Speaker Bios
Updated 2025-06-14
Bios are listed in order of appearance on the agenda.
Rob McHenry
Rob McHenry is the deputy director of the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA). He rejoined DARPA in September 2022 after serving as founder and chief executive officer of Bright Silicon Technologies, an optical microdevice manufacturing company. McHenry has been an executive leader of organizations at the forefront of advanced technology development. He began his career as a nuclear submarine officer in the U.S. Navy, serving aboard the USS Portsmouth (SSN 707) and as a special assistant to the Chief of Naval Operations.
Upon leaving military service, he supported DARPA, including technical development for the DARPA Grand Challenge for Unmanned Ground Vehicles, and managed a consulting firm where he served as director of future development for the Littoral Combat Ship program.
From 2007 to 2012, McHenry was a program manager in DARPA's Tactical Technology Office, where he focused on complex autonomous systems in the maritime domain. His research in self-deploying unmanned ships (Sea Hunter) developed the first class of maritime vessels traveling long distances autonomously for months at a time. He also started the Long-Range Anti-Ship Missile program, which is a foundational breakthrough in autonomous weapons, and successfully transitioned to the U.S. Navy as a program of record.
McHenry worked from 2012 until 2020 at the Palo Alto Research Center (PARC), where he held the roles of energy technology program manager, vice president of public sector operations, chief operating officer, and executive-in-residence for the founding of a new business unit for advanced materials manufacturing. He serves on the board of trustees of the USS Hornet Sea, Air, and Space Museum in Alameda, Calif., and is the coinventor of six patents for energy and optical systems.
Alexei Bulazel
Alexei Bulazel serves as Special Assistant to the President and Senior Director for Cyber at the National Security Council (NSC). He is a cyber policy and technology expert with extensive experience in the U.S. government and private sector, including roles as Director on the NSC staff, Senior Security Researcher at Apple, and Security Architect at Oracle. He also previously served as a non-resident senior fellow at the Foundation for American Innovation and as Hacker In Residence at NYU Tandon School of Engineering. Alexei has presented research on software reverse engineering and vulnerabilities in antivirus software at numerous venues and has published peer-reviewed academic papers at the USENIX Workshop on Offensive Technology (WOOT) and the Reversing and Offensive-oriented Trends Symposium (ROOTS).
John Hultquist
John Hultquist is Chief Analyst at Google Threat Intelligence Group. John has over 20 years of experience in intelligence and special operations, principally covering emerging threats in cyber espionage. His team found and first publicly exposed the Russian threat actor best known as Sandworm. John is the founder of CYBERWARCON and SLEUTHCON, and he teaches at Johns Hopkins University. John is also a veteran of the U.S. Army.
Col. Richard Leach
Army Col. Richard Leach is the director of Defense Information Systems Agency's J-2 Intelligence Directorate. He is responsible for coordination, collaboration, and integration of intelligence across the combatant commands and intelligence community to enhance DISA's information needs.
As an Army reservist, Leach held a variety of roles in the military, government, and industry before joining DISA. Before being activated, Leach was a division chief under the Risk Management Directorate, and chair of the DoD Security and Cybersecurity Authorization Working Group (DSAWG). During his last military assignment, Leach was the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency headquarters, U.S. Army Reserve detachment officer in charge, where he supported disaster and emergency response communications. From 2018 to 2020, he served at U.S. Cyber Command as the J-2 for Joint Task Force-ARES, supporting cyber operations against global violent extremist organizations. In addition to his intelligence background, Leach also holds a secondary area of concentration as a 26B information systems engineer. He served as the chief systems engineer for the 335th Theater Signal Command in Kuwait in 2017. Other operational assignments include the National Ground Intelligence Center and tactical assignments within Afghanistan and Iraq. Leach was commissioned through ROTC in 1996.
