payments. He is passionate about people, technology, innovation and security. Sascha also advises start-ups, is involved in UNSW’s Cyber Security courses, still tinkers with code and thinks best with his head in swimmable waters.

Shannon is a Staff Security Strategist within Splunk SURGe. He hails from Melbourne, Australia. Originally from Seattle, Washington, he has worked in a number of varied roles. He has been a video game tester at Nintendo (Yoshi's Island broke his spirit), a hardware tester at Microsoft (handhelds have come a long way since then), a Windows NT admin for an early security startup and one of the first Internet broadcast companies, along with security roles for companies including Juniper and Cisco. Shannon enjoys getting outdoors for hikes and travelling.

Nirav Kamdar is a Cybersecurity Solutions Architect - Cloud and DevOps for APAC COE, located in Melbourne, Australia. With more than 17 years of industry experience, Nirav has worked for renowned technology companies such as Oracle, IBM, and Accenture. 

As an expert in cloud-native technologies, Nirav has made significant contributions to the open source community. He is a sought-after speaker who has shared his insights and expertise on cloud-native technologies, DevOps, and security at several industry conferences and events. Nirav's presentations are well-researched, practical, and insightful, making them a hit among attendees. 

At Qualys ANZ, Nirav provides thought leadership and advocacy for clients to accelerate the adoption of emerging cybersecurity technologies for hyperscalers and DevOps with business and IT value.

Dr. Leanne Ngo, an Associate Professor at La Trobe University, specialising in digital education innovations, cyber security culture, and community cyber safety awareness. With over 20 years of education experience, she focuses on the human aspect of cyber safety, empowering diverse and vulnerable communities to securely navigate the digital world. As a passionate advocate for women in STEM and cyber security, Leanne leads the Women in Cyber initiatives at La Trobe, providing mentorship and support while developing essential professional skills. Honoured for her contributions to digital education and curriculum design, she has earned multiple awards, including the prestigious Australian Awards for University Teaching (AAUT). Driven by her commitment to inclusive education, Leanne strives to ensure accessibility for all and cultivate a safe, inclusive digital learning environment.

Dale Bowie is IBM Security's worldwide software architect for the QRadar Network Detection and Response (NDR) portfolio. Since graduating over a decade ago with a degree in software engineering and artificial intelligence, Dale has developed vendor products in a variety of security domains. This began with some early multi-factor authentication access management software, before moving into network security spaces such as intrusion detection/prevention systems and Secure Access Service Edge systems. For the past 6 years, Dale has been working in the QRadar NDR portfolio, holding various engineering and product ownership leadership positions across that time.

John Fokker is a Principal Engineer at Trellix. John leads the Threat Intelligence Group (TIG) that empowers Trellix customers, industry partners, and global law enforcement efforts with 24/7 mission-critical insights on the ever-evolving threat landscape. Prior to joining Trellix, he worked at the Dutch National High-Tech Crime Unit (NHTCU), the Dutch National Police unit dedicated to investigating advanced forms of cybercrime. During his career he has supervised numerous large-scale cybercrime investigations and takedowns. Fokker is also one of the co-founders of the NoMoreRansom Project.

Annie is the founder and principal of Cyber GC - a legal and consulting practice dedicated to helping Australian businesses prepare for and fight cybercrime. Annie is a multi-award-winning cybersecurity lawyer and was recently awarded General Counsel of the Year (Australian Law Awards - Lawyers Weekly - 2021), Technology, Media and Telecommunications Lawyer of the Year (Corporate Counsel Awards - Lawyers Weekly -2021) and Australian In House Counsel of the Year (Australasian Law Awards 2021).

She brings to Cyber GC the experience gained as 6 years as global legal counsel for Accenture's managed security business and regional counsel for Accenture Security, one of the largest security companies in the world. She has 20 years experience in technology law, and rare expertise advising on enterprise security risk, including legal regulation, and the impact on the whole organisation of cybersecurity issues.

She is a regular speaker on issues around the intersection of the law, cybersecurity and emerging technology.

Nivedita Newar holds a senior leadership position and directly reports to the CISO. She is responsible for the development, delivery and oversight of enterprise-wide cybersecurity policies, risk management, enterprise security architecture, controls assurance, security awareness, compliance, and strategy. Nivi is the winner of AISA - Cyber Security Outreach Program of the year, Australian Women in Security Awards for Most Innovative Educator and CAUDIT Emergin Leader Awards in 2022.

When not wrangling his two young boys and answering "yes, dear" to his wife of 20 years, Jason is passionate about doing his part in securing individuals and organisations from current and emerging cyber risks. No stranger to the world of cyber, Jason has been in the industry for over 20 years working across various roles including global IT organisations, big four consulting and local Australian IT-service providers. His core focus is helping individuals understand cyber in plain English and providing practical risk centric ways to prevent cyber breaches.

Alexey has over 15 years of experience specialising in the development of quantum technology offerings, building cybersecurity functions and risk management. Currently, Alexey is a Senior Manager at EY, and he leads the Global Quantum Strategy efforts while also delivering Cyber Security Transformation projects. He is part of the EY Global Innovation Quantum Technology Lab, the trailblazer of the quantum efforts in EY.

Before EY, Alexey worked as a County Information Security Officer at the Deutsche Bank Moscow Branch. Alexey graduated from the prestigious Bauman Moscow State Technical University, the same institution from which Yuri Gagarin, the first man in space, graduated.

Alexey authored a number of articles and presented at internal and public events on topics ranging from quantum security to the latest advancements in the field. Recently Alexey took the stage at the major quantum technology conference - Quantum Australia.

Reilly is a cognitive and behavioural insights specialist at Alpha Echo, a cybersecurity company based in Newcastle. His role involves applying behavioural insights to develop more effective cybersecurity programs that account for the human factor in the system.

Reilly has a strong background in psychological research, having completed his Bachelor of Psychology (Honours) at the University of Newcastle, followed by a PhD in cognitive science. His doctoral research focused on measuring cognitive workload and modelling behaviour to promote safer working environments and better understand attention-driven decisions.

After completing his PhD, Reilly worked in a multidisciplinary neuroscience team at the University of Amsterdam, where he studied the relationship between brain structures and decision-making behaviours. Upon returning to Australia, Reilly sought to apply his knowledge of cognitive science to the growing field of human factors in cybersecurity.

By understanding the cognitive processes that underlie human behavior, Reilly is working towards designing more effective cybersecurity programs that not only mitigate risks but also engage employees in proactive security practices.

In addition to his work at Alpha Echo, Reilly is an active member of several Newcastle industry groups and academic networks, where he is able to continue collaborating with other experts in the field.

Marina Liu is a PhD candidate at Deakin University. She is a recipient of the Deakin University Postgraduate Research Scholarship. Prior to that, she received her master’s degree in cyber security from Deakin University in 2021. Her research interests include zero trust, cybersecurity management and blockchain. Her research has been published in the Journal of Computer Information Systems.

Steven is a privacy and cyber security lawyer. He advises Australian businesses, government agencies, not-for-profits on privacy, cyber security including data breach resilience and incident response, IT contracting, and intellectual property protection and commercialisation.

Before practising law, Steve worked in product development and marketing for mobile and fixed line broadband services and a security software vendor.

Steven has experience in telecommunications leasing and land access arrangements, Agile software development and project contracting models. He also has a detailed understanding of government Information Technology Contracting frameworks and their implications for both government buyers and technology suppliers.

David is the National Privacy Lead at CyberCX. Prior to joining CyberCX, David was the national lead partner for privacy at Deloitte Australia, during which time oversaw the establishment of the group privacy functions at two of Australia’s big four banks, acting in the Chief Privacy Officer roles at both. Before joining Deloitte David was responsible for privacy at State Street Corporation across APAC, built and led the CBA’s first dedicated privacy team in the first line and led the privacy functions at both NEHTA (now the ADHA) and Fox Interactive Media in Australia/NZ.

Heidi has worked in intelligence and operational roles across the government, finance and tech sectors. She is currently at the ACSC, leading efforts to uplift Australia's critical infrastructure.

Jason Ford is the Lead of the Cyber Attack Simulation team at Accenture. His interest in Cyber Security dates to when he was a teenager and finding ways to bypass security controls at high school. Jason has been a penetration tester since 2017 and a cyber security lead since 2020.He also is well known in the offensive security community through the work on his YouTube channel JSON SEC and has been a mentor for those trying to break into the field. Jason has volunteered at bootcamps, Q&A Panels and presented at various conferences including CyberCon 22.

James has over 15 years of experience working in a variety of Government ICT roles, and for the last five years has been specialising in cyber security. He has helped numerous Government entities to improve their cyber security, including performing Essential Eight assessments, implementing cyber security improvements such as application control and privileged access management, providing technical advice and working as an Information Technology Security Adviser (ITSA). James has a broad range of cyber security skills, and is particularly interested in cloud security, Active Directory, PowerShell, Python and penetration testing.

Professional Certifications Certified Information Systems Security Professional (CISSP)

Certified Cloud Security Professional (CCSP)

Certified Information Security Manager (CISM)

Certified Information Systems Auditor (CISA)

Certified in Risk and Information Systems Control (CRISC)

GIAC Certified Penetration Tester (GPEN)

GIAC Defensible Security Architecture (GDSA)

Infosec Registered Assessors Program (IRAP)

Assessor Linux Professional Institute Certified Linux Administrator

Kylie is a Sociologist that specialises in Cyber security. Human centred design and its applicability to the technical cyber security landscape is where she adds significant value. Whether it's advising on the human elements for incident response (including internal and external networks), cyber risk adoption frameworks including nudge theory and change management techniques, advising on cyber criminal behaviours to determine degrees of maliciousness, hybrid cloud risk factors, or embedding security by design practices throughout the enterprise Kylie advises clients across all industries.

She is published in academic journals for her thought leadership on the human factor in cyber security, nudge theory and the risks in predictive analytics and AI and is able to break down these theories to practical applications for clients.

Kylie is an engaging speaker that lights up a room with her energy and insights.

Pranjali worked as an architect in the construction industry for better part of two decades before moving into Cybersecurity.

Today, she works as a Cyber Defence Analyst at Interactive in the 24/7 SOC. She also teaches Cybersecurity to students of Certificate IV in Cybersecurity and Advanced Diploma in Cybersecurity.

Pranjali is currently working towards a Post Graduate level Graduate Certificate in Cybersecurity.

