Jody R. Westby, Esq.

The New York Times article At Conference on the Risks to Earth, Few Are Optimistic said

ERICE, Sicily — This ancient hilltop town, rife with Roman, Greek, Norman and other influences, is hosting a very modern gathering: a conference on global risks like cyberterrorism, climate change, nuclear weapons, and the world’s lagging energy supply.
 
More than 120 scientists, engineers, analysts and economists from 30 countries were hunkered down here for the 40th annual conference on “planetary emergencies”. The term was coined by Dr. Antonino Zichichi, a native son and a theoretical physicist who has made Erice a hub for experts to discuss persistent, and potentially catastrophic, global challenges.
 
Jody R. Westby, the chief executive of Global Cyber Risk, a Washington-based consulting company, warned that governments were not doing enough to anticipate attacks. She said that the United States, while investing heavily in classified work on communications networks, had only one small program doing advanced research on the vulnerabilities in the private networks that handle the brunt of government communications and information management.

Jody R. Westby, Esq. is CEO and Founder of Global Cyber Risk. She chairs the American Bar Association’s Privacy & Computer Crime Committee and represents the ABA on the National Conference of Lawyers and Scientists. She is also a member of the United Nation’s High Level Experts Group on Cyber Security and and serves as Distinguished Fellow for Carnegie Mellon CyLab.
 
Jody brings a seasoned, multidisciplinary perspective to the many issues facing businesses and governments today in the areas of privacy, information security, outsourcing/offshoring risks, cybercrime, and IT business risk management. Drawing upon more than twenty years of technical, legal, policy, and business experience, she regularly consults with governments, private sector executives, and operational personnel on the development of enterprise security programs that dovetail the technical, legal, operational, and managerial considerations.
 
As an internationally recognized attorney, consultant, and speaker, Jody has had the opportunity to work with many skilled professionals. For Global Cyber Risk, she has assembled a team of highly-specialized senior staff with targeted and proven expertise. The Global Cyber Risk team knows how to bridge issues to balance risk and reward and reach a common goal of protecting digital assets, infrastructure, and operations.
 
Prior to forming Global Cyber Risk, she served as senior managing director for PricewaterhouseCoopers (PwC), specializing in outsourcing and cyber security/privacy issues. Before that, she was president of The Work-IT Group, launched an IT solutions company for the CIA, managed the domestic policy department for the world’s largest business organization, was senior fellow and director of information technology (IT) studies for one of the nation’s leading think tanks, practiced law with two top-tier New York firms, and spent ten years in the computer industry specializing in database management systems.
 
Jody authored Homeland Security v. Homeland Defense: Gaps Galore, coauthored Well-Guarded Deals: Federal contractors must now provide heavy-duty information security and Governing for Enterprise Security (GES) Implementation Guide, and edited International Guide to Privacy, International Guide to Combating Cybercrime, International Guide to Cyber Security, and Roadmap to an Enterprise Security Program.
 
Jody earned her B.A. (summa cum laude) from University of Tulsa and her J.D. (magna cum laude) from Georgetown University Law Center in 1989.
 
Listen to her CERT podcast The Legal Side of Global Security.