He earned a bachelor's degree in justice, cum laude, from the University of Alaska, Fairbanks, and is working on a master's degree from the College of Information and Cyberspace at the National Defense University in Washington, D.C. He holds certifications as CISSP, CASP, SEC+, AWS foundations, and ITIL 4. His military awards include two Bronze Stars, a Defense Meritorious Service Medal, a Joint Service Commendation Medal, and other service and campaign medals.
Kathleen Fisher
Kathleen Fisher, PhD, assumed the role of office director for DARPA's Information Innovation Office (I2O) in May 2022. In this position, she leads program managers who fund the development of programs, technologies, and capabilities to ensure an information advantage for the United States and its allies. She coordinates this work across the Department of Defense and the U.S. government.
Fisher was previously the deputy office director for I2O from October 2021 to April 2022. This is Fisher's second tour at DARPA, having previously served as a program manager in I2O from 2011 to 2014. As a program manager, she conceptualized, created, and executed programs in high-assurance computing and machine learning. Her High-Assurance Cyber Military Systems (HACMS) and Probabilistic Programming for Advancing Machine Learning (PPAML) programs continue to benefit the Department of Defense and U.S. commercial industry. Fisher joined DARPA from Tufts University, where she was a professor in the Department of Computer Science, and served as chair of the department from 2016 to 2021. Earlier in her career, she was a principal member of the technical staff at AT&T Labs.
She is an AAAS fellow, an ACM fellow, and a Hertz Foundation fellow. Fisher has served as chair of the ACM Special Interest Group in Programming Languages (SIGPLAN) and as program chair for three of SIGPLAN's marquee conferences: PLDI, OOPSLA, and ICFP. She has also served as an associate editor for TOPLAS and as an editor of the Journal of Functional Programming. Fisher was co-chair of the Computing Research Association's Committee on the Status of Women (CRA-W) for three years, and she co-founded SIGPLAN's Programming Language Mentoring Workshop (PLMW) series. Fisher is a recipient of the SIGPLAN Distinguished Service Award. She is a past chair of DARPA's Information Science and Technology (ISAT) Study Group and a member of the Harvey Mudd College Board of Trustees.
Michael Hicks
Michael Hicks is a Senior Principal Scientist at Amazon Web Services and Professor Emeritus at the University of Maryland (UMD). As notable service, he was the first Director of the Maryland Cybersecurity Center (MC2), 2011-2013, and was the elected Chair of the Association of Computing Machinery's (ACM) Special Interest Group on Programming Languages (SIGPLAN) from 2015-2018. Hicks' 25-year research career has explored how to apply novel programming languages and program analysis techniques to solve a variety of problems in security, systems, databases, networks, and quantum computing. One sustained area has been the exploration of practical means to enforce memory safety in low-level programs through programming language design, program analysis and transformation, and automated testing. At AWS, he has co-led the development of Cedar, the new authorization policy language underpinning the Amazon Verified Permissions authorization service, and is now leading a team doing automated test generation. He is a two-time winner of NSA's Best Scientific Cybersecurity paper competition and several other distinguished research paper awards. In 2022 he received the ACM SIGPLAN Distinguished Service Award and in 2023 he was made a Fellow of the ACM. Hicks earned his BS (1993) in Computer Science at Penn State, and his MS (1996) and Ph.D. (2001) in Computer and Information Science at the University of Pennsylvania.
Matt Turek
Matt Turek, PhD, assumed the role of deputy office director for DARPA's Information Innovation Office (I2O) in May 2022. In this position, he provides technical leadership and works with program managers to envision, create, and transition capabilities that ensure enduring information advantage for the United States and its allies.
