Casey O'Brien joins ITI as assistant director for cybersecurity education

Casey O’Brien has joined the Information Trust Institute as the new Assistant Director for Cybersecurity Defense Education and Training in the Information Trust Institute.  

In this newly created position, O’Brien will be the administrative lead on a DHS project (funded through ITI's Critical Infrastructure Resilience Institute) that is creating a nationwide institute delivering cyber-security education to under-served populations.  More generally, he is responsible for supporting, developing, and managing ITI activities related to cybersecurity focused training and workforce development programs. Such programs and initiatives include the creation of original content, facilitation of partnerships and collaborations, and providing support and direction for a number of sponsor-funded initiatives that focus on implementation strategies, increased cybersecurity awareness, technical skill enhancement, and promotion of an increase in cybersecurity workforce participation by a broader set of individuals.

“Education and workforce development are a critical component of ITI’s mission,” said ITI Director David M. Nicol, the Herman M. Dieckamp Endowed Chair in Engineering. “Casey has the right qualifications to help lead efforts that are essential in training the next generation of cybersecurity professionals.”

O’Brien has more than 25 years of large-scale information security and IT engineering, implementation, and management experience in challenging and cutting-edge public and private sector environments.

His teaching and research interests include: practice-centered education and training solutions that combine accelerated learning programs, validated assessments, instruction, practice labs, and challenge scenarios to improve information security talent management in organizations; rapid deployment of customizable and adaptive curriculum that raises learner capability maturity in foundational security concepts, tactics, techniques, and procedures; and formative credentialing solutions that increase the number of capable professionals.

O’Brien is the Technical Editor of five textbooks: Ethical Hacking & Systems Defense, Linux Server Fundamentals, Information Security Fundamentals, Introduction to Scripting, and Networking Fundamentals. He holds a bachelor’s degree in psychology from the University of St. Thomas and a master’s degree in psychology from Duquesne University.