Jason lead’s EY’s Cyber Incident Response practice and has over 20 years of global experience working across the public and private sector to support clients in time of crisis. He has undertaken Cyber investigations across 27 countries spanning Asia, Europe, South America, Africa and the US providing insights and advice to Boards and senior executives prior to and during cyber security breaches. He has a unique combination of traditional Law enforcement, Forensic Technology and Cyber Operations experience that he is able to leverage during times of Cyber events.

For the past 10 years Jason has worked closely with Corporate teams and Organisational executives to ensure they are both ready for and able to respond in the event of a Cyber Attack.

Charlotte is an executive with the whole of NSW Government function, Cyber Security NSW. In her role as Director of Policy, Awareness, her work is focused on uplifting cyber security across NSW Government.

Charlotte completed a Churchill fellowship in 2022, conducting research internationally on innovative ways to drive cyber security awareness. She completed an Executive Master in Public Administration in 2022. She has previous academic qualifications in leadership, accounting, and community education and development.

Charlotte was previously a public servant with the Australian Government for 14 years, culminating in her role as Manager of Cybercrime Intelligence with the Australian Criminal Intelligence Commission.

Liz is a Senior Cloud and Container Security Engineer, the last four years of her career has been focussing on actively assist teams in securing and optimising their container lifecycle. Her expertise is around various containerisation technologies, enabling them to address diverse challenges faced by development and operations teams. She has been an advocate for best practices, guiding teams on how to implement robust security measures, continuous integration, and delivery pipelines, and optimise container orchestration. Her deep understanding of container security vulnerabilities and mitigation strategies has been invaluable in safeguarding sensitive data and ensuring compliance with industry standards.

With over 18 years' experience in Information Technology, Daniela Fernandez is a cyber security and analytics leader, who values integrity, diversity of thought, continuous learning, sense of achievement and ensuring a healthy work/life integration.

Through the years Daniela has become an expert in different domains including fraud detection, cyber security, risk management and analytics. Currently Daniela is the Head of Information Security at PayPal Australia where she focuses on making security a business enabler while ensuring that PayPal delivers secure products to customers and meets local regulatory requirements. Before that, Daniela was Director of Cyber Risk and Strategy at Deloitte. Prior to Deloitte, Daniela worked in multiple roles at CBA, across protective services, intel, fraud detection and cyber.

Daniela is one of the AWSN chapter leads, actively encouraging women to pursue a career in security. With her technical skills, personal motivation and experience Daniela is committed to break stereotypes, promote diversity in cyber security and empower talented women in technology. Recently, Daniela was one of the winners for the 2022 CSO30 Awards.

Daniela has a bachelor’s degree in computer science and software engineering and master’s degree of IT in systems security, and holds multiple industry certifications.

Meet Rebecca Williams, a highly self-motivated and creative Cyber Security Advisor with a knack for adapting to various business environments. With a specialty in Governance, Risk, and Compliance, Bec has amassed a wealth of experience in information security risk, cyber security strategy development, and helping organisations improve their security posture.Rebecca’s academic accomplishments are as impressive as her professional track record. She holds a Master of Policing, Intelligence, Cyber Security, and Counterterrorism from Macquarie University, a Bachelor of Criminology and Criminal Justice from the University of New South Wales, and a Diploma of Government from the University of New England. She's also a Certified Information Security Manager (CISM) and an AWS Certified Cloud Practitioner.

In her spare time, Rebecca enjoys anything active outdoors, volunteering on the ISACA Adelaide Board, and loves to travel to new places.

Melissa Wong is an accomplished Cybersecurity Project Manager, with a decade’s worth of expertise in Construction, Defence and Technology projects. Melissa excels in delivering complex projects and programs in high-risk public and private environments, showcasing strategic acumen, innovation, and collaborative stakeholder engagement. ?She also exhibits a creative flair in her professional pursuits, drawing upon her experience as a building architect and theatrical circus and dance performer. Melissa successfully blends her unique range of skills to passionately lead her projects with emotional intelligence, ethical consideration and compassion for the people that operate within her teams.

Vannessa is the Director of Security Services at Kinetic IT. Vannessa leads a National team providing threat intelligence and threat response to a range of Australian customers with critical operations. Vannessa has over 20 years of Information Technology experience, coupled with a Law Degree, Master of Business Administration and Postgraduate Diploma in Psychology. This background provides an in depth understanding of technology, risk, strategy and organizational culture.

In her career she has led service delivery at Telstra in WA SA and NT through the pandemic, bushfires, and cyclones. Her current role includes security operations and incident response. Her experiences have shaped to know crises are inevitable, and preparing to respond requires disciplined operational procedures, responsive technology and a culture of teamwork and continuous learning. You can’t control what life throws at you, but you can control how you respond. Vannessa is a finalist in the Most Outstanding Woman in Protective Security at the 2022 Australian Women in Security Awards and winner of WitWA Tech+ Most Outstanding Women in Leadership.

Adam P. Henry is a cyber security thought leader, published author, international speaker and executive. He has developed research and programs focused on fixing the education, skills and workforce gaps, cyber disaster response/resilience and cyber warfare. His research and initiatives have focused on developing strategies and effective responses to these key issues. He is the Senior Advisor at the Social Cyber Group, SME for Canberra Cyber Hub, Facilitator of Masters courses for RMITO/Curio and an Adjunct Lecturer at the UNSW Canberra.

He has participated in national and international projects and programs and also spoken widely at major conferences in Australia and internationally. He has established strong collaborative networks while in search of impactful partnerships in providing innovative solutions to our biggest technological challenges.

He has extensive experience in digital and cyber leadership including transformation, developing, leading and executing technology business solutions and strategies. He is a new thought leader in this field, pushing the boundaries with his research while implementing practical solutions to these global issues.

Hiroki is a career OSINTer and is passionate about all things open source. From cyber threat intelligence to Defence capability development, he has had applied OSINT experience to wide spectrum. In the past he has developed and delivered OSINT training and worked with non government organisations such as the Bellingcat Volunteer Project and the Global Authentication Project.

David Fairman is an experienced Technology Executive, Venture Capitalists and Non-Executive Director. David has extensive experience in the global financial services sector. David’s current portfolio spans several sectors and includes him holding the role as the APAC CIO for Netskope, Partner and CISO-in-residence at SixThirty Ventures, Non-Executive director of a number of privately held companies and angel investor. Previously, David was the Chief Security Officer at NAB owning all aspects of Physical Security, Fraud, Investigations and Cyber Security. Prior to NAB, he was the Group CISO for RBC and has held senior roles at JPMC and RBS.

Su-Ann has over 15 years of experience in providing commercial, legal and risk management services to public and private sector organisations. Su-Ann has led procurement and business transformation projects for large organisations which rely heavily on Australian and global supply chains. Su-Ann draws on her experience as a former in-house lawyer to enable ambitious business outcomes while managing risk appropriately. Su-Ann's experience includes:
· Strategic procurement and contracting
· Risk advisory including privacy and information security
· Organisation design and capability uplift
· Governance and performance
Su-Ann has a particular interest in modern technology development in secure environments. Su-Ann has worked with future-driven technology teams in established organisations to develop commercial and operating frameworks to achieve speed, security and optimal user experience in product development projects.

Brett is a Partner within PwC Australia's Cybersecurity & Digital Trust team. Brett helps organisations manage their cyber risk posture through the delivery of technical cyber services including penetration testing, red teaming, and vulnerability management. Brett co-leads the Offensive Security capability at PwC Australia.

Rob Auer has been passionate about technology and human psychology for more than 20 years. His career has spanned consulting across a dozen sectors and been involved in cybersecurity, cloud, infrastructure, and enterprise services in numerous multidisciplinary and international environments.

Dr. Jabed Chowdhury is currently working as Lecturer in Cybersecurity discipline at La Trobe university. He has been awarded his PhD from Swinburne University of Technology, Melbourne, Australia.

He regularly publishes his research in top journals and conferences. He has also attacked significant amount research grants for his research in cybersecurity. One of his research interest includes design and development of innovative techniques to teach cybersecurity students. Recently he has been awarded with Australian Award for University Teaching, which is regarded as national teaching excellence award in Australia.

He also holds many industry certifications such as EC-Council Ethical Hacking (CEH), Red Hat Certified System Administrator (RHCSA), AXIOM Forensic, and Cisco CCNA-Security.

Craig has extensive thought leadership experience across AP/J ICT markets. He is CEO & Principal of DataDriven, which specialises in research-based thought leadership and consulting for ICT Strategy, Outsourcing, Cyber Security, Digital Transformation, Cross-Cultural Communications/Leadership, and Managing Virtual Teams across borders.

Craig has over 30 years of executive and board-level experience in the industry, including as group VP Gartner Research AP/J; CEO Gartner Japan; Global VP Frost & Sullivan; Executive GM marketing/CTO of Fujitsu ANZ & Asia; and GM marketing, strategy and alliances at BT Syntegra. More recently, he was VP global strategy/VP digital services at Fujitsu’s Tokyo HQ. As a well-known ICT analyst, Craig has written over 200 research pieces, and presented at over 1,500 events globally.

Craig holds an MBA in International Business/Marketing (SGSM/WSU), is VP of the Australian Computer Museum Society (ACMS), Fellow of the Institute of Managers and Leaders (IML), ex. Chair of the Australian Computer Society (ACS NSW), and until recently on the Federal Board/Exco of the Australian Information Industry Association (AIIA). He is in the final phase of a Doctor of Business Administration by research (DBA) focussed on the intersection of national culture and strategic use of/ investment in ICT (Australia compared to Japan).

Chathura is a Director in the Forensic practice of KPMG Australia and leads the Cyber Attack and Response services. He is a highly technical Cyber security practitioner with over 20 years’ experience in offensive Cybersecurity and Incident Response. He is a CREST Certified Tester and an examination assessor for the CREST International. He is also an advisory board member of the CREST Australasia. He has delivered complex technical Cyber security assessment programs and Incident Response engagements for a number of high profile Australian and global organisations.

She possesses a strong understanding of governance, compliance, regulatory and financial standards, such as APRA CPS-234, ASD ISM, NIST, Australian Privacy Principles and ISO 27001.

She is currently working at NAB as Senior Security Specialist in Identity Management team.Prior to KPMG she was an Information Security Consultant at DXC Australia, and she was part of their Security Advisory team.She has three(3) years of experience in delivering information security risk assessment, vulnerability assessment and ISO 27001 implementation processes and procedures. Sonakshi has a keen interest in cyber security space, particularly in cyber security risk management and incident management domain. She is well-versed with risk management standards and methodology e.g. ISO 31K and ISF IRAM.