Turek joined DARPA in July 2018 as an I2O program manager and served as acting deputy director of I2O from June 2021 to October 2021. He previously managed the Media Forensics (MediFor), Semantic Forensics (SemaFor), Machine Common Sense (MCS), and Explainable AI (XAI) programs as well as the Reverse Engineering of Deception (RED) AI Exploration program (AIE). His research interests include computer vision, machine learning, artificial intelligence, and their application to problems with significant societal impact. Prior to his position at DARPA, Turek was at Kitware, Inc., where he led a team developing computer vision technologies. His research focused on multiple areas, including large scale behavior recognition and modeling; object detection and tracking; activity recognition; normalcy modeling and anomaly detection; and image indexing and retrieval. Turek has made significant contributions to multiple DARPA and Air Force Research Lab (AFRL) efforts and has transitioned large-scale systems for operational use. Before joining Kitware, Turek worked for GE Global Research, conducting research in medical imaging and industrial inspection. Turek holds a PhD, Philosophy in Computer Science from the Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, an MS, Electrical Engineering from Marquette University, and a BS, Electrical Engineering, from Clarkson University.
Theresa Beech
Theresa Beech is the Principal Investigator for the CAPSTONE Mission Extension Experimentation. CAPSTONE, a spacecraft in the Near Rectilinear Halo Orbit (NRHO) at the Moon, will be demonstrating novel, state-of-the-art autonomy and standards-based, interoperable communications technologies in the challenging cislunar environment. Beech has worked for 25 years in space SW technology development, space mission design, satellite navigation, and space communications network design for satellite operators and space agencies around the world. She has extensive experience in space SW technology development, satellite navigation, satellite communications, flight dynamics, mission systems engineering, flight and ground system design and development, space mission cybersecurity, technical team leadership, and space program management. Beech has worked on communications, imagery, PNT, and scientific missions for U.S. Government space agencies, commercial telecommunications operators, and joint agency missions.
Before joining NASA Goddard Space Flight Center in late 2017 as the GMSEC Product Development Lead, Theresa founded and ran MetiSpace Technologies Inc., a woman-owned, small engineering business dedicated to satellite flight and ground systems engineering. In early 2021, she became the GMSEC Program Manager responsible, and in 2022, this role was expanded to include Space Mission Cybersecurity. In early 2022, she was also appointed by the Office of the Center Director for two years as a National Security Space Liaison for NASA Goddard Space Flight Center. Beech has a B.S. with Honors in Physics from the University of Michigan (Ann Arbor), and an M.S. in Atmospheric Sciences from the University of Washington (Seattle).
Oren Edwards
Oren Edwards serves as Chief Engineer for the Medium Altitude Unmanned Aircraft Systems Division, Air Force Life Cycle Management Center, Air Force Materiel Command, Wright-Patterson Air Force Base, Ohio. The division provides acquisition management services, logistics sustainment, and research, development, test, and evaluation for the MQ-9 Reaper and classified Unmanned Aircraft Systems. The division maintains a high level of mission capability and availability with ongoing modifications and fielding of the MQ-9. The division supports ACC, USSOCOM, AFSOC and ANG requirements, among others.
Edwards is an acquisition systems engineer with Armament and Systems Integration experience on a number of fighter, attack, bomber, ISR and unmanned Weapon Systems. His support of integration efforts has spanned a spectrum of USAF, Special Operations, Air National Guard, Joint Service, as well as for Foreign Military Sales and NATO international partners. He graduated with a Bachelor of Science in Mechanical Engineering from the University of Idaho. He began his U.S. Government civil service career in 2002 as a PALACE ACQUIRE intern, working Armament Integration with the F-16 Systems Program Office at Wright Patterson AFB, OH.
Philip Johnson-Freyd
Philip Johnson-Freyd is Principal Member of Technical Staff for Cybersecurity at Sandia National Laboratories, currently serving in the Digital Foundations and Mathematics department where he is involved in a wide variety of formal methods efforts. With his primary focus on forward engineering trustworthy systems, he led the formal verification of a secure root of trust for a high consequence control application and oversees Sandia's highly customized branch of the CompCert formally verified C compiler. Additionally, he has promoted a reverse engineering methodology of "model-based red teaming," where formal methods tools are used to find and address defects with existing and deployed systems. Most recently, Johnson-Freyd took on the role of Chief Subject Matter for a laboratory-wide advisory Technical Expert Network in Cybersecurity. Johnson-Freyd holds a PhD in Computer and Information Science from the University of Oregon. Outside of work, he is a bit of an opera fanatic.
