Dr. Riza Aditya

Cyber Security Authority, Thales

Riza Aditya has more than 20 years of Cyber Security experience in various roles and domains.  In the role of Cyber Security Authority, he ensures Cyber Security is adequately considered in solution, balancing the needs from Customer and internal stakeholders. He contributed to definition and validation of Cyber Security in various domains, including: Rail Signaling, Air Traffic Management, Electricity Transmission and Distribution, and Banking and Finance. He has a Ph.D for research in cryptographic protocol.

Aaron Amorim

Cyber/IT Architect, Thales

Aaron Amorim is an experience Cybersecurity and IT Solution Architect with nearly 20 years of experience in the railway industry.  His experience covers not just security and IT but also embedded software development as well as diagnostics and maintenance.  This unique combination of skill gives him background to provide end-to-end solutions that ensures not just compliance, but also value across the security, operations, and maintenance spheres.

Janno Lieber

Administrator of the Transportation Security Administration

John (“Janno”) Lieber was confirmed as Chair and CEO of the Metropolitan Transportation Authority (MTA) in January 2022, following his nomination to that position by Gov. Kathy Hochul. Lieber has been serving as MTA Acting Chair and CEO since July 2021 and is the Authority’s 15th Chair since it was founded in 1968.

In this position, Lieber provides strategic, financial, and operational leadership for the MTA, the largest public transportation agency in North America. He also heads the MTA Board of Directors, senior leadership team, and a total workforce of more than 60,000 employees.

From 2017 to 2021, Lieber served as President of MTA Construction & Development, the organization responsible for planning, developing, and delivering capital projects across the MTA. In that position, he led the creation and implementation of the MTA’s 2020-2024 $51.5 Billion Capital Program. He also managed the integration and transformation of construction and development management practice at the MTA.

Prior to the MTA, Lieber served as President of World Trade Center Properties LLC, where he was responsible for managing all aspects of the Silverstein organization’s efforts to rebuild at the World Trade Center site, including planning, design, and construction issues; business, financing, and legal matters; and public affairs, government, and community relations.

Earlier in his career, he held positions in the administrations of President Bill Clinton and NYC Mayor Ed Koch and worked as an attorney in private practice.

Christian Maisonneuve

Head of Information Technologies, Privacy Officer, Nova Bus

As a 20 year veteran of the Transport industry, Christian has successfully evolved through operations, manufacturing and product development, as well as contributing to articulated and hybrid bus industrialization supporting industry demand. As electromobility becomes the future of transport, with digital solutions and connected services in tow, he is now fully committed to heralding in digital transformation to our current landscape.

Christian’s current focus as a member of Nova Bus executive team, is responsible for Information Technology and recently became a Nova Bus Privacy Officer. He is a natural leader with the ability to build the required collaboration necessary to provide and promote team work, partnership and performance needed to meet objectives.

Christian, a holistic solution problem solver, promotes cohesion problem which will remain a top priority for him.

Scott Margolis

Chief Information Security Officer, Massachusetts Bay Transportation Authority

Prior to joining the MBTA, Scott Margolis lead the Commonwealth of Massachusetts Health Exchange Security & Privacy Compliance program established to support and meet the goals of The Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (ACA).   Working with State Agencies and IT Services organizations, Scott is responsible for ensuring compliance with Centers for Medicare & Medicaid (CMS) and Internal Revenue Service (IRS) guidelines as part of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts implementation of a Health Information Exchange (HIX) and Integrated Eligibility System (IES).

Mr. Margolis has more than 30 years of information technology, security governance, and regulatory compliance experience as an entrepreneur, senior leader and consultant. He has worked across the healthcare continuum having worked for payer, consulting and product organizations. He has successfully managed information technology and security organizations, led large consulting initiatives in both the public and private sectors, and developed products for the commercial marketplace.

Mr. Margolis holds a Master of Business Administration in Management Information Science and a BA in Computer & Information Sciences from Temple University

Rafi Khan

Chief Information Security Officer, New Jersey Transit

Rafi is Chief Information Security Officer at NJ TRANSIT, the third largest transportation agency in the US with nearly $4 billion operating and capital budget. Prior to that, he was Senior Associate at Open Minds, providing technology strategies for healthcare companies on IT systems, security, business workflows & execution. Previously, he was VP, CIO and CISO of Edible Arrangements and Edible Brands, leading its global technology teams responsible for e-commerce, BI, analytics, DevOps app development delivery, infrastructure, security and support, spanning 1300 international locations and 15K endpoints.

Rafi is recognized as one of the winners of CISOs Connect top 100 CISOs in 2022

Rafi graduated from the School of Nuclear Medicine Technology at the VA Medical Center, Northport NY, and is board certified by the Nuclear Medicine Technology Certification Board.

Jesse Whale

Vice President, Chief Information Security Officer, Amtrak

Jesse Whaley is an accomplished thought and action leader across multiple disciplines encompassing technology, security, intelligence, and criminal investigations. He has consistently delivered award-winning cybersecurity performance and groundbreaking improvements for the U.S. Department of Defense, international governmental alliances, and private companies.