In 2015 and 2016, she completed her ITIL v3, ISO 27001:2013 Lead Implementer and Certified Ethical Hacker (CEH) programs. On several occasions, she has been admired by her professional network (over LinkedIn) for sharing Cybersecurity related news and updates. Sonakshi has been actively participating in various security conferences and is a member of AISA and ISACA.

During her tenure at the KPMG Australia, she drove the implementation of ISO 27001 standard and performed security risk assessments on technology related projects. Before KPMG Australia, she was an Assistant Professor at a major University in India delivering cyber security subjects along with others.

Sonakshi has extensive experience in biometric security (Identity and Access Management). In 2012, her research paper - "Secure Personal Recognition System based on Hashes Keys" was selected at International Journal of Advanced Science and Technology.

She also has a Master of Computer Science and Engineering (with honours) from Kurukshetra University, India.

James Anderson is a Principal Consultant with Mandiant Red Team, with a strong track record of testing and overcoming security barriers to obtain secure information. With a background as a malware analyst, security engineer, and network specialist within the Australian Department of Defence, he has gained a diverse perspective on offensive and defensive techniques and methods to both attack and detect resources. In his free time, he enjoys dissecting software to research potential exploits and methods of payload delivery to enhance stealth.

For over the last 24 years, Jason has been ethically peering into Client Behavior, Wireless Networks, Web Applications, APIs and Cloud Systems, helping organizations secure their assets and intellectual property from unauthorized access. As a consultant he's taken hundreds of organizations through difficult compliance mine fields, ensuring their safety. As a researcher he has found flaws in consumer IOT systems and assisted in hardening them against external attacks. At Cequence Security Jason does research, community outreach and supports efforts in identifying Automated Attacks against Web, Mobile, and API-based Applications to keep Cequence's customers safe.

Kelly Henney is Australia’s National Data Privacy Leader. Kelly is a legal practitioner with over 18 years of experience across the corporate sector and in Government regulation. Kelly brings a wealth of experience managing Data Security & Privacy risks in complex and sensitive transactions, data breach response, and complex regulatory investigations throughout the Asia Pacific. Kelly was awarded an Australia Day medal for her work as the Lead Lawyer on the ABC Learning Centre Taskforce. Kelly has a strong reputation and is widely known as the “go-to” person on Privacy related matters and is often asked to speak publicly on data Privacy and cyber related matters. Naveen Malhotra is a Manager in KPMG’s Privacy and Data Protection team. With over 12 years of professional services experience, Naveen has served as a Manager in Technology consulting and Cyber Security, Privacy, and Risk practice at KPMG Singapore and India. Throughout this tenure, Naveen has gained valuable expertise in undertaking diverse engagements spanning multiple industries in both the public and private sectors. Naveen has successfully conducted internal audits, privacy advice to clients, and conducted compliance reviews.

Steven is a highly accomplished individual with a passion for mechanical engineering and cybersecurity. He received his Bachelor of Engineering (Mechanical Engineering) (Honours)/ Bachelor of Science (Biotechnology) degree from RMIT University with a perfect GPA and was awarded the SEW-Eurodrive Prize and Robert W. Dorrat Memorial Prize. He is currently working as a Mechanical Building Services Engineer at Mott MacDonald and a Cybersecurity Change & Awareness Analyst at RMIT University. Steven gained valuable experience through internships, including working as a Facilities and Asset Management Intern at RMIT Property Services and a Design Engineer Intern at OMX Solutions. Steven's experience in both mechanical engineering and cybersecurity brings a very different lens to the cyber world, allowing him to see the forest for the trees and bring innovative ideas to the world of cybersecurity.

Rose has 9 years’ experience in the Cyber security industry, partnering with Cyber Security leaders, Enterprise Executives and IT teams to understand their security challenges and help them solve these issues through technology and process alignment.

As a Microsoft Security Solutions Specialist, Rose is responsible for working with organisations, partners, technology leaders and industry regulators to ensure that Microsoft technology aligns with their cybersecurity strategy and helps them adhere to their security, data protection and risk management requirements. Rose holds a Master in Medical Physics and Honours Degree in Nuclear Physics.

Aaron is a seasoned information technology professional with over two decades of experience. Beginning in technical support for a web application load testing company prior to the dot com bust he transitioned into cybersecurity before it was mainstream cool, designing and implementing email and web gateways that would go on to stop large scale and widely publicized spam campaigns involving a former tennis player and letters of love! And earning an infamous status within numerous student populations due to blocking warez, newz and torrent downloads within schools.

Witnessing major events firsthand from the Code Red worm circumnavigating the globe in record time causing many organizations to pull the plug on their gateways onto the rise of spammers transitioning from cheap pharmaceuticals to fake anti-malware and onto ransomware – Aaron is passionate about modern computing and the seemingly never-ending challenges it brings to businesses both old and new.

An old school and retro video game enthusiast, Aaron will be more than happy to talk at ends how two-dimensional side scrolling ‘platformer’ video games are the best to wind down after a hard day on the keyboard.

With a career marked by a deep commitment to cybersecurity and a dedication to staying at the forefront of the constantly evolving technology and threat landscape, it’s now time to amplify the ‘shared security model’ into a shared fate – Aaron’s goal is to equip people and teams with knowledge and technology to build cyber resilient businesses.

Richard is a 30-year ICT veteran starting with mainframes with the Commonwealth Bank, moving into SME markets and onto large clients in shipping, mining, and other heavy industries. He became IT director in 2010 for a mining company with uranium, gold and diamond projects in Outback Australia, Laos, and Canada. He also founded his IT consulting company in 1999 and today work with two large telcos and several Australia Federal Government agencies.

He is a hands-on tech with a philosophy to never separate Cyber Security from Information Technology.

He was in national congress and an executive committee member at the Australia Computer Society until 2020 and is the chair Cloud branch at AISA.

Michelle is passionate about emerging technology, startups and scale-ups and Australia’s science and technology foundations. She is in particular a champion of Australia’s cyber security sector enabling all Australian organisations to grow and take advantage of the cyber world. She is also a strong advocate for increasing diversity in the cyber security workforce and inspiring people with the possibilities of cyber innovation.

Michelle is a Partner with EY Australia, working within the cyber practice to support public sector clients, together with startups and scale-ups through EY Private. Prior to joining EY, Michelle was the CEO of AustCyber, the Australian Cyber Security Growth Network Ltd, part of the Australian Government’s Industry Growth Centres Initiative and, as of February 2021, a subsidiary of Stone & Chalk Group. Michelle was the inaugural Chief Operating Officer of AustCyber, joining the company in January 2017 and appointed as CEO in April 2018.

Prior to joining AustCyber, Michelle was the first Senior Adviser for Cyber Security at the National Security College within The Australian National University. Before joining the ANU, she held various strategy and risk management roles across the Australian Government, including at the Department of the Prime Minister and Cabinet (PM&C), where she was instrumental to the delivery of the Government’s 2015 Cyber Security Review and 2016 Cyber Security Strategy. Prior to PM&C, Michelle worked in several strategy and risk roles across Government, including in law enforcement and health portfolios.

Prior to Government, Michelle worked on risk management and strategy in Australia’s food industry focusing on the development and implementation of national food safety standards and supply chain management. She has also worked in the advertising industry, in regional Australia.

She holds a Bachelor of Arts (Economics, Business Law) from Macquarie University, a Bachelor of Design (Visual Communications) from the University of Technology, Sydney and is an alumna of the Harvard John F. Kennedy School of Government.

EJ is one of Australia’s most experienced Cyber Security lawyers with over 29 years’ experience as a lawyer in the Royal Australian Air Force, Cyber Squadron and also serving several years in the Pentagon - US Air Force JAG Operational and International Law Section.

In addition to EJ’s military career, EJ has also served as an in-house lawyer for Australian Federal and State Government Departments and is an Adjunct Professor - Deakin School of Information Technology.

EJ’s extensive legal experiences, server her clients to preserve their legal positions through policy, governance and preparedness work, cyber security training, incident drills, and emergency incident response.

Dr Shuiyin Liu is a Senior Lecturer at the Faculty of Information System at Holmes Institute. He is mainly interested in information theory, coding and cryptography. This includes applications of lattice codes, coding for data storage, precoding/decoding for multiple-input multiple-output (MIMO) systems, lattice-based cryptography, physical layer security, lightweight cryptography, and IoT security. Dr Shuiyin Liu currently leads several research projects on IoT security.

Aaron Jacobs is a Sophos Global Solutions Engineer, specialising in Managed Detection and Response. With more than two decades of experience in the IT industry, Aaron has delivered a variety of successful projects both with Sophos and as a general manager of a leading Australian MSP. Aaron has enabled a range of organisations to grow in an ever-changing business and threat landscape, utilising his skills as a systems engineer to advise customers on cybersecurity and business continuity. He is an experienced speaker and established thought leader in the MSP space and cybersecurity industry.

Ailie is an Associate Consultant with CyberCX's Strategy & Consulting practice and was a member of the CyberCX Academy inaugural cohort.

With a previous career as a registered nurse specialising in anaesthetics, Ailie made a career change into cyber security in 2022. The transition into cyber security was challenging but leveraging her experience in a fast-paced, ''think on your feet'' environment, she has found a new passion in adapting to a dynamic cyber landscape, helping to secure and support our communities in a new way.

Ailie is a passionate advocate for women in cyber and whilst concurrently studying a master’s degree in cyber security, as a mum, seeks to inspire others to lean into the challenge and find their own path in cyber.

Dr Jongkil Jay Jeong (BCom Otago, MIS/PhD Eng. Melb) is a Senior Research Fellow for the Cyber Security Cooperative Research Centre (CyberCRC) exploring next-generation cyber security technologies and services. On top of his academic positions, Jay also has extensive industry experience serving as the Managing Director of Elegant Minds - a digital advisory company; and also spearheading the Webasia Initiative at Melbourne IT where he was responsible for orchestrating a strategic partnership agreement with Alibaba. He has also been involved in multiple start-ups ranging from creating one of New Zealand's first commercial wireless networks to developing a charity/lifestyle app as a part of Google Campus Seoul. Considered one of the foremost authorities on human factors in cyber security and cyber risk, Jay’s work has been published and presented in both leading academic and mainstream media outlets as well as advising both public and private sectors on matters pertaining to cyber security.

