National Security Advisor, Telstra

What drew you to working in your chosen field?

I started my career as a language specialist and made the transition to cyber security because I was attracted by the strategic and law enforcement elements of cyber and the real world impact I could have working in the field.

Which of your many career achievements do you feel is your greatest and/or most exciting?

In my career, I have most loved the opportunities to create and lead teams around the world that pursue ambitious strategic visions, and what I find most exciting now is being in a position to connect talented people to roles that allow them to make a strong contribution to the cyber security community.

What would you say is the currently the biggest challenge facing the international cyber community?

We need to work to better leverage all available resources to counter the new 'hybrid' online threats that don't align with our democratic values or agreed norms of behaviour. We also need to better define civilian critical infrastructure internationally to establish what is 'off limits' to state actors.

How could Australia further engage with our international partners to harness the opportunities of the digital age?

We need to be humble enough to learn from the governments and companies that are further advanced in their cyber capability and innovation than us, and generous enough to 'pay it forward' to other countries and organisations that are in earlier stages of their capability development. This helps to build the maturity and resilience of our entire global digital economy.