Creating Connections: Bringing order through chaos.

Staying Connected

By Jennifer Eiben, The CyberWire

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It's November! Seems like a bit of a time warp since the pandemic was just beginning and many of us were meeting up at conferences like RSAC talking about our exciting plans for the year. Now, we are in the thick of it with no definite end in sight and our meetups are either virtual or very small and socially distanced. It's hard and yet I notice that we are able to connect in new and different ways. In fact, I have found myself connecting with even more people than I regularly did prior to the pandemic. While it has been a challenge to explore creative events and ways to carry on networking and conversations beyond traditional face to face, it's helped us widen our circles and get to know many more women in the cybersecurity industry.

Stay tuned to a very exciting development coming about that our team actually discussed while walking down the street in San Francisco back to our hotel from a long day at RSAC. We will be introducing a new way to get to know women in cybersecurity and for them to share their expertise with a wider audience. I'm looking forward to sharing more with you in the near future. In the meantime, please feel free to contact me should you have ideas for staying connected. We are always looking for new and innovative ways to highlight the work that women do in our industry. Have a great November!

Read a good article relating to Women in Cyber recently? We’d love to hear about it! Please email us with the link and we may feature it in our next newsletter.

Featured Cyber Women

Bringing Order through CHAOS: A Framework for Understanding Russian Cyber Operations and Disinformation during the 2020 U.S. Elections and Beyond

By Bilyana Lilly, RAND Corporation. Follow her on Twitter @BilyanaLilly.

With a few days left before the U.S. presidential election, U.S. government agencies and social media companies are taking steps to enhance U.S. resilience and defend democracy against another episode of Russian interference. These efforts address only some aspects of Russia’s playbook, which is multidimensional and continuously applied. To visualize the main elements of Russia’s playbook and enable the discovery of patterns in Russia’s behavior across cases, this article offers a framework that can bring order to the chaos of Russia’s activities, through CHAOS (Cyber, Hype, and Associated OperationS). This framework may serve to draw predictions about what to expect during and after the 2020 U.S. elections and in future Russian interference. CHAOS can also facilitate improvements in policy to address each activity. Read the full article.

Would you like to be featured in a future issue of the Creating Connections newsletter? We are currently accepting submissions for pieces written by women, about women, and information on women in cyber related events. Simply reply to this email to get started.

More Women and Minorities Needed in Cybersecurity

By Teresa Shea, Raytheon Intelligence & Space.

The lack of female and minority representation within cybersecurity is nothing new. It is clear that the cyber field requires creative thinking and diversity brings that talent to the table. While recruitment and retention efforts should be a priority in the near-term, looking ahead, we must close the cyber talent gap early-on by creating our own talent. We’re seeing progress with inaugural educational facilities like the Alabama School of Cyber Technology and Engineering (ASCTE), which is recruiting diverse students and granting them access to cybersecurity mentors at a young age. If others follow suit, we can develop the next generation of security leaders that is diverse and prepared for future challenges. Read the full article.

A new addition and highlights from the CyberWire’s Career Notes podcast

By Jennifer Eiben, The CyberWire

Kelsea usually contributes this part, however, she had a bit of an early departure on a planned maternity leave. The CyberWire team would like to welcome a new member to our family; Kelsea had a healthy baby boy, Charlie, a few weeks ago! Please join us in welcoming Baby Charlie to our ranks.

In last month's Creating Connections issue, Kelsea shared how Bilyanna Lily’s episode of Career Notes inspired her to get into a binge-fest of all our Career Notes episodes, specifically the ones that featured women in cybersecurity and their career paths. I'm taking up the baton from Kelsea here to share about a few of the women we featured. I am going to choose two that are not technical cybersecurity professionals, as that is how I see myself as I have an economics and policy background.

Kathleen Booth had early dreams of acting that morphed into goals of making the world a better place. As a cybersecurity marketing professional, she shares how she sees that proving your worth can lead to success. Favorite quote: “So whether it's marketing or cybersecurity or whatever it is, if you're just getting started and you want to pursue it, you know, don't take no for an answer and be willing to do anything that gets you in.”

Elizabeth Wharton is a technology lawyer and talks about how she always liked solving problems and Nancy Drew mysteries, but not litigation. She shared how she loves planning and strategy in her work and encourages others to ask questions and absorb all of the information. Favorite quote: “We didn't get to where we are without the help of others. And so I'd just like to add strong shoulders for someone else to stand on and help reach their heights."