As the Pacific Zone’s Senior Cyber Security Governance officer, Asaf Ahmad’s mission is to protect and manage cybersecurity risks to Schneider Electric, its customers, and other stakeholders. Asaf is responsible for enabling the business to minimise those risks and ensure it is continuously maturing its capability across the organisation. He is also responsible for challenging, reviewing and enhancing the cybersecurity posture (process, people, technology). In doing so, he works closely with every part of the organisation to enhance collaboration and partnerships across Schneider Electric’s stakeholder ecosystem to keep raising the cyber resilience bar of the industry at large.

Prior to Schneider Electric, Asaf has worked in both the private sector and government sector to implement information security management systems. This includes his role as Chief Information Security Officer at Fire & Rescue NSW as well as his experience in the oil and gas industry, where he was involved with system engineering, digital and advanced control in refineries.

Asaf has also served as president of the Information Systems Audit and Control Association (ISACA) board of directors, among other positions, and has contributed to cyber security professional leadership and certifications to address the emerging cyber security needs of the industry for building a cyber-safe ecosystem.

Asaf brings with him over 35 years of experience, a Master of Technology in Management and Systems, a Bachelor of Science in Electrical Engineering, and CISM, CRISC, ISO 27001, and CDPSE, FGIA certifications. Although Asaf is Indian by birth, he, his wife, and two sons call Australia home.

Richard has 20 years’ experience at the Westpac Group. Prior to his appointment as Group Chief Information Security Officer, Richard was the Head of Technical Security Services for the Group. In these roles, he has led the Group’s information security strategy, delivery and governance. Prior to joining the Westpac Group, Richard held roles as Head of Technology Audit at Woolworths Limited, Technology Audit Manager at BT Financial Group, and in Computer Risk Management at Arthur Andersen.In addition to his academic credentials, Richard has a number of professional security qualifications including CISA, CISM, CISSP, CRISC, SCF, and ACP.

Daisy Wong (she/her) is an experienced cybersecurity expert with over a decade of experience. Born with a tumour in her lower spine, surgery has left gher spinal cord damaged and she uses walking sticks and a (pink) wheelchair for mobility. She does not let her disability stop her from living life or achieving goals. She is currently the Security Culture and Awareness Lead at Flybuys, where she leverages her expertise in marketing and behavioural studies to promote a stronger security culture among both employees and customers.

Sharon is the Cyber Awareness and Change Lead at the NSW Department of Education. Dedicated to strengthening the cyber security culture of an organisation with more than one million users, she’s always on the lookout for new ways to engage staff and students in safe cyber security practices. She is proud to be part of the national team responsible for developing and delivering Cybermarvel, an online safety education program for school communities that’s now in its third year. Sharon comes to cyber security with 30 years’ experience in information technology, spanning both the UK and Australia. With a solid technical background and a wealth of management experience, she transitioned into adult learning and organisational change management, all of which have influenced her approach to cyber security awareness.

Dr Teague is a cryptographer living and working on Wurundjeri land in south eastern Australia (near Melbourne). She is interested in cryptographic protocols that support a free and democratic society. She works on openly-available research and open-source software for supporting democratic decision making and empowering ordinary people to make choices about their own data.

Chirag is a seasoned cyber security executive with extensive experience leading cyber security, risk management, and compliance programs in multiple countries across various industries.

He is the author of the two bestselling books – “7 Rules to Become Exceptional at Cyber Security” and “7 Rules to Influence Behaviour and Win at Cyber Security Awareness." Chirag is featured in the prestigious CSO30 2022 list of top 30 cyber security executives in Australia. He was also recognised as a finalist for the Australian Cyber Security Professional of the Year Award in 2022 and 2020.

Chirag is a well-known keynote speaker and has presented at numerous leading international and regional conferences and forums on topics such as cyber threat landscape, effective cyber security strategies, cyber regulations, security culture, and the importance of human factor.

He is currently a Director at ISACA Sydney and has conducted several successful cyber security education sessions for executives and non-technical audiences in industries such as financial services, energy, healthcare, government, and higher education. He has led teams and multi-million-dollar cyber transformation initiatives. He has experience in both IT and OT environments and has managed cyber security through demergers and divestments.

Chirag’s academic qualifications include Master’s degree in Telecommunications Management and Bachelor’s degree in Electronics and Telecommunications Engineering. He holds multiple certifications including CISA, CISM, CRISC and CDPSE.

Mark began his career in digital technology as a linguist, telecommunications specialist and research analyst with the US government in divided Berlin during the Cold War. There he worked with one of the world’s first supercomputers.

Mark is currently AISA Deputy Branch Chair in Darwin, working with our Chair and others to grow and invigorate AISA’s youngest chapter here in the far north. He is also a Life Member of the IEEE, currently serving on the IEEE Society for the Social Implications of Technology (SSIT) as a Coordinator for Darwin. He has served on academic advisory boards of universities in Australia and overseas primarily advising on information security curriculum. He delivered the first post-graduate course in cryptography and key management at Monash University.

Mark received the Information Security Leadership Award from (ISC)2 in 2007 and served on the Board of Directors of the Singapore ISACA Chapter over a four year period.

Daniel has jumped between application security, development and security operation roles throughout his career. He has been in the industry for over a decade in a variety of roles, ranging from network security engineer to penetration tester to Director of Cyber Architecture and Integration at a global MSSP. He now runs the Penetration Testing and Security Architecture teams as the Chief Optimist (CTO) at Phronesis Security.

Ellie’s Psychology degree, gained in her home country of England, was an unlikely springboard into a career in cyber security.

Despite no traditional technical background, a deep-rooted interest into the weird and wonderful aspects of human behaviour navigated her into her first cyber role in social engineering simulation, training, and awareness. This led to delivering complex security behaviour uplift programs to enterprise organisations across the globe.

Particular professional highlights include a personal record of one million simulated phishing emails sent to one client in a year, and running round a bank in South Africa scattering USB sticks, aiming to see who would plug it in and click the totally legitimate looking file labeled ‘EMPLOYEE PERSONAL BONUSES’.

Since then, one move across the pond later, Ellie has worked in the MxDR space in Australia delivering capability and service uplift for clients across the Asia Pacific region. Most recently, Ellie is now truly gaining an insight into the width and breadth of human behaviour, leading client delivery in APAC for cyber incident response, crisis management, and cyber incident readiness and preparedness services at Accenture.

Conor Kenny is a senior analyst at Accenture's ANZ Cyber Strategy Team, specializing in cyber strategy, operating models, governance frameworks, and treating cyber risk as a business context.

Jessica Robinson is the Executive Officer of PurePoint International helping CEOs and C-level leaders bridge the gap among data security, cyber risk and privacy and is currently the vCISO for Women In Cybersecurity. PurePoint International provides cybersecurity consulting, advisory, and training for financial services, insurance and other middle market global companies from start-up to $5B in revenue.

Jessica’s vision to create a different kind of security company has earned the company and award for International Affairs and Women’s Security from Jaycees Philippines-New York Chapter and Philanthropy Company of the Year Award for the 2021 Ally of the Year Awards. Jessica is also on the Chair Emeritus of World Pulse.

Ryder is a consultant at Modern Methodologies, she started her career at Microsoft as a digital strategy advisor, helping customers design and realise their digital transformation goals and achieve their business objectives. She then moved to the client side to broaden her experience in strategy development across core architectural domains and establishing a digital transformation team to deliver strategy projects.

She is also passionate in helping non-for-profit organisations where she championed and led a team of experts on a worthy initiative to reduce information silos across the homelessness service providers.

Pieter Danhieux is the CEO of Secure Code Warrior, a global security company that makes software development better and more secure. In 2016, he was No. 80 on the list of Coolest Tech people in Australia (Business Insider) and awarded Cyber Security Professional of the Year (AISA - Australian Information Security Association).

Pieter is also a Principal instructor for the SANS Institute teaching military, government, and private organizations offensive techniques on how to target and assess organizations, systems and individuals for security weaknesses. He also serves as an advisory board member of NVISO, a cybersecurity consulting company in Europe. Before starting his own company, Pieter work at Ernst & Young and BAE Systems.

Pieter obtained the Certified Information Systems Security Professional (CISSP) certification as one of the youngest persons ever in Belgium. He then obtained the Certified Information Systems Auditor (CISA, now expired), the GIAC Certified Forensics Analyst program (GCFA), and is currently one of the select few people worldwide to hold the GIAC Security Expert (GSE) certification.

Pieter has spoken at over 50 public presentations in the last 7 years including RSA Asia Pacific & Japan, ACSC, AusCERT, ISACA, ISSA, AISA, CloudSec, and SANS Institute Community Events.

Arni, currently serving as the Head of Assurance at Tesserent, boasts an extensive consulting background across all major sectors, both locally in Australia and internationally. His experience encompasses a wide array of large companies in fields such as finance, government, and technology. Before joining Tesserent, Arni worked with firms like Syndis, Thekking, and Betware. He is also a regular speaker at various universities and TAFEs, sharing his knowledge on a range of subjects related to the industry, focusing on various topics related to offensive security.

Leela has been a long-term security and privacy nut. She started out in IT in the late 00's and has since worked to keep people protected in her work.

Leela is a person to take action and show initiative, jumping into situations as they arise and taking ownership of problems. She has worked at The Australian National University since 2018 and has seen and driven a lot of change in the cyber security posture of the University being heavily involved in Passwordless an email security.

She is also an activist pushing for a safer world both physical and digital, Leela is involved with Anti-War, pro LGBTQ, and pro Cycling/Safe Streets protests.

Dr. Hussain Aldawood works as a Cybersecurity Innovation & Partnership Director at NEOM. His track record demonstrates 13+ years of cybersecurity achievements with global industry leaders. Recipient of many prestigious and international honors and awards. A global thought leader and influencer with a superior understanding of state-of-the-art systems and multiple research publications on cybersecurity topics.

Systems of National Significance (SoNS) are Australia’s most important critical infrastructure, by virtue of their interdependencies across sectors and potential for cascading consequences to other critical infrastructure providers if disrupted. The Department’s goal is to create a genuine public-private partnership with the entities responsible for Systems of National Significance, to boost critical infrastructure defences through collaboration, coordination and the application of effective regulatory settings. This effort is led by SoNS Director Whitney Harris.

Ivano is a researcher, consultant, author, and speaker whose work focuses on the managerial and business implications of Cybersecurity.