As Amtrak’s current Chief Information Security Officer, Jesse leads the management of cyber risk and information security matters. He manages everything from traditional enterprise technology risks to unique challenges with the operational technology that securely moves trains and safely delivers passengers to their destinations. Jesse authored and is delivering a comprehensive cybersecurity strategy to strengthen the company’s security posture while supporting the digital transformation of the business.

Previously, Jesse transformed cybersecurity operations at the Pentagon. He designed and built major programs to protect the nation’s military headquarters from cyber threats, including cyber intelligence fusion, cyber hunt, and user activity monitoring in support of the DoD Insider Threat Program. Jesse held many other leadership positions throughout DoD, including leading defensive cyberspace operations at a regional cyber center. He delivered unique critical technology capabilities as a Director within the military intelligence community and served as an IT Director (CIO equivalent) overseas. Jesse also provides expert advisory services.

Jesse is especially known for leading revolutionary global initiatives. His accomplishments include successfully leading teams through resolution of over 10,000 cybersecurity incidents and over 500 criminal investigations. Jesse and his teams have received numerous awards. In 2017, Jesse was named the Pentagon IT Senior Civilian Employee of the Year. Jesse is active throughout the technology and security communities as a member of (ISC)2, ISACA, Evanta’s Washington DC CIO/CISO Governing Body, the Association of American Railroads (AAR) Rail Information Security Committee (RISC), and HMG Strategy’s Washington DC CISO Advisory Board.

Jesse also served ten years in the U.S. Army as a CID Special Agent and a Digital Forensic Examiner. Jesse has lived and worked across the globe, developing trusted partnerships with his counterparts in Asia, Europe, and the Middle East.

Philippe Ayrault

PhD, Systems Safety/System Assurance Manager – Systra USA

Mr. Ayrault is a specialist in mass transportation supervision and signalization. He is an expert in systems reliability, availability, maintainability, and safety (RAMS) and was Thales’ RAMS department lead. In addition, Mr. Ayrault has expertise in CBTC, data management, ETCS, IXL, OCC and PDC. For system safety, he is a specialist in systems/software, Cenelec and CEI61508 Standards and is highly skilled in common criteria, evaluation, and formal methods for system security. He employs various tools, including Fault Tree, Atelier B, Coq, and SAT solvers and is well versed in the Methods and Norms: EN-5012x, DO178, DO333, CEI 61508.  

Richard Lewis

Designated CISO, San Francisco Municipal Transportation Agency (SFMTA)

Rick Lewis joined SFMTA as Principal Security Manager in Mar 2022. He is CISSP and passionate about Network Security and Performance. His background includes working for Gilead, Walmart, and Visa, where he successfully defended against DDoS attacks and broke kill chain on attempted exploits.   He was born in San Francisco and lives in San Mateo with his wife, daughter, and dogs.  

Dennis Wong, PE

Mr. Wong’s experience is primarily focused in mass transit systems applications and communications systems design. He participates in various aspects of project delivery for train control and SCADA systems for low voltage and vital and non-vital train signaling systems, control/monitoring of SCADA, automatic train supervision, PLC, and HMI programming. Mr. Wong has provided consultant services to various transit agencies throughout the US from project conceptual stage through preliminary engineering, as well as systems commissioning and closeout.  

Nick Urlaub

Critical Infrastructure Resiliency and Safety Capability Area Lead MITRE Labs

Mr. Urlaub is the Critical Infrastructure Resiliency and Safety Capability Area Lead for MITRE. He comes from an electrical engineering background having spent 7 years working for Power Engineers, an engineering consulting firm, as a SCADA engineer. For the past 5 years, he has been working on the cyber security of industrial control systems at MITRE. Recently, Mr. Urlaub participated in a number of engagements looking into the transportation sector cybersecurity including helping lead an internal research project to investigate railroad cybersecurity issues.

Adi Karisik

Global Technology Principal/Operational Technology Cybersecurity, Jacobs

Mr. Karisik’s work experience covers a variety of organizations in the intelligence arena. He teaches at the Naval Post Graduate School in Monterey and has authored several types of training that include cross-cultural negotiations, predictive behavior analysis, human terrain reading, and survivability. At Jacobs, Mr. Karisik has held prominent positions in Cybersecurity. Since 2022, he leads the Jacob OT Cybersecurity division as part of the Divergent Solutions Line of Business.  

Mathew Rogers, PhD, CISA

ICS Cyber Security Expert
Office of the Technical Director at CISA

Mr. Rogers is an ICS Cyber Security Expert in the Office of the Technical Director at CISA. He received a PhD in securing legacy OT vehicle networks from the University of Oxford on a Rhodes Scholarship. Matthew worked as the founding engineer at a vehicle and weapon system cybersecurity startup before pursuing broader ICS cybersecurity efforts at MITRE. At CISA Matthew focuses on ICS Strategy and how ICS R&D efforts can be transitioned to effective tools for Critical Infrastructure sectors.  

George Fosu

AECOM Cybersecurity Project Manager

Mr. Fosu is an experienced Cybersecurity Project Lead Engineer specializing in transportation, automotive technology, mechatronics (electrical and mechanical engineering), information technology, project management, and commercial vehicle product change management.  