Women on the CyberWire

Krystle Portocarrero from Juniper Networks on the continued rise of encryption and the technical and privacy challenges that come with it on the Daily Podcast and Interview Selects.

Diane M. Janosek, Commandant for the National Security Agency's National Cryptologic, on Career Notes.

Betsy Carmelite from Booz Allen discusses threats to telehealth platforms on the Daily Podcast.

Rosa Smothers, Senior VP of Cyber Operations at KnowBe4, on Career Notes.

Jessica Gulick from Katczy with a visit to the Cyber Carnival Games on the Daily Podcast.

Carolyn Crandall from Attivo Networks with a look at the market for cyber deception tools on the Daily Podcast.

Jadee Hanson from Code 42 on juggling priorities and protecting her organization as external and internal threats constantly take aim on the Daily Podcast.

Bilyana Lilly from RAND on Russia’s strategic messaging on social media (and the disinformation that may be a part of it) on the Daily Podcast.

Carole Theriault from TickTock Social and. Smashing Security appeared on Career Notes.

Events

Global Summit for Women in Tech, Law & Policy (Online, Nov 4 - 6, 2020) Over the course of this week, we will host a combination of on-demand and live sessions featuring women leaders in tech, law and policy. Each day will also include live networking opportunities and virtual activities to allow attendees to get to know each other socially. For more details, click the link below!

Day of Shecurity (Boston, Massachusetts, USA, Nov 6, 2020) A one-day conference advocating the inclusion of women & diversification of cybersecurity

She Summit (Online, Nov 9 - 13, 2020) Since 2012, S.H.E. Summit has been connecting, educating and activating new generation of leaders--and celebrated for our innovative and holistic approach. Women, men and all attendees will depart with replenished energy, personal breakthroughs, clearer vision, and powerful tools to propel your success on an organizational and personal level for 2021 and beyond.

National Cybersecurity Career Awareness Week (Online, Nov 9 - 14, 2020) Take out your digital devices and join others in sharing your short videos, pictures, or stories on social media about what you love most about #mycyberjob. Throughout the week we are challenging those who work in cybersecurity to reflect on their own workforce experiences. Help spread cybersecurity career awareness by participating in our #mycyberjob challenge. Share at least one reason you love your job in cybersecurity each day of the week between November 9-14th. We can’t wait to see your posts! Make sure to include the hashtag: #mycyberjob.

Vogue Codes Summit (Online, Nov 10 - 11, 2020) Technology touches more roles and careers than ever before and continues to open up new areas of opportunity. The 2020 Vogue Codes Summit will explore technology as a force for good, how to create a culture of inclusion, and career-defining moments from top Australian business women.

Pennsylvania Conference for Women (Online, Nov 11, 2020) The Pennsylvania Conference for Women is a one-day professional and personal development event for women that features more than 100 renowned speakers sharing inspirational stories and leading seminars on the issues that matter most to women.

WiCyS Webinar: Equity & Diversity: Allyship and Beyond (Online, Nov 12, 2020) At Amazon, representation matters because we know Equity and Diversity is important in helping us build better for our customers, employees, and community. Join us to hear personal stories from our panelists on how they support representation within and beyond the workplace as allies.

Women|Future Conference (Online, Nov 12 - 13, 2020) The Women|Future Conference encourages engaging connections, professional and personal development, and health and financial wellness through keynotes, educational sessions, and networking. From aspiring business professionals to entrepreneurs to executives, this evolving event features movers and shakers like you, looking to Cultivate their Tomorrow.

Hack the Building (Annapolis, Maryland, USA, Nov 16 - 19, 2020) There are an estimated 2.5 million unique ICS systems that are used in over 300,000 buildings and over 250,000 linear structures. This Maryland Innovation & Security Institute and DreamPort event is inspired by a DoD request for an offensive and defenseive exercise that demonstrates the impact of IT, IoT and OT cyber attacks against critical building automation and mission operations.

Women in Technology World Series Online Festival (Online, Nov 16 - 20, 2020) 10,000+ female tech professionals and diversity advocates from across the globe will unite at The Women in Technology World Series Online Festival this November. Join this week-long festival to celebrate the power of resilience amongst female tech professionals as we shine a light on the transformative tech engineered by women of all diverse backgrounds across the world.

