Name: Rob Karas
Title: Director, National Cybersecurity Assessments and Technical Services
Agency/Company: Department of Homeland Security
Speed tester. It’s one thing to conduct a dozen penetration tests on high-value government assets in one year, but conducting 53 such tests in 100 days requires the leadership of someone like Karas. In May 2016, the Office of Management and Budget asked NCATS to do just that. Karas and his team had already developed a scorecard, vulnerability tracker and dashboard for identifying and mitigating critical vulnerabilities. Karas led efforts to modify those tools and procedures so DHS could fulfill OMB’s request. The resulting products have improved DHS’ ability to determine the network security status of any federal agency.
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