A Lecturer in Information Security, Governance and Leadership with the UQ Business School and a member of UQ Cyber, Ivano helps business leaders and executives make evidence-based decisions in cybersecurity. With a professional background in risk and security management, Ivano's work bridges the gap between technical cybersecurity and its repercussions across organisations. He has advised ministers, policy-makers, board members, and senior executives on strategies, governance structures, policies, and training programs for effective cybersecurity management. Ivano is also an experienced facilitator in the fields of Design Thinking and Design-Led innovation, having run since 2015 more than 50 design-led workshops and longer projects for public and private sector organisations.

Natalie Weinel (she/her) is an experienced IT professional who spent 10 years in the ERP space before taking a break to raise a family. Recently she has returned to the workforce with a newfound passion to pivot into cybersecurity, but has encountered numerous challenges despite her prior experience in IT. Undeterred, Natalie remains committed to forging a successful career in cybersecurity, breaking down long-standing biases and stereotypes that hold women back, and fostering a more diverse and inclusive workplace culture across the industry.

Sarah Daniell is the Managing Director and Principal Lawyer at Lextechia, a director of the Australasian Cyber Law Institute, and a Senior Fellow of the University of Melbourne.

She has over twenty years’ experience in technology and commercial law advising public and private sector organisations on all aspects of technology and other procurement, including privacy and cyber security law compliance, operational risk management, and contract design.

Sarah has previously led the Commercial Law team at the Department of Health and Human Services, the Intellectual Property & Information Technology team at the Victorian Government Solicitor’s Office, and commercial purchasing for the Victorian government centralised IT purchasing body CenITex. She was a primary legal advisor for the Victorian government Emergency Alert, Nurse-on-Call, and Environment Protection Authority core operations systems. In addition to her time in private practice and government, she has held in-house roles drafting and negotiating IT contracts and providing other legal support to St John of God Health Care and the Austin Hospital.

Patrick Fair is the principal of Patrick Fair Associates, an Adjunct Professor at the School of Information Technology, Faculty of Science, Engineering and Built Environment at Deakin University, the Chairman of the Communications Security Reference Panel at the Communications Alliance, a Fellow of the Australian Information Security Association, a member of the IoT Alliance of Australia Security Workstream Member Technical Advisory Standing Committee auDA and General Advisor to and an author of LexisNexis Practical Guidance Cybersecurity, Data Protection and Privacy

Nicole Stephensen (FAISA) is Partner and Privacy Lead at IIS Partners. In privacy for more than two decades, she is widely recognised for her local and international expertise in privacy program management and acculturation. Nicole is an active mentor for privacy and cybersecurity professionals and is a sought-after speaker, guest lecturer and course curricula author about the interface between privacy, cyber security, risk management, ethics and trust. She seeks out great coffee and takes bush walks for inspiration.

Bobbie Darrock specializes in helping enterprise and mid-market organizations enhance their email security to prevent cyberattacks and data loss. With an acute understanding of how the human element impacts cyber risk, Bobbie focuses on helping organizations identify risk caused by phishing attacks, human error, and data exfiltration to deliver robust security improvements. Bobbie's collaborative approach and industry expertise blend perfectly to deliver high levels of customer satisfaction.

Carsten Boeving (Re4son) is a Kali Linux developer and a veteran in cyber security with over 30 years in the industry. Carsten has a background in electronic engineering but quickly discovered his passion for security after finding out that making a robot dance salsa by exploiting a vulnerability is much more entertaining than getting it to assemble car parts.Carsten has spent half his career in security operations, the other half as CISO in public and private sector organizations, and is the holder of OSCE, OSCP, CISSP, CCSP, CISM, CRISC, CDPSE, ISO/IEC 27001 LA, MCSE, ZTX.As a Kali Linux developer, Carsten is the maintainer of NetHunter, NetHunter Pro, Kali-Pi Kernel, Win-KeX, Kali Unkaputtbar, etc. and is currently working with Kiwi on Kali-Purple - The ultimate SOC in the box.

Deanna specialises in working with organisations as a trusted advisor to achieve a strong cyber security posture across multiple facets of enterprise security. This includes advising on strategic cyber security policy outcomes through the design, implementation and assurance of security programs that leverage technology to achieve transformational business change and compliance to the relevant industry guidelines and government legislation.

Her experience is end to end including endpoint security, vulnerability management, identity and access management, threat intelligence, cloud and data risk.

Deanna is a thought leader in security and data privacy, and has co-authored multiple submissions to government on open data, digital identity and the Security of Critical Infrastructure Amendment Act. She is a regular speaker on her expertise in cyber risk, digital identity, identity and access management, as well as data governance and data risk.

Most of all Deanna is a dynamic leader and trusted client advisor - making a specialty of managing large, deeply technical teams. She threads change management practices throughout her work to ensure adoption, and understanding and that the human side of security risks is always being considered.

Ka Choy (CISM, BSc (Computer Science), MACS (SNR) CP)), an ICT Security Manager joined Justice Health NSW part of NSW Health in mid-March 2022. She is responsible for Justice Health NSW cyber security and information security advisory, strategy, governance, and operations. A highly regarded professional with extensive national and global cyber security, information security and project management experience in public and private sectors including SA Health, Canberra Health Services, Access Canberra of ACT Government, and the world’s top port operator group. She is also a mentor in the Australian Women in Security Network.

Jonathan is a security risk partner specialist and a committed team player with a range of experience across cyber security, this includes incident response consulting, risk management and security related standards and frameworks such as NIST, ISO, PCI DSS, and others. He thrives in high performing environments in order to work with stakeholders to drive collective outcomes. His key strengths are in security control and risk assessments, problem solving and stakeholder management. He is self- motivated and is capable of working independently or within a team. He is naturally curious and has an inquisitive mind and is always on the lookout to identify opportunities to increase efficiencies. Jonathan has skills in Security GRC including Security Gap Assessments, Risk Assessments, Policies, Standards, Procedures, Incident Response Preparation and Planning, and Third-Party Cyber Risk Assessments.

Peter is a cybersecurity engineer and consultant with Mantel Group. He has been designing and building cloud and DevOps style environments for most of his career. He has worked in a variety of roles including IT operations, software development and security, across industries including banking, government, media, telecommunications, education, and e-commerce. He's helped lead and develop operations in every size of organisation, from 15 person start-ups to multinational enterprises.

Peter now focuses on helping customers improve their cloud and application security in meaningful ways. He does this by applying the principles of DevSecOps to challenge the idea that you can’t have both security and speed in software development.

For over three decades, Eleanor has dedicated her professional career to public schools with the belief that every child can, and should be, successful. She places strong emphasis on working with colleagues to improve learning opportunities for students.

Believing staff should continually examine their practice, in order to be better teachers, Eleanor has established an innovative secondary college with a strong focus on quality teaching and effective leadership culminating in success for all students.

Fostering a culture of continuous professional learning, her vision is to create a curriculum that meets the passion and interest of students, by including real world subjects, project-based learning and inquiry approaches.

Rhys Burns is the Team Lead for Managed Detection and Response for Australia. With over a decade of experience in the IT industry, Rhys has a background in data centre infrastructure, network security and operational leadership. Rhys' diverse background in operations and leadership has enabled him to build successful teams across the cybersecurity space. His diverse background in operations enables him to think quickly and make difficult decisions while minimizing the effect on the customer experience.

Jennie has 10 years’ experience designing and placing insurance solutions for many of Australia’s leading organisations. As part of Aon’s Cyber Solutions Group, Jennie specialises in Cyber Insurance placement for large corporations. Previous experience wholesale broking from Aon’s London Global Broking Centre and working on the client side as the Global Insurance Manager for ASX-listed, Camplify.

Puneeta comes with 15+ years of cyber experience and offers management consulting and cyber security experience with a pragmatic approach in implementing sustainable change. She is both a coach and advisor to clients across diverse industries advocating a 2-speed approach when navigating through their cyber, digital and innovation journey.

Connecting vision and reality - she helps organisations move with confidence to overcome the challenges of an ever changing threat landscape, and work with them all the way from business intent to value realisation & combat business risks.

Puneeta has been a cyber security Practitioner helping CISOs & CROs adopt pragmatic solutions that Reduce business & Compliance Risks; harnessing her exuberant skills & experience across consultative selling, building security business solutions, customer management, security advisory & roadmaps across large transformation programs.

She has provided leadership and managed large and distributed teams, managing a multi-vendor and rightshore delivery model, be seen as a cyber/technology enablement advisor in a diverse and geographically dispersed working environment partnering seamlessly across business and IT.

In her recent engagements she has been closely working with CIO,CISO and CROs on helping them with board reporting templates, dashboards and strategies with an enterprise level view on cyber for the organization.

Dr. John DiLeo is the Auckland-area leader of the OWASP New Zealand Chapter and, in his day job, is a lead Solution Architect at IriusRisk, covering the Asia/Pacific region. Before joining IriusRisk, John led the Application Security Services team at Datacom, providing support and guidance to clients in launching, managing, and maturing their enterprise software assurance programs.

Before turning to full-time roles in security, John was active as a Java enterprise architect and Web application developer. In earlier lives, John has been a full-time professor and had specialised in developing discrete-event simulations of large distributed systems.

John is on the core team for the OWASP Software Assurance Maturity Model (SAMM) Project, leads the OWASP State of AppSec Survey Project, and is a member of the OWASP Education and Training Committee.

Sinead is a Senior Manager at Accenture Security with over 16 years of client-facing experience in Cyber Delivery. She specializes in Identity and Access Management and Cyber Resilience, having led large-scale Security projects across various industries. She is knowledgeable across all stages of the project delivery lifecycle and has experience in Delivery Management and improving operational efficiencies.

Mark is a seasoned cyber security professional with a track-record extending over 30 years. Over that time, he has become a trusted advisor to both public and private sector organisations. Throughout his career, Mark has been at the forefront of implementing technological solutions to some of the biggest cyber security challenges.

He understands the importance of aligning an organisation’s technology strategy with its broader objectives. As Chief Technology Officer, Mark oversees CyberCX’s technology strategy and capabilities, ensuring they meet the organisation’s vision and goals. He ensures CyberCX is at the forefront of technology leadership in the cyber security market in Australia and New Zealand.

Steven Coomber is a Senior Manager Cyber with Synergy Group. As an intelligence professional he has previously held positions inside the National intelligence Community across counter-terrorism, counter-espionage and technical capabilities.

Steven has advised government services in South-East Asia and delivered a variety of human-led capability building programs to partner Five-Eyes and cooperating foreign intelligence services in the Asia-Pacific, Middle East and African regions.

