Group: CARE Senior Fellows

Penguin Securities group announced the appointment of Tomofumi Okubo as Chief Security Officer

We’re pleased to announce the appointment of our Chief Security Officer, Tomofumi Okubo. Prior to joining Penguin Securities, he served as co-chair of the Automated Certificate Management Environment (ACME) working group at the Internet Engineering Task Force (IETF) in 2024. In 2022, Mr. Okubo joined the Japan Fair Trade Commission’s Economic Affairs Bureau, Office of Policy Planning and Research for Digital Markets as a Digital Analyst, where he provided comprehensive advisory services as a technologist. His career in cryptographic key management spans nearly two decades, beginning with his work in a joint project between the U.S. Department of Commerce, Verisign, Inc., and the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN) in 2009.There, he specialized in high-security cryptographic operations, including both offline and online key management, for mission-critical entities such as Certificate Authorities, DNSSEC, and financial institutions. He played a key role in the signing of the DNS Root Zone and later joined ICANN in 2010 as the DNSSEC Trust Anchor Manager and Director of Security for the Internet Assigned Numbers Authority (IANA), where he enhanced the security of IANA functions. Mr. Okubo’s foundational expertise is rooted in his academic background, having graduated from Hosei University with a major in English.

About Tomofumi Okubo

Dr. Linton Wells II has more than twenty years of leadership experience at the interface of policy and technology. Recent research has focused on international cyber resilience and critical infrastructure protection, building resilience in the space domain, countering disinformation in complex information environments, and supply chain risk management, as well as the policy implications of accelerating, converging technological change in areas like biotechnology, robotics, augmented intelligence, advanced manufacturing, information technology, nanotechnology and energy. This includes the national security implications of the replacement of labor by automation and artificial intelligence, and the ability to reduce pressures for migration and marginalization by building resilience at community levels.

While in the Office of the Secretary of Defense, he served as acting Assistant Secretary of Defense for Networks and Information Integration (ASD NII) and Department of Defense (DoD) Chief Information Officer (CIO) in which roles he oversaw the Defense Department’s $30 billion budget for information technology and related areas. Other senior positions have overseen Command, Control, Communications and Intelligence (C3I), as well as the National Industrial Security Program (NISP). From 2010 to 2014 he led the Center for Technology and National Security Policy, a research center at National Defense University (NDU).  In 2014 he completed 51 consecutive years with DoD.  He is the President and CEO of Global Resilience Strategies—”Be prepared to bounce forward better,” Visiting Distinguished Research Fellow at the Institute for National Strategic Studies (INSS) at NDU, Chairman of the Advisory Group to the C4I & Cyber Center at George Mason University (GMU), Executive Advisor to GMU’s Center for Resilient and Sustainable Communities, and a member of the National Association of Corporate Directors (NACD).

In twenty-six years of naval service, Dr. Wells served in a variety of surface ships, including command of a destroyer squadron and guided missile destroyer. He also acquired a wide range of experience in operations analysis; Pacific, Indian Ocean and Middle East affairs; and C3I.  Born in Luanda, Angola, he was graduated from the United States Naval Academy and holds a Bachelor of Science degree in physics and oceanography. He attended graduate school at the Johns Hopkins University, receiving a Master of Science in Engineering (M.S.E.) degree in mathematical sciences and a PhD in international relations. He is also a graduate of the Japanese National Institute for Defense Studies in Tokyo.  He served on the National Advisory Council of the Whiting School of Engineering at Johns Hopkins.

Dr. Wells has written widely on security studies in English and Japanese journals. He also co-edited a series of books on leader development and international security transformation. He received the Woodrow Wilson Award for Distinguished Government Service from the Johns Hopkins University and has thrice been awarded the Department of Defense Medal for Distinguished Public Service.

Frank is the co-founder of aiLeaders, a boutique advisory firm that exists to help develop the missing component America needs to win the AI era, i.e., enough qualified analytics and AI leaders.

He is the co-author of the upcoming book: Winning the National Security AI Competition – A Practical Guide for Leaders.