Matthew Wilding
Dr. Matthew Wilding joined DARPA in March 2022 to develop, execute, and transition programs in software engineering and critical system assurance. Wilding came to DARPA from Collins Aerospace, where he managed the trusted methods group, working with Collins product groups and government research sponsors to pioneer rigorous development methods and apply them to computer-based products. He served as a company subject matter expert on formal verification, and he led the machine-checked verification of a separation kernel in the AAMP7 microprocessor's firmware and the development of the Turnstile high-assurance network guard. Earlier in his career, Wilding founded and led a digital vision research group, researched how to use automated theorem provers to establish hardware and software correctness, and worked as a software engineer. Wilding holds a doctorate in computer sciences from the University of Texas at Austin and a Bachelor of Science in computer science from Virginia Tech.
Stephen Kuhn
Dr. Stephen Kuhn joined DARPA in October 2024. His research interests include resilient systems design, language security (langsec), and blended architectures focusing on transition to solve warfighter needs. He joins DARPA from industry, where he focused on transitioning and implementing technologies. Before that, Kuhn served 22 years in the federal government, including the Office of the Under Secretary of Defense working on policy, the Air Force Research Laboratory researching various technologies, hypervisor design, hardware virtualization, large-scale data processing, data format enforcement, and blended hardware-software architectures, and Air Combat Command transitioning modernizing cyber capabilities. Kuhn is a Commander in the U.S. Navy Reserve and has served nearly a year in Afghanistan as the Signals Intelligence Officer in charge of a task force, working with multiple U.S. and foreign partners. He holds a Doctor of Philosophy degree in engineering science from Dartmouth College, a master's in engineering from Syracuse University, and began his academic career at Clarkson University. He has published multiple papers on resilient systems techniques and operating systems design.
Dan Wallach
Dr. Dan Wallach joined DARPA in June 2023 to develop, execute, and transition programs in computer security, cryptography, and related applications. Wallach joins DARPA from Rice University's computer science department, where he works on a variety of topics in computer security, including smartphones and electronic voting systems. Wallach served on the Elections Assistance Commission's Technical Guidelines Development Committee as the IEEE representative (2019-2023), was a member of the Air Force Science Advisory Board (2011-2015), and was a member of the board of directors of the USENIX Association (2011-2012). He was also the lead principal investigator of the National Science Foundation-funded A Center for Correct, Usable, Reliable, Auditable, and Transparent Elections (ACCURATE, 2005-2011). Wallach holds a doctorate and Master of Arts in computer science from Princeton University and a Bachelor of Science from the University of California, Berkeley. His work has been included in more than 140 publications.
Thomas Bailey
Thomas Bailey is a Research Manager in the Secure and Resilient Systems group at Riverside Research. He earned his undergraduate degree in Computer Science from the University of Kentucky, along with the university's certificate in Cybersecurity. Prior to joining Riverside Research, he worked as a Cybersecurity Analyst for the University of Kentucky, where he responded to large-scale incidents and led integrative teams in securing university systems. He has worked in the areas of language-theoretic security, software security, and vulnerability management and analysis. Bailey has worked as a principal investigator for multiple DoD programs, including transition efforts for DARPA and the Navy to the Open Architecture community. He has led programs developing advanced secure parsing solutions applied directly to operational technologies in the hands of the warfighter. Bailey has experience leading teams of subject matter experts in addressing highly technical problems and has worked on previous DARPA research efforts (including HARDEN and multiple SafeDocs transition efforts). He has presented at venues such as the Aviation Cyber Initiative's Cyber Rodeos and DARPA's Resilient Software Systems Demo Day, showcasing technology transition across the DoD's Valley of Death and from the lab to the field.
Howard Shrobe
Howard Shrobe, PhD, joined DARPA in April 2022 to develop, execute, and transition programs in computing systems, cyber security, and artificial intelligence (AI).