Jessie Gill

Manager of Systems Technical Services at British Columbia Rapid Transit

Jessie Gill is the Manager of Systems Technical Services for British Columbia Rapid Transit. His department manages, maintains and secures BCRTC OT environment from SCADA systems, CCTV, Card Access, Train Control to server and network infrastructure. He has over 20 years of IT experience including 10 years in Transportation with 7 of those in the Operational Technology (OT) environment. Jessie sponsors over 150 million dollars in capital projects that are modernizing and transforming the BCRTC OT landscape.  

Helen Negre

Chief Cybersecurity Officer, Siemens USA and CSO, Americas-Siemens Mobility, Inc

Helen is the Chief Cybersecurity Officer for Siemens USA and the Americas CISO for Siemens Mobility overseeing IT/OT security and Product Security strategy and operations in the critical infrastructure and transportation sectors. She sits on the Siemens Product Security Board in the data privacy working group and is passionate about ensuring the upmost security in our products.  She has an educational background in Digital Forensics and Psychology. Previously, she has served as the Head of Cybersecurity Incident Response, Product Security Officer, a Forensic Investigator, and a DevSecOps Lead. Previous to her time with Siemens, she worked in IT and Product Security in the Aerospace industry. In addition to her security work, She is the chair of the Siemens Mobility Women’s Empowerment network and Sits on the Diversity and Inclusion Strategy Council. Outside of work, Helen volunteers with the Diana Initiative, Mental Health Hackers, Women of Security (WoSEC), and enjoys a quiet life with her husband, chickens, and five dogs.

Brydon Owen

Director, Electrical Engineering, New Flyer

Brydon Owen joined New Flyer in 2005, and since then has advanced through engineering leadership roles in design, electrical integration, electrical engineering, production, and new product development, most recently serving as Chief Engineer, Electrical Engineering. In his current role, Brydon oversees development and execution of New Flyer’s long-term technology roadmap, building on his foundation of zero-emission bus development by strengthening its electrical architecture, software, and controls in alignment with ISO26262 and emerging vehicle cybersecurity industry standards. Brydon is an expert in advanced control systems and holds a Bachelor of Applied Science in Electrical and Electronics Engineering (B.Sc.) from the University of Manitoba, a Master of Electrical and Electronics Engineering (MASc) from the University of Toronto and is an accredited Professional Engineer. He remains an active member of APEGM, IEEE, and SAE, and in 2018 was named to Mass Transit’s prestigious Top 40 Under 40 list.  Brydon is also a certified functional safety professional and has complete Level 1 ISO21434 Automotive Vehicle Cybersecurity Training

Joel D. Waugh

Sr. Director, Cybersecurity & CISO, Washington Metropolitan Area Transit Authority (WMATA)

With more than 20 years of experience installing, managing and securing information systems, Joel Waugh brings unique insight and experience to his position as WMATAs Chief Information Security Officer. 

From 1990 to 2011, he proudly served in the US Army. Notable accomplishments during his career include a deployment to Bosnia and Herzegovina in support of NATO peacekeeping operations and two deployments to Iraq in support of Operation Iraqi Freedom. Upon retiring from the Military in 2011, Joel joined the Federal Bureau of Investigation, where he spent 8 years building a customer-focused cybersecurity program around the National Institute of Standards and Technologies (NIST) Risk Management Framework. Joel’s career at the FBI culminated as the Chief, Information Security Risk Management, responsible for the security for over 500 hosting environments and information systems across multiple security enclaves.

Since January 2019 Joel has been with WMATA. First in the role of Director of Cybersecurity, where he led a dynamic team in the implementation of a robust cybersecurity framework founded on a Federal-style assessment and authorization process. For the last six months, Joel has served as the Senior Director of Cybersecurity and CISO, in charge of risk management, defensive operations and cybersecurity governance.

Eddy Thesee

Vice President, Products & Solutions Cybersecurity, Alstom

Eddy Thesee has been appointed Vice President Products & Solutions Cybersecurity at Alstom in September 2018. His current scope of responsibilities includes the definition of the cybersecurity strategy for products and solutions across the complete Alstom portfolio, the execution of cybersecurity activities in projects and new products, as well as the development of the cybersecurity standalone business allowing Alstom to provide services and solutions answering to the growing demand in the railway market. 

Prior to joining Alstom, Eddy was working in consulting companies implementing mathematical algorithms for the prediction of stock market prices. Eddy joined Alstom in 1999 to support the activities related to the “year 2000” mitigation. After several positions in IT for Alstom global operations and end users support, Signalling, Turnkey & Infrastructure, he has been in charge of Processes, Methods, and tools for Signalling and Digital Mobility.

Eddy studied Mathematics, Telecommunication, Information technologies and psychology at the University Renee Descartes in Paris and holds master degrees in these disciplines. He lives in Paris, France, with his daughter.

Mical Solomon

Acting Chief Information Security Officer at the Port Authority of NY & NJ

Mical Solomon is the Acting Chief Information Security Officer at the Port Authority of NY & NJ. Mical has worked in the Information Security/Cyber