Frank has 20 years of executive leadership experience in all three major sectors: public, private, and non-profit. During 22 years of public service, Frank helped lead several technology innovations including: evaluating and transitioning to production the nation’s first long endurance unmanned aerial system; delivering intelligence to the tactical edge using narrow and wide-brand technologies; agile prototyping of big data analytics; and designing the first wargame to quantify the value of information to military operations.

The Director of Central Intelligence awarded Frank the National Intelligence Medal of Achievement in recognition of these accomplishments. Frank was also the National Reconnaissance Office’s (NRO) Legislative Director, and a member of CIA’s Senior Intelligence Service, where he received the NRO’s Medals of Distinguished and Superior Service.

Leaving the public sector in 2002, Frank co-founded Edge Consulting, a firm that achieved national recognition for pioneering work in the use of analytics to quantify the value of intelligence to special and conventional military operations. Frank helped lead Edge from a start-up to significant year-over-year growth, culminating in an acquisition by the National Interest Security Corporation (NISC).

Frank has extensive teaching experience in government, industry, and academe. George Mason University students in two different tech programs have recognized Frank with the outstanding faculty award. He is a coach with the Center for Creative Leadership. Frank holds a BA in Business Management, MS in Technology Management, and has completed postgraduate course work in human and organizational learning.

Mr. Sullivan is an accomplished healthcare information technology (HIT) management and advisory executive with extensive U.S. and international experience. He specializes in Health Information Exchange (HIE), Electronic Health Records (EHR) and interoperability, laboratory information systems (LIS) and medical device integration, Medicaid Management Information System (MMIS), public health informatics, and enterprise health systems architecture, operations, policy, and AI.

Currently, Jim serves with NTT Data as HIT Industry Solutions and Services Strategic Advisor. Prior to NTT Data, Jim served as a Chief Technologist with Booz Allen Hamilton as part of BAH’s federal civilian healthcare practice working on CDC’s National Data Modernization Initiative (DMI). He has held senior and executive roles throughout his HIT career with companies that include TATA Consultancy Services, KPMG, Cognizant, Capgemini, Quest Diagnostics, SmithKline Beecham Clinical Laboratories, and others.

He has dedicated much of his career work to Health Information Exchange, and is recognized for his thought leadership advancing HIE. Jim began his focus in HIE in 2004 with Care Science as the company’s Technical Project Director for the Santa Barbara County Care Data Exchange (SBCCDE) in California, integrating the county’s hospitals and public health agencies into one of the first national models for Regional Health Information Organizations (RHIO). The founder and then President/CEO of Care Science, Dr. David Brailer, went on to be appointed by President George W Bush as the first National Director of the Office of the National Coordinator for Health IT (ONC), now known as ASTP – Assistant Secretary for Technology Policy.

Jim is a frequent conference speaker, and has held current and past seats with organizations, including: Executive Board of Pennsylvania HIMSS Keystone Chapter (President Elect 2023/2024, President 2024/2025, Past President 2025/2026); Keystone Health Information Exchange (KeyHIE) Steering Committee (part of the Kaiser/Risant/Geisinger Health System in Pennsylvania); Senior Fellow with the George Mason University Center for Assurance Research and Engineering (CARE); past seat with the Board of Advisors and Program Mentor with the Canadian Technology Accelerator (CTA) and eHealth Innovation Program for the Office of the Trade Commissioner for HIT, Consulate General of Canada; past HIE/HIT Advisory Committee of the Technology Council of Central Pennsylvania (TCCP); original Chair of the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania’s Public Health Gateway (PHG) Governance Board.

Rasch’s career spans more than 25 years of corporate and government cybersecurity, computer privacy, regulatory compliance, computer forensics and incident response. He is trained as a lawyer and was the Chief Security Evangelist for Verizon Enterprise Solutions (VES).  He is recognized author of numerous security- and privacy-related articles. Prior to joining Verizon, he taught courses in cybersecurity, law, policy and technology at various colleges and Universities including the University of Maryland, George Mason University, Georgetown University, and the American University School of law and was active with the American Bar Association’s Privacy and Cybersecurity Committees and the Computers, Freedom and Privacy Conference.   Rasch had worked as cyberlaw editor for SecurityCurrent.com, as Chief Privacy Officer for SAIC, and as Director or Managing Director at various information security consulting companies, including CSC, FTI Consulting, Solutionary, Predictive Systems, and Global Integrity Corp.