He holds a Bachelor of Education and has supported the University of Melbourne's research and development around capabilities to assess and counter disinformation with citizen intelligence using AI augmented collective analytics.

Polly is a cybersecurity professional and reformed lawyer who has finally discovered her inner geek. Her extensive legal background combined with her cybersecurity experience gives her a unique perspective and allows her to grow into a trusted advisor helping secure organisations in an increasingly complex legal and regulatory environment. She is currently a security advisor at REA group.

Brett works full-time as a Principal Consulting Engineer for MongoDB, and is the global Kubernetes and encryption specialist alongside his expertise in Linux systems administration, software development, and DevOps. His significant skillset across data, network, and computer systems engineering sees him working across some of the most complex enterprise environments in the government, defence, and financial services industries.

He has extensive experience as team leader, instructor, and mentor, and has developed technology start-ups as the first person on the ground in international markets, where he was then responsible for scaling and managing technology teams. His educational background includes a Bachelor of Computing, a Masters of Systems Engineering, and a Graduate Diploma of Brewing. Brett is also SSCP qualified.

Joseph Cheng is an experienced auditor with a unique background that sets him apart from others in his field. He comes from an extensive IT background, having worked in various IT roles before transitioning to auditing. Joseph also completed a Bachelor of Psychology. Joseph's has always been fascinated by how people interact with technology. This led him to start examining cybersecurity issues from a psychological perspective. He believes that understanding the psychological and human aspects of cybersecurity is crucial for enterprises to protect themselves from cyberthreats.

Joseph is also passionate about using his knowledge to push the boundaries of what it means to be an auditor, bringing new perspectives and insights to the field of cybersecurity. He was invited to present at the 2022 AISA Brisbane CyberCon, 2022 ISACA Sydney 1 Day event, and the 2023 AISA Australian Cyber Conference in Canberra to share his expertise and insights on the psychological aspects of cybersecurity. His paper ‘The Human Consequences of Ransomware Attacks’ was published in ISACA Journal in June 2022.

Sean currently serves as the Vice President and Regional Chief Security Officer for Asia Pacific & Japan at Palo Alto Networks, leveraging his extensive experience in cybersecurity to develop thought leadership, threat intelligence, and security best practices for the cybersecurity community and corporate executives.

With a career spanning over two decades in the IT and security sector, Sean has established himself as a reliable advisor to regional organisations. He aids these businesses in bolstering their security defences and strategically aligns security measures with their broader business goals.

Before Palo Alto Networks, Sean dedicated 15 years to McAfee, culminating in his role as the Chief Technology Officer for Asia Pacific. His diverse professional journey has seen him engaging in various capacities, from software development and technical support to consulting services for internet security solutions. This rich tapestry of experiences has equipped Sean with a profound understanding of cybersecurity and honed his ability to understand, forecast and counteract emerging threats.

Today, Sean advocates for more robust cybersecurity measures, striving to elevate industry standards and protect organisations from emerging cyber threats.

Marianne Cologon is an experienced cyber security professional with over 15 years experience. She is well-versed in a wide range of cybersecurity topics, including risk management, threat analysis, incident response, security operations and compliance. She has worked with organisations across the public and private sector, and has developed a deep understanding of the unique cybersecurity challenges faced by organisations of all shapes and sizes.

Whilst she has found all the elements of cyber security enjoyable, her real love is making cyber security easy and understandable for everyone. Her ultimate aim is for cyber security to stop being a speciality and become just a part of what everyone does every day.

Marianne has managed teams of cyber security professionals and served as a trusted advisor to executives and board members. Marianne is passionate about cyber security and is committed to helping organisations protect their sensitive data and assets from cyber threats.

Matt Caffrey is a seasoned cyber-security professional with over two decades of experience in the field. He serves as a Solutions Architect at Barracuda for four years, where he demonstrates his expertise in delivering effective solutions to complex security challenges.

During his tenure with various Managed Service Providers (MSPs), Matt gained extensive experience as a Systems Integrator. He has worked on diverse projects ranging from networking to storage and compute, and excelled in qualifying for vendor certifications related to infrastructure security in private, public, and on-premises deployments.

Jana serves as a Strategic Threat Advisor at CrowdStrike. She is responsible for CrowdStrike’s Threat Intelligence business across Australia and New Zealand. Prior to her current role, Jana was a Senior Cyber Threat Intelligence Analyst at CyberCX, developing a wide variety of analytical products across strategic, operational and tactical levels of intelligence for a diverse customer base. Before moving to Australia, Jana held multiple intelligence-based roles across Merck and Amazon in the Czech republic, and served in NATO commands across Italy, Belgium and the Netherlands.

Andrew is a seasoned CISO at the NSW Government Department of Communities & Justice. He brings deep experience in public sector and passionate about driving pragmatic security .

Randall C. Hughson is a Cyber Security and Infrastructure Consultant, Company Director, Speaker and Musician. With over twenty years across business sectors and industries, he brings a unique and relevant approach to handling critical information security and technology issues, with a keen interest in first response and business resilience. He specialises in management liaison, technical guidance, privacy advocacy, technology strategy and long term thinking. He enjoys sharing his knowledge and experience, discussing world affairs and as well, playing in bands wherever there's a need for a good sax player.

Narayana Madineni is a security technical specialist and Master Inventor at IBM Security specialising in Identity, Access Management, Data security, mobile device management and cyber fraud detection and protection solutions with over 17 years of experience in the IT industry. He had contributed to quantum safe TLS at IBM while working in the crypto, SSL and key management library team. He is a master inventor with 30+ patents submitted to the US Patent Office and has organised several security hackathons at IBM. He is passionate about innovation, outreach, hackathons and mentoring and has won several hackathons including WW Call for Code 2021

Yvonne is a seasoned professional with over 23 years of experience in privacy, cyber security, and business continuity. In 2018, she was designated a Fellow of Information Privacy by the International Association of Privacy Professionals (IAPP), a testament to her expertise in the field. The Business Continuity Institute (BCI) recognised her outstanding work by naming her the best consultant in Australasia in 2018 and again in 2020. Yvonne was also honoured with the title of Fellow of Information Security by the Australian Information Security Association (AISA) in 2022, demonstrating her outstanding reputation among her peers. In addition to her awards and accolades, she is also the Managing Director of ISD Cyber, where she provides strategic leadership and guidance to the organisation. With a deep understanding of the complex and ever-evolving landscape, Yvonne consistently delivers results that ensure the protection and continuity of critical business operations. She is known for her dedication and commitment to excellence, making her a sought-after advisor and thought leader in the field.

Sally Cumming is the Founder and Director of Engage Health, a leading global provider of mental health and psychological resilience programs for organisations throughout Australia and New Zealand. Sally is a keynote speaker and leading expert in the field of neuroscience, psychological resilience and ‘mental fitness’.

Sally is a certified mindfulness-based stress reduction and cognitive therapy practitioner, who is passionate about helping employees train their mind and thrive in the face of adversity. Her speciality is helping individuals with high levels of stress, anxiety, depression, trauma, empathic distress fatigue, PTSD and burnout. Sally provides imperative training to high intensity organisations that include, but not limited to Victoria Police and emergency service workers, mental health nurses, clinical psychologists, doctors, social workers, disability staff, cyber /security professionals, court personnel, Workcover clients and individuals experiencing high levels of psychological distress within the workplace.

With the ever evolving and significantly increasing cyber threat landscape, Sally discovered a void in “proactive” mental health programs that not only prevent serious harm and psychological injuries, but also teach “prevention strategies” for psychological safety and mental performance. Her workplace neuroplasticity programs are well-researched, delivered proven results and have helped thousands of employees engineer mentally healthy, resilient brains leading to personal development and greater organisation efficiencies and effectiveness

Sharin Yeoh is the Asia-Pacific Information Security Officer at Lockheed Martin, with a career history spanning 20 years in advisory, architecture & consulting, including 10 years in cyber security. With experience across industries such as defence, federal goverment and commercial, Sharin promotes transparent collaboration across all parts of ICT & cyber thru to the C-Level across the world.

Darren is the Practice Lead for Technical Consulting for TrustedImpact.

Darren’s experience with networks, systems administration, and cyber security spans 25 years. He has worked across a broad range of industries including retail, finance, consulting, NGOs and State and Local Government. He has led and performed hundreds of penetration tests and evaluations of technical issues with respect to External, Internet-facing technologies, Internal Networks, Web applications, Operational Technology (SCADA, PLC, etc.), Wi-Fi, Mobile Applications and Cloud Infrastructure.

Darren strives to clearly communicate risk, issues and recommendations to clients in an understandable and relatable way.

Darren is the author of 'No Regard for the Truth' which was shortlisted for the Victorian Community History Awards in 2020.

Dave Cohen is the General Manager of Cyber & Tech at the Risk 2 Solution Group and the General Manager of the Cyber-Tech Institute of Australia, an RTO specialising in Cyber Security training in the Risk 2 Solution Group of Companies. Dave founded the ISRM Global Cyber Security Special Interest Group, providing thought leadership on understanding cyber risk as a business risk, by integrating People, Process and Technology, applying the principles of proactive prevention, enhanced decision making and opportunity centricity. As an Axio 360 Cyber Quantification Practitioner, Dave helps organisations understand cyber risk as a business risk.

Dr. Frank Jiang is a senior cybersecurity academics in School of IT at Deakin University, Australia. He completed his PhD degree in communication and cyber security at University of Technology, Sydney (UTS), and was awarded the prestigious UNSW Vice-Chancellor’s Postdoctoral Research Fellowship (2011-2014) for four years in UNSW@ADFA, a former member of Australian Cyber Security Center in Canberra. His current research interests include IoT security and privacy, Authentication and intrusion detection in V2X, Data-driven anomaly detection, Blockchain-based supply chain/logistics, and Bio-inspired context-aware algorithms and protocols.

Simon Harvey is an Information Security Professional of over 25 years, starting out in Research in the UK and then into Strategy & Architecture Consulting, Pre-Sales and End-User Organisation Architecture roles across France, the UK, Europe, the Middle East, Asia-Pacific and Australasia.

He is also an Licensed Mental Health First Aid Instructor for MHFA Australia, and an Ambassador for Cybermindz.

Throughout his career he as observed, and also himself personally experienced, others going through various stages of poor mental health and illness. He has taken up an interest in driving out how we, as an Industry and Community, need to uplift ourselves to identify, support and assist, those going through such phases in life.

He is a Queenslander first and an Australian second, but taking on his most challenging task of being a completely devoted husband, a Daddy to their mini-CyberWarrior in-training (who also “likes to Cyber Cyber"), and scratching post for the newly-acquired kitten.

Professor Asha Rao is a Professor of Mathematics at RMIT University. She was Associate Dean of Mathematical Sciences from 2017-2023. Asha is a 2019-2020 Science & Technology Australia Superstar of STEM. She has won numerous awards including the India Australia Science and Technology Development Award. In 2021 she was Inducted into the Victorian Honour Roll of Women in the Trail Blazer Category.

Asha is a trans-disciplinary researcher in Cyber security, with diverse research partnerships, ranging from mathematics and communication technologies, social media and risk management, resulting in highly ranked publications and over $4M in funding over the past 10 years. The impact of her research in risk, which addresses issues such as fraud and money-laundering, has resulted in invitations to participate in national and international bodies, including attending (by invitation) the UN Office of Drugs and Crime’s Intergovernmental meetings on Cybercrime.

She has undertaken Leadership roles both within RMIT and outside. As Program Director for Information Security, she brought management and business into a mainly technical degree, making many links with the cyber security industry. As the FoundingCchair of the Women in Maths, she put in place several initiatives to improve gender equity with mathematical sciences.

Tony is a seasoned cyber security strategist who has advised Fortune 500 companies around the world on best practices for managing cyber risk. He has counselled governments, major banks and multinational companies, and his comments on cyber security and the rising threat to critical national infrastructure have been reported in local and international media including CNBC, Channel News Asia, and the Straits Times. Before joining Darktrace, Tony previously served as CTO at Check Point and held senior advisory positions at FireEye, Standard Chartered Bank, and Telstra. Tony holds a BA in Information Systems from the University of Melbourne.

Dr. Geetika Verma is a Lecturer in cyber security at RMIT University. Her responsibilities include liaising with industry connections to coordinate courses such as industry awareness project and industry linkage projects within Maters of Cyber security degree. She continues to build relationship within academia and industry to include recent developments in cyberspace as part of her teaching delivery.

Her research drive in abstract and modern algebrais helping her to build a pathway and lifting her understanding about the applicationsof cryptography. More precisely, her current research and industry-engagement openschannels of communication with other researchers interested in exploring identity andaccess management system within an organisation. Not only this, she mentors student research projects designed to protect organisations from cyberattacks and threats. She has supervised a few research projects on how to accelerate automation in security operations and vulnerability management.

Darren specialises in advising businesses on both proactive and reactive uses of technology in the areas of cybersecurity, privacy, digital forensics and technology-led investigations.

Darren is a highly respected, qualified investigator and forensic technology expert with more than 25 years of specialist forensic experience and more than five years as a foundation member of the Forensic Computer Examination Unit with the Queensland Police. Held in high regard by attorneys and the courts, he has undertaken complex computer forensic examinations for both criminal and civil litigation in Australia and overseas.He works regularly with boards, executives and senior business leaders in organisations of every size to consider and set technology strategies for cyber, privacy, data protection and information risk management. His extensive experience spans across a wide range of industries, including business services, construction, entertainment, financial services, government, healthcare, insurance, leisure, manufacturing, retail and technology. He also regularly applies his digital forensic and investigative expertise to help resolve time- critical and highly sensitive issues as they arise. These matters range from large-scale data breaches or theft, through to employee misconduct or intellectual property matters.

With over 20 years’ experience, Andrew is a passionate information and cyber security leader. Andrew’s expertise spans risk, governance, compliance, strategy, critical infrastructure security, and technology management and architecture.

Andrew started his career in the world of data networking and system administration, before jetting off to Europe where he worked with Japanese telco giant KDDI, and looked after a rolling communications network for Honda F1 racing.

Returning home to Australia, he tackled network operations for Credit Suisse, managed security for Commonwealth Bank, and then oversaw the Australian and New Zealand network for Deutsche Bank. From there, Andrew moved into the fin tech sector, taking on infrastructure service manager positions, before moving into CIO roles at top tech firms.

In 2020, Andrew struck out on his own, founding Secureroo. Secureroo takes the guesswork out of cyber security with its user-friendly governance, risk and compliance services. He founded de.iterate in 2021.

I am a cybersecurity practitioner at Ernst and Young, Australia specializing in Vulnerability Management, Incident Response, and Detection. I hold a Bachelor's Degree with Distinction in Cyber Security and Behaviour which ignited my passion to explore technology from a human behavior perspective.

I strive to empower more women in STEAM fields to enforce creative and innovative solutions to technological problems.

I am an appointed NSW Cyber Ambassador and am a regular author in the Australian Women in Security Magazine where I pen my views and experiences of working in the cybersecurity industry. I have conducted more than 200 skill development and technical workshops for university & high school students across Australia & Oceania region to educate and upskill them in trending technologies such as Cyber Security, Blockchain, and Machine Learning.

I continue to volunteer with NGOs to encourage digital literacy and cybersecurity awareness among young children and the elderly. An ardent believer in digital equity and impact entrepreneurship, I envision creating practical solutions and tools to enable each human regardless of class or gender to understand and interpret technology for their own goodwill.

Reshmi has a strong background in information security, governance, risk management and compliance and has worked with Government and private sector companies to solve their cybersecurity challenges ranging from developing customised cybersecurity frameworks, performing risk assessments, and running information security programmes to comply with various industry standards and regulations.Starting her career in the academia, she has worked in diverse roles spanning research, public policy and information security consulting and auditing. She now works at Microsoft as a Data Security and Privacy Technology specialist.She is a passionate advocate for diversity and inclusion & diversity of thought. She also serves on the board of ISACA Sydney chapter.

Parambir is Director of APAC SOC Operations/Managed Detect and Response business based in the Sydney office. He has over 15 years’ experience in the IT Security Industry and has deep experience and understanding with the breadth of Security tools on the market. Parambir holds a master’s degree in computer science from University of Southern Queensland. He also holds numerous industry certifications. He has proven experience in Security Operations Management and Security Service Delivery Management in large, complex and challenging environments.

Melissa is Head of Cyber Insurance and Partner at Lander & Rogers. Melissa regularly provides incident response management services and advises on privacy issues arising out of cyber incidents. Melissa also advises on complex coverage issues, cyber recoveries, regulatory investigations, as well as acting in disputes arising from cyber incidents. Melissa also acts as coverage and monitoring counsel on significant and high-profile cyber incidents. Melissa has been awarded the Royal Melbourne Institute of Technology (RMIT) University credential for Cybersecurity Risk and Strategy. Melissa has also been recognised by Lawyerly as a Litigation Rising Star, Insurance Business Australia as a Young Gun, and Australasian Lawyer as a Litigation and Dispute Resolution Rising Star. Melissa regularly provides in-house training for clients and market participants on cyber issues.

As an information security leader and expert, Sam Fariborz strongly believes in people on top of processes and tools. With more than 12 years experience in the information technology industry and cybersecurity, Sam plans and designs security measures, controls and solutions. She makes it her mission to help companies in lifting up their information security and cyber resiliency posture.

Eoin Healy is on the coalface of cybercrime. A Senior Threat Researcher for BlackBerry’s Threat Intelligence team, Eoin is based in Sydney Australia, but part of a global network of experts providing governments and the private sector with the latest insights on new and emerging threats. . Originally from Cork, Ireland, his work is primarily focused on tracking cybercrime and advanced persistent threats (APTs) globally.

Prior to working directly in Threat Intelligence, Eoin worked in BlackBerry’s Applied Research team where he spent most of his time focused on developing countermeasures related to Endpoint Detection and Response. He is passionate about Threat Intelligence, Reverse Engineering and Windows Internals, with previous experience presenting at BlackHat and other major cybersecurity conferences.

Eoin attended Munster Technological University and holds an MSc in Cybersecurity.

A highly skilled security professional with vast experience in incident response management, security operations engineering, and cloud security. Taiye has a Master's degree in Cybersecurity and has obtained many industry recognised certifications including CISSP, CCSP, SSCP, CCSK, AWS Security, and AWS Solution Architect. Taiye is an expert in the field and known for delivering top-quality security solutions.

As an incident response lead, Taiye delivered several incident response services, including developing incident response playbooks, plans, standards, and facilitating tabletop exercises with business leaders. Taiye has strong technical skills, which he utilizes to lead the implementation of security controls and architect technical strategies in the cloud.

Taiye's passion for helping others succeed in cybersecurity is demonstrated by his part-time Teaching Assistant role for cybersecurity bootcamps at Monash University.

Andrew Jackson leads Cyber Response and Digital Forensics for the NSW Department of Education. With 20 years of experience working in various industries, across the public and private sectors, Andrew is a seasoned cybersecurity professional who has a knack for thinking creatively and outside the box.

Andrew's recent focus has been on combining his technical expertise with his passion for cyber education and awareness. He's been known to captivate audiences with his real-life accounts of cyber security incidents, while also providing easy-to-understand advice for audiences to take away. When not busy leading cyber responses, Andrew is pursuing his Master of Cyber Security degree at the University of New South Wales, as well as spending time on a hobby of his, repairing upright pianos.

I am working as a Senior Cloud Security Specialist with Telstra. I have more than 17 years of experience in Security field, out of which 3 years in Cloud Security specifically. In my present role of Sr. Cloud Security Specialist – I am responsible for assessment, testing and deployment of security toolsets, develop security & governance and compliance visibility across Telstra public cloud platforms. In past, I worked as a Senior Network Security Engineer and responsible for designing, testing, implementation and roll out of security capabilities across on-prem platforms. I did many Networking certification in past but recently did few security certification like CCSP, CISSP , AWS Security Speciality, AWS Solution Architect Associate.

James works as a Security Strategist within the SURGe team at Splunk. He calls Brisbane, Australia home and has spent much of his career supporting the state law enforcement and emergency services. When he's not solving problems in Python, he's being "that guy" about how Rust avoids the bugs of the past, or contributing to open source projects. He claims it's rarely DNS.

Meagan McClendon (they/them/she/her) is a non-binary individual working in GRC as a Principal Security Advisor in Canberra. They are an Associate of (ISC)2 and lead the LGBTQIA+ Stream for Trustwave PAC's D&I Group. They are passionate about building a more inclusive environment for folks who are not "traditionally" seen within the Information Security Industry. Meagan believes that cultural change needs to come from leadership, but also through grassroots movements and support.

Iona Luke is an experienced legal, compliance and governance professional. She has broad experience advising financial services businesses on governance, regulatory and transactional matters. Her external consultancy and in-house legal and compliance experience give her a practical perspective in assisting clients to achieve their goals.

Iona is a committee member of the Australian Society for Computers & Law’s Cyber Risk and Governance Committee. She is a Graduate of the Australian Institute of Company Directors (GAICD) with experience as a non-executive director, a Fellow of the Governance Institute of Australia (FGIA) and degree qualified in Master of Information Technolog

Dr Mohamed Elyas is a research fellow at the Cyber Security Research and Innovation Centre, Holmes Institute. His area of expertise revolves around the security and privacy of the Internet of Things, with a particular focus on strategy, governance and policy. Dr Elyas has led various research projects and produced educational materials with an aim to raise the public awareness of IoT security and privacy.

Adam is a seasoned entrepreneur with over two decades of experience in founding and managing innovative online businesses. With a strong focus on network security, Adam has worked extensively in the online security and hosting industry.

Adam began his career at Netregistry in 1999, where he spent 14 years rising through the ranks to become the CTO of Australia's largest hosting and domain provider. During his tenure, he was instrumental in the development of platforms for automation and management of domain registrations, service management, and payment gateways. Adam also designed and managed Australia's first clustered cloud hosting platform, overseeing one of the nation's largest email and web hosting infrastructures across multiple data centres.

In 2010, Adam co-founded eCompanies, a platform for online business formation that quickly grew into Australia's third-largest company registration platform by volume. The platform was acquired by InfoTrack in 2017.

In 2017, Adam co-founded Peakhour.io, a company focused on delivering critical security, performance, and reliability to online businesses. Given his extensive experience in network security and his understanding of the risks and threats posed by online proxies, Adam's expertise is vital in shaping Peakhour.io's approach to delivering the fastest, safest, and best customer service experience online.

Joanna McCarthy is a Senior Director at Morrow Sodali , a leading global stakeholder communication and engagement firm where she leads the Crisis & Issues Management and Cyber response function.

With over 20 years’ experience Joanna is a trusted advisor to CEOs and leaders on sensitive, complex projects and issues across most sectors including Healthcare, Government, Consumer Products, Technology and Financial Services.

Joanna was a founding member of the Security Crisis and Emergency Management Team and the COVID-19 Taskforce at Transport for NSW where she was a strategic communications advisor. The COVID-19 crisis work was adopted in the US and UK governments and has been awarded locally and internationally.

Bethany is a time served information governance professional, passionate and energetic about assisting organisations to better manage their risks, relating to cyber security by championing effective information governance. Her career spans 3 decades, two continents and she brings a wealth of practical experience and knowledge to the table. Bethany is a Principal Consultant at Votar Partners, a small boutique information governance consultancy, specialising in assisting firms with their cyber security, information governance and information management challenges. With a PhD in archives, postgraduate qualifications in marketing and communications, public administration and archival administration, as well as being a PROSCI Change Management champion, she is exceedingly well qualified and enjoys sessional teaching at Curtin University. She works closely with industry organisations (including RIMPA Global for whom she is a nominated Victorian Ambassador) to promote more effective ways of managing information to achieve cyber security compliance and mitigate risk.

Anna-Lena Naumann is a Cyber Security Strategy Advisor with expertise in SIEM/SOC, ISIM, Vulnerability Management, Governance and Regulation, and Security Reporting. She is passionate about raising awareness for security at a C-Suit level and ensuring it becomes an integral part of organisation’s overall strategy.

Prakriti works as a Security Engineer at AGL Energy where she helps secure their Digital, Retail and Cloud Initiatives. She has curated security generalist experience across multiple disciplines, including Vulnerability and Threat Analysis, Security Operations Engineering, and Cloud Security. One of her strong suits is combining her cyber knowledge with strong programming and analytical skills that have helped her bring value through automated dashboards to address security visibility concerns in organisations that she’s been a part of.

Prakriti holds a Masters in Networks and Security from Monash University. She is an ardent learner in her full-time role and a passionate teacher in her part-time job as a tutor at her alma mater. She continues to give back to the cyber-learning community as a mentor under the Betty Amsden Foundation.

Simone specialises in cyber risk management and education, professional liability and insurance. With a passion for empowering others to protect themselves from cybercrime, she provides legal advice for those impacted by cyber events, and she is the author and presenter of online courses, webinars, in-person presentations and cyber incident tabletop exercises providing practical cyber risk resilience guidance.

Simone was named Innovator of the year at the 2022 Women in Law Awards and is again a finalist in 2023 in the Thought Leadership category. Simone has also given written expert opinion in Supreme Court proceedings involving payment redirection fraud.

Paresh Kerai is an OT Cybersecurity Specialist with exida, leading OT security engagement, managing the technical aspect of the technology transformation and threat and risk modelling, and cybersecurity training for exida clients.

Over 15 years of cyber security, enterprise environments and industrial control system experience, where he has consulted for various organisations, both in the private and government sectors. Passionate about threat intelligence, threat hunting, computer and network forensics, architecture transformation, threat modelling, and OT security

Oakley is a cyber security researcher with an interest in the application of artificial intelligence to manage cyber risk. His research has been published in peer-reviewed journals and by the US Government Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA). In 2022 he was a delegate on a UK Government GEM (Global Expert Mission) to Australia, during which he collaborated with stakeholders in Government, academia and business to understand innovation and the cyber security landscape in Australia. He has presented at multiple conferences and events including the Gartner Information and Risk Management Summit in Sydney, the SANS ICS Summit in Florida, and the Future of Cyber Security Europe in London.

During his PhD, Oakley’s research into the applications of computational chemistry for drug discovery was published in Chemical Science (impact factor 9.0) and has since been cited over 100 times. The work continues to be used as part of the XChem facility at public-private innovation campus at Diamond Light Source, UK.

Since joining Darktrace as as a Cyber Analyst in 2017, Oakley has played a key role in the development of new threat detections for OT (Operational Technology) networks. After leading a team of Cyber Analysts at the Cambridge headquarters, he relocated to New Zealand in 2022 where he is responsible for the defence of critical infrastructure and industrial control systems across the APAC region. His research into cyber-physical security continues to support internal R&D, help to solve complex problems for customers, and contribute to the wider cyber security community. Oakley is GIAC certified in Response and Industrial Defense (GRID), and has a Doctorate (PhD) from the University of Oxford.

Katherine is the Executive Director of Cyber Intelligence at CyberCX, leading a team uniquely focused on Australia and New Zealand’s cyber threat landscape. Concurrent to this role, she’s a senior fellow at the Australian National University’s National Security College. Katherine regularly briefs boards, senior government and military officials on complex security and technology matters. She commentates in the media and has testified before parliamentary committees. Previously, Katherine held posts at think tanks in Canberra, Washington, DC and at Harvard University. Before that, she was an adviser to a federal cabinet minister, commercial solicitor, and served as a judge’s associate in the High Court of Australia. Katherine holds a Masters in Public Policy and Bachelors of Laws / International Relations.

Jonathan has over two decades experience helping organisations across APAC and EMEA deal with the ever-evolving cyber threats across multiple sectors – including energy, health, critical infrastructure, finance, legal and government. This includes leading regular advisories to boards and executives on how to manage, predict and prevent the threats to IoT, networks, applications, endpoints and people. He specialises in cybersecurity, threat intelligence and digital forensics.

An accomplished Cybersecurity leader with over 20 years’ experience in technology and security management focused roles. Asaf’s experience was gained in a range of industries and international roles (Europe, US, Asia and Australia) that required technical skills as well as risk management leadership and stakeholders’ management capabilities. Asaf has a proven track record of leading and transforming technology initiatives and aligning Cybersecurity and technology capabilities with business strategy. Asaf has wide ranging international Information Technology management experience within industry gained in different roles within the Energy, Finance (Trading), Information Technology, Higher Education and e-commerce sectors. Currently as a part of an academic stint, Asaf lectures at the University of Sydney business school in Information Systems related subjects. He is also a PhD candidate, leading a multi-year research project on Cybersecurity Governance. Asaf is a graduate of the MScBA in Business Information Management from the Rotterdam School of Management at the Erasmus University. He also carries industry leading certifications in Cybersecurity (CISSP), Audit (CISA), Governance (CGEIT), Risk management (CRISC) and Enterprise Architecture (TOGAF).

Bella is an award-winning senior lawyer working for the social services and community health care sector. She has extensive experience in working with government entities, communities, all levels of management and boards on cyber security and its legislative requirements. Bella will share insights on where the law maker is heading in the foreseeable future and what and how an individual can best prepare themselves for compliance.

Melissa is an award-winning freelance security awareness and culture specialist and coach. She specialises in cyber security culture programs through effective education and change management. With over 9 years’ experience, Melissa has delivered over 50 programs to Australian and international clients across finance, property, higher education, insurance, and government.

Elena Scifleet is a Cyber Education Lead at Alpha Echo, a cybersecurity company in Newcastle. Her role involves creating engaging cyber training to upskill the workforce and make a positive cyberculture change for her clients. Elena has been a part of the IT professional industry and educator for the last 20 years and has been securing environments even before cybersecurity was a hot topic. With various technical and non-technical roles under her belt, Elena has been a key contributor to the curriculum of CyberCX Academy, an industry-led initiative that has achieved major success in growing over 160+ new cybersecurity professionals. Elena is very passionate about cyber security and works hard to demystify the concepts and make them accessible to all. Through her work and volunteering, she is striving to increase diversity in the cybersecurity field. Elena is also a firm believer in lifelong learning, a critical skill in a fast-paced industry like cybersecurity and has just graduated from Charles Sturt University with a Master's in Cyber Security with a postgraduate medal.

Cory Keating (they/them) is a non-binary risk and security professional, with prior experience in government, and currently working at ANZ Bank as a payments assurance manager. They actively contribute to the ANZ Pride and Diversity & Inclusion working groups, and participated in the advertising campaign covering the release of Mx and Non-binary options for customer products, sharing their lived experiences as a non-binary person.

Harriet Farlow is the CEO at Mileva Security Labs and a PhD Candidate in Machine Learning Security at UNSW Canberra. She missed the boat on computer hacking so now she hacks AI and Machine Learning models instead. With a passion for bridging technical and non-technical disciplines, Harriet’s professional experience spans consulting, academia, start-ups and Government. She has worked and lived in the UK and the USA. She holds a Bachelor of Science in Physics and Bio-anthropology, and a Master of Cyber Security, Strategy and Diplomacy.