Over the past four and a half years, cybersecurity has become one of the top priorities at the Department of Homeland Security. Today, I am pleased to announce the appointment of Phyllis Schneck as the new Deputy Under Secretary for Cybersecurity for the National Protection and Programs Directorate (NPPD). Phyllis will be coming to the Department of Homeland Security from her current position as Vice President and Chief Technology Officer for the Global Public Sector at McAfee, Inc. with a wealth of experience in cybersecurity and information security.
For more than 14 years, Phyllis has had a distinguished presence in the security and infrastructure protection community, most recently as a key contributor on the CSIS Commission on Cybersecurity for the 44th Presidency. Phyllis is the current Chairman of the Board of Directors of the National Cyber Forensics and Training Alliance, a partnership between corporations, government and law enforcement for cyber analysis to combat international cyber crime. Phyllis has also served as the Chairman of the NIST Information Security and Privacy Advisory Board, which helps identify emerging managerial, technical, administrative, and physical safeguard issues relative to information security and privacy.
Before joining McAfee, Phyllis held various senior and information science positions at Research Integration for Secure Computing, eCommSecurity, SecureWorks, Inc., Avalon Communications, CygnaCom Solutions, the MITRE Corporation, Computer Sciences Corporation, IBM, NASA and the University Of Maryland.
Phyllis has been a close partner in our cybersecurity mission for many years. She served for eight years as chairman of the FBI’s InfraGard National Board of Directors and founding president of InfraGard Atlanta, growing the InfraGard program to over 30,000 members nationwide in the past decade, and fostering a relationship between InfraGard and DHS. Equally impressive, Phyllis holds three patents in high-performance and adaptive information security, and has six research publications in the areas of information security, real-time systems, telecom and software engineering.
During my tenure as Secretary, we have strengthened partnerships with the private sector to secure cyber networks and protect physical assets while developing a world-class cybersecurity workforce. In fact, the position of Deputy Under Secretary for Cybersecurity was created in 2011 to act as the Department’s chief cybersecurity policy official, in recognition of the growing importance of cybersecurity to DHS’ mission of strengthening the security and resilience of our nation's critical infrastructure. I am confident that Phyllis will continue these efforts, and build upon the foundations laid by her predecessors, to create a safe, secure and resilient cyber environment and promote cybersecurity knowledge and innovation.