Earlier in his career, Rasch was with the U.S. Department of Justice where he led the department’s efforts to investigate and prosecute cyber and high-technology crime, starting the computer crime unit within the Criminal Division’s Fraud Section, efforts which eventually led to the creation of the Computer Crime and Intellectual Property Section of the Criminal Division.  He was responsible for various high-profile computer crime prosecutions, including Kevin Mitnick, Kevin Poulsen and Robert Tappan Morris. Mark is a frequent commentator in the media on issues related to information security, appearing on BBC, CBC, Fox News, CNN, NBC News, ABC News, the New York Times, the Wall Street Journal and many other outlets.

Christine Pommerening is a Managing Partner at novaturient LLC, where she leads the risk management practice, including developing client contacts, preparing briefs and reports, and holding workshops, using NIST-CSF and other frameworks.

Dr. Pommerening has held appointments at George Mason University since 2004. As an instructor, she develops and teaches undergraduate, graduate and executive courses in public policy. She managed the School of Policy’s Executive Education Program from 2014-2016, including conceptualizing and conducting programs for various public, private, and international clients. She served as the Director of the School of Policy’s Masters of Public Policy Program with over 400 students in 2013-14.

Past research projects include directing the development of a training program on enterprise-wide risk management for electric utilities under a cooperative agreement with the Federal Emergency Management Agency; coordinating a data modeling project on the economic and workforce effects of military spending for the Virginia Governor’s Office and the Department of Defense Office of Economic Adjustment; and managing a comprehensive study on historical, legal, economic, and societal aspects of the postal service, conducted on behalf of the Postal Regulatory Commission, which was submitted to Congress in December 2008.

From 2004 until 2008, she was a Senior Research Associate at the Center for Infrastructure Protection and Homeland Security at the George Mason University School of Law, focusing on public and private sector approaches to infrastructure security, cybersecurity, and risk management.

Prior to that, she held appointments at Technische Universität Kaiserslautern and Ruhr-Universität Bochum, Germany.

Christine Pommerening has a Ph.D. in Public Policy from George Mason University, and an M.A. in Industrial and Organizational Sociology from Ruhr-Universität Bochum, Germany.

Jeffrey Matsuura’s practice focuses on domestic and international legal and regulatory issues associated with the development, distribution, and use of technology.  His work has involved a range of technologies, with special emphasis on communications and computing, nanotechnology, artificial intelligence, aerospace, robotics, health and medical, and blockchain.  He is a member of the Virginia Bar and the District of Columbia Bar, and earned degrees from Duke University, the Wharton School at the University of Pennsylvania, and the University of Virginia School of Law.   Mr. Matsuura also provides strategic and operational advice regarding management of intellectual property rights.  He assists clients to establish, implement, and maintain business strategies which maximize the commercial value and operational effectiveness of their intellectual property.   Mr. Matsuura is a former Fulbright Fellow who has written and taught extensively on subjects associated with technology law and intellectual property rights.  He previously served as assistant professor and Director of the Program in Law and Technology at the University of Dayton School of Law.  He has also served on the visiting and adjunct faculties of numerous academic institutions in the United States and in other countries, including Ukraine, New Zealand, and China.  Mr. Matsuura is the author or co-author of several published books on law and technology topics, including: Law of the Internet (written with George Delta, published by Wolters Kluwer , Global Information Technology Law (written with Craig Blakeley , Thomson Reuters West), Digital Currency: An International Legal and Regulatory Compliance Guide (Bentham Science Publisher, A Manager’s Guide to the Law and Economics of Data Networks (Artech House), Security, Rights, and Liabilities in E-commerce (Artech House), Managing Intellectual Assets in the Digital Age (Artech House), Nanotechnology Regulation and Policy Worldwide (Artech House), and Jefferson vs. the Patent Trolls: A Populist Vision of Intellectual Property Rights (University of Virginia Press).