President of Information Security Forum Appointed

The Information Security Forum (ISF) has selected its new President, Professor Howard A. Schmidt.

The ISF is a non-profit organisation that is funded by over 300 of the world’s largest companies, which have already chipped in over US$100 million to fund the organisation’s work in the field of information security and risk management – issues that affect not only the big companies but also public institutions and individuals.

The appointment of Schmidt reflects the ISF’s first shot in addressing the growing scale and diversity of information security threats facing organisations around the world.

The professor certainly comes with the kind of resume that will be sure to delight the backers of the group.

He has over 40 years experience in law enforcement and corporate security.

One of his more recent posts was as chief security strategist at eBay as well as holding a similar position at Microsoft.

Schmidt paid his dues working for over 30 years in US government security positions, until being appointed to the lofty position of vice chair of the US Government’s Critical Infrastructure Protection Board and as special advisor for cyberspace security to the White House.

His most recent position was as chief strategist for the US CERT Partners Program of the National Cyber Security Division of the Department of Homeland Security.

Howard Schmidt must not have a lot of time to play golf as he is also involved in the Permanent Stakeholders Group (PSG) for the European Network Information Security Agency (ENISA), and as an International Advisory Board member to the International Multilateral Partnership against Cyber Terrorism (IMPACT) led by the Prime Minister of Malaysia.

In addition he is a member of the High Level Experts Group for the ITU’s Global Cyber Security Agenda.

Howard is a member of the board and security strategist for (ISC)2, the global standard for information security certifications and immediately prior to joining the ISF was President and CEO of R & H Security Consulting LLC.

The ISF is a unique organisation that provides information for its members on security issues and risk management that spans the many different types of businesses and different cultures in countries across the globe.

They are a centre that will perform research and advise their members on threats and strategies, with research, methodologies and tools not available anywhere else.

Howard says that his main focus will be combating growing cyber-crime threats and assisting in building strategies to aid companies with compliance issues.

He aims to create a library of over 200 authoritative reports along with information risk methodologies and tools that are available free of charge to ISF Members