Day in the Life Series Webinar (Online, Nov 18, 2020) Have you ever wanted to know what is involved in a particular Cybersecurity role? Unsure of what to expect day to day in a specific role? With so many resources available, we decided to go right to the source. Join us for Day in the Life with cyber professionals. Each month we will dive into various cyber roles and hear from those actually working in the field. Bring your questions and your ears for these conversations. Speaker be announced soon!

Women in Tech Festival UK (London, United Kingdom, Nov 30 - Dec 1, 2020) Computing and CRN will be hosting an online festival: Women in Tech Festival UK will provide two-days of carefully selected motivational keynotes, case studies, panel discussions and mentoring. Our industry leaders will cut through the smoke and mirrors to encourage women to step out of their comfort zone and make achieving the ‘next step’ a reality, not a dream. Alongside this will be our remote fringe events such as mindfulness, yoga, zen den, nutrition zone and more to be announced.

Perspektywy Women in Tech Summit (Online, Dec 1 - 2, 2020) The Perspektywy Women in Tech Summit is the biggest meeting of women in technology, female inventors, innovators, IT students, start-up founders and high profile representatives of high-tech industry, community leaders and policy makers in Eastern-Central Europe and Central Asia. Last year’s edition brought together over 6 300 participants from 52 countries.

Women in Cloud Summit 2021 (Redmond, Washington, USA, Jan 30, 2021) The Women in Cloud Summit is a one-day, life-changing event for women tech entrepreneurs, corporate and community leaders, policy makers, and allies from around the globe. Women are key drivers of economic growth, and the Summit strives to change the industry narrative by creating economic access for women in the cloud economy.

Selected Reading

The importance of women in cybersecurity for innovation, investment and enrichment (Security Boulevard) Of those companies in the Fortune 500 with three or more women in leading positions 66 percent saw an increase in ROI, found Women Who Tech. Since then, as we fly through 2020 into the new decade, women are becoming an ever-more prevalent and disruptive force within the tech market – particularly cybersecurity. In almost seven years I have worked in the cybersecurity sector with Trusted Computing Group (TCG), I have witnessed first-hand the enrichment their work has brought to the perspective of the industry, and how this has diversified its strategies for a more successful industry position.

Naval Academy officially opens new cyber building named after Rear Adm. Grace Hopper (Capital Gazette) Rear Adm. Carl Lahti remembers meeting Rear Adm. Grace Hopper as a plebe. She gave a lecture at Mitscher Hall, during which she handed out pieces of nanowire, including to Lahti. That was 34 years ago, Lahti said Thursday, as he stood in front of the Naval Academy’s latest building.

Grace Hopper: Science Hero, Role Model (SecurityRoundtable.org) One of my favorite computer science heroes is Rear Admiral Grace Hopper. She stands as the perfect role model for anybody in the tech industry today, but especially for women. She studied math early on and got her Ph.D from Yale 30 years before Yale accepted women as students. She joined the Navy at the age of 38, when WWII began, and was one of two women to work on a 13-person team during the war to calculate ballistic solutions on one of the early computers, called the Mark I. She was second in command.

Diversity metrics incentivize inclusion, but bring potential pitfalls (SC Media) Diversity metrics can help provide businesses the impetus they need to create a more inclusive cyber workforce, but organizations must not allow these metrics to limit their thinking about what constitutes diversity, warned a panel of security experts Wednesday.

5 minutes with Joan Pepin – Diversity in cybersecurity (Security Magazine) As CSO of Auth0, Joan Pepin is responsible for the holistic security and compliance of the company's platform, products, and corporate environment. Here, we talk to Pepin, who has focused her time on mentoring and advocating for women in cybersecurity and technology, working to reconstruct the notion that women should only work within their bounds, and encouraging women to reach higher and challenge the status quo.

Exclusive: Halcyon, AWS launch tech incubator for female founders in Middle East (Washington Business Journal) It's not the first teaming up for the local nonprofit and Amazon subsidiary.

Department of Defense and National Security Agency announce new cybersecurity initiative aiming to close the cybersecurity talent gap (NSA) The Department of Defense and the National Security Agency and Department of Defense announced the kickoff of a new workforce development program that redefines the academic path to a successful career in cybersecurity.

Fact Sheet for Cybersecurity Education Diversity Initiative (CEDI) (MISI) MISI and is proud to partner with the NSA, DoD OSBP, the MISI Academy, the MISI DreamPort program, Excelsior College and Fordham University and their partners in support of Minority Institutions and the next generation of cyber warriors.

Women in Cyber: How ManTech is Making a Difference (MeriTalk) MeriTalk recently connected with ManTech’s Seana McMoil, Senior Executive Director, National Cybersecurity Programs, on how the coronavirus pandemic has impacted agencies’ cyber defense plans, and the importance of raising awareness of women in cybersecurity as October is National Cybersecurity Awareness month.

Women in cybersecurity (CyberNews) You’ve probably heard about the cybersecurity skills shortage. That’s undoubtedly a severe problem in itself, but there’s a related issue — the under-representation of females in the sector. Let’s take a look at some relevant findings about women in cybersecurity and the need for more workforce diversity.

UWF to announce major cybersecurity workforce development initiative (University of West Florida Newsroom) The University of West Florida will host a virtual press conference to make a major announcement regarding cybersecurity workforce development. Speakers include: UWF President Martha D. Saunders; Diane M. Janosek, Commandant, National Security Agency’s National Cryptologic School; Dr. George Ellenberg, UWF Provost and Senior Vice President; and Dr. Eman El-Sheikh, Director of the UWF […]

Treat the Whole Patient: Cybersecurity Amid COVID-19 (ISACA) Treat the whole patient. Public health practitioners have long known that the symptoms a patient presents in the doctor’s office tell only a portion of the story.

Women less likely to receive retention pay at NSA (Federal Times) The National Security Agency's program for offering retention incentives to critical personnel did not have needed oversight or goals, according to the agency's inspector general.

Women in the News

Laughton Joins Coalfire's Growing Ranks Of Top Women Cyber Executives (PR Newswire) Coalfire, a provider of cybersecurity advisory and assessment services, today announced the promotion of Karen Laughton to vice president, FedRAMP assurance services (Federal Risk and Authorization Management Program). Laughton will lead the security industry's most-experienced assessor and cloud advisory teams in building FedRAMP-compliant environments, guiding clients through government standards transitions, and achieving rapid ATO (Authority to Operate) certification.

Female CISOs lead global enterprises through unprecedented change (SC Media) When the pandemic pushed state workers in Colorado home, the state’s security department “became the heroes,” said Deborah Blyth, chief information security officer of State of Colorado.

After breach, Twitter hires a new cybersecurity chief (TechCrunch) Following a high-profile breach in July, Twitter has hired Rinki Sethi as its new chief information security officer.

EHNAC Appoints Healthcare Leader as Commissioner to Governing Body (Yahoo) "Cyberattacks have exposed the security vulnerabilities of our nation's most trusted financial, consumer and healthcare institutions and continue to pose a serious threat.

USGIF’s New CEO … She Enjoys a Promotion (SatNews) The United States Geospatial Intelligence Foundation (USGIF) Board of Directors (BOD) has elected Ronda Schrenk to serve as chief executive officer.

The Unsinkable Maddie Stone, Google's Bug-Hunting Badass (Wired) The Project Zero reverse engineer shuts down some of the world's most dangerous exploits—along with antiquated hacker stereotypes.

KnowBe4’s VP of SMB Sales Brittany Scott Wins Silver in the 13th Annual 2020 Women in Business and the Professions World Awards® (PRWeb) KnowBe4 announced today that Women World Awards has named Brittany Scott, VP of SMB Sales a Silver winner in the 13th Annual 2020 Women in Business and th

Michelle Sutphin Joins SAIC as Chief Security Officer (WashingtonExec) Technology integrator Science Applications International Corp. announced Michelle Sutphin has joined as chief security officer. In her new role, Sutphin

Computing announces the shortlist of the Women in Tech Excellence Awards (Computing) With many hundreds of high-quality submissions received, Computing has chosen the shortlist for the coveted Women in Tech Awards. Is your name on the list?

Deep Instinct appoints Heather Bellini as CFO (Help Net Security) Deep Instinct announced that Heather Bellini will join as CFO to further the company’s accelerating growth path.

One Last Thing

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