Shrobe joins DARPA from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology's (MIT) Computer Science and Artificial Intelligence Lab (CSAIL), where he leads research creating high-performance, reliable, and secure computing systems and technology. He first joined MIT's research staff in 1978, initially working on computing systems and AI, and later adding cybersecurity as a focus area. Shrobe has previously worked at DARPA with two tours as a program manager. He has also worked in industry as the technical director and vice president of technology for Symbolics Inc., from 1982 to 1992. Shrobe holds a doctorate in computer science and Master of Science from MIT and a Bachelor of Science from Yale University. He is a Fellow of both the Association for the Advancement of Artificial Intelligence and the American Association for the Advancement of Science. His work has been featured in over 100 publications.
Darren Cofer
Darren Cofer is a Principal Fellow at Collins Aerospace. He earned his PhD in Electrical and Computer Engineering from The University of Texas at Austin. His area of expertise is developing and applying advanced analysis methods and tools for verification and certification of high-integrity systems. His background includes work with formal methods for system and software analysis, the design of real-time embedded systems for safety-critical applications, and the development of nuclear propulsion systems in the U.S. Navy. Cofer has served as principal investigator on many government-sponsored research programs developing and using formal methods for verification of safety and security properties and currently leads the Collins effort on DARPA PROVERS. He is a member of SAE committee G-34, developing certification guidance for the use of machine learning technologies onboard aircraft.
Benjamin W. Bishop
Dr. Benjamin W. Bishop is the Deputy Director for Transition in the Adaptive Capacities Office (ACO), Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA). He leads a team that advises DARPA Program Managers on the best means to accelerate the delivery of breakthrough technologies to warfighters. Bishop was commissioned in 1997 as a distinguished graduate of Purdue University's ROTC program. He began a career as a fighter pilot and retired from active duty as a Command Pilot with over 2,700 flight hours, primarily in the F-15E, F-35A, and F-16C/D. During his career, he commanded at multiple levels, including the 354th Fighter Wing at Eielson Air Force Base, Alaska. Before his current duties, Bishop served as the Special Assistant to the Director of the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) and as Operational Liaison to the Department of the Air Force. Additionally, he is an Assistant Adjunct Professor in the Center for Security Studies within the Walsh School of Foreign Service at Georgetown University.
Stacy Bostjanick
Ms. Stacy Bostjanick is a member of the Senior Executive Service and serves as the Chief Defense Industrial Base Cybersecurity, Deputy Chief Information Officer for Cybersecurity (DCIO(CS)), Office of the Chief Information Officer. In this position, she serves as the focal point within the DoD CIO to implement the Cybersecurity Maturity Model Certification (CMMC) program across the Defense Industrial Base (DIB).
As the CMMC Director, Bostjanick is responsible for shepherding this critical program though the Code of Federal Regulation System rulemaking process for both the CFR 32 and 48 and ultimately implementing the program across the more than 220,000 companies that make up the DIB. This includes collaborating across the Federal Government with partners such as the Department of Homeland Security and the other members of the Federal Acquisition Security Council, to standardize this process and truly federalize it. In this role, she also directs the Department’s efforts to educate DIB partners on programatic requirements and ensures that DoD implements risk information sharing though the program’s execution. Additionally, Bostjanick is responsible for ensuring the Defense Acquisition community is trained and capable of including these requirements in their Programs and Acquisitions. Prior to joining the CIO, Bostjanick served as the Director of SCRM for OCISO(A&S), where she was responsible for ensuring the incorporation of integrated supply chain efforts within USD(A&S). Bostjanick has an extensive career as an Acquisition Professional with roles that include the head of DIA’s Contracting Activity, and the Senior Contracting Officer for the Missile Defense Agency on the Standard Missile 3 Block IA and IB development and production program. She was responsible for cradle-to-grave execution of over $5 billion of highly-complex, cutting-edge contracts for our nation's missile defense systems. She has also served as the Deputy Procurement Executive with the Office of the Director of National Intelligence where she had responsibility for establishing Intelligence Community Enterprise-wide Policy and submissions to the Program Management Plan on an annual basis.
Bostjanick has had numerous awards and accomplishments throughout her career including the Naval Meritorious Civilian Service Award, David Packard Excellence in Acquisition Award, Office of the Secretary of Defense Certificate of Appreciation, the Director of National Intelligence Award for Collaboration Leadership, National Intelligence Meritorious Citation, and the Small Business Award.
John Garstka
John Garstka, a member of the Senior Executive Service, is the Director for Cyber Warfare within the Office of the Deputy Assistant Secretary of Defense for Platform and Weapon Portfolio Management (PWPM), Office of the Under Secretary of Defense for Acquisition and Sustainment (OUSD(A&S)). His current responsibilities include oversight of the development and acquisition of capabilities for cyberspace operations and implementation of DoD's Strategic Cybersecurity Program, which focuses on cyber hardening the Department's highest priority missions. As the Director for Cyber Warfare, he pioneered the application of Cyber Resiliency assessments to help Combatant Commands understand cyber risks to critical missions and the application of Mission Focused Cyber Hardening to prioritize cyber mitigations.
Garstka began his career as an officer in the U.S. Air Force. He was commissioned in 1983 after graduating as a Distinguished Graduate from the U.S. Air Force Academy with a BS in Mathematics. He earned a Master of Science degree in Engineering from Stanford University in 1985 and served on active duty in the U.S. Air Force for 10 years and in the U.S. Air Force Reserve for 15 years. He has an extensive background in systems engineering, mission analysis, cyber risk assessment, and capability development for space, communications, networking, and cyber capabilities. His experience includes material solution analysis for space surveillance systems, communications satellites, unmanned aerial systems communications, airborne networking, cyber ranges, and capabilities for cyber situational awareness. As an operations research analyst, he conducted force structure analysis for the Air Force Officer Force and the Air Force Acquisition Workforce. He has written and spoken extensively on the topics of network-centric warfare, warfighting innovation, and defense transformation.
Forrest Shull
Dr. Forrest Shull is the Principal Director for Advanced Computing and Software at the Office of the Under Secretary of Defense for Research and Engineering (OUSD (R&E)). With a strong background in software engineering and research, Shull leads the strategic direction for implementing advanced computing and software solutions across the Department of Defense (DoD), while coordinating scientific and technical development activities.
Prior to his current role, Shull served as the Lead for Defense Software Acquisition Policy Research at the Carnegie Mellon University Software Engineering Institute (SEI). There, he led the SEI's technical response to the DoD, supporting critical initiatives and improving acquisition processes through the incorporation of modern software development practices. An important outcome was the development of the Department's first software-specific acquisition policy in 2020, which facilitated the rapid and iterative delivery of software capabilities to meet urgent user needs. Before joining SEI, Shull spent 15 years at Fraunhofer USA, where he established and served as the Director of the Measurement and Knowledge Management Division. His extensive research work included collaborations with organizations such as the DoD, NASA, DARPA, the National Science Foundation, and commercial companies. Notably, his contributions to NASA software products earned him a Group Achievement Award for advancing the state-of-the-art in the software industry.
As a distinguished author, Shull has published over 100 peer-reviewed publications with more than 11,000 citations according to Google Scholar. He has been actively involved in the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE) Computer Society, serving as its President in 2021. During his tenure, he spearheaded the development of a competitive funding process for pilot activities in emerging technologies and initiated collaborations between academia, government, and industry to address crucial technical topics. Prior to his presidency, Shull served on the Society's Board of Governors and Executive Committee since 2015, leading data-driven decision-making initiatives and transforming the Society to better serve its members' needs. From 2011 to 2014, he also served as the Editor-in-Chief of IEEE Software, where he oversaw the launch of a new digital edition and expanded the magazine's multimedia reach. With his expertise and accomplishments in the field of software engineering, Shull is instrumental in driving the advancement and integration of cutting-edge computing and software solutions to enhance the capabilities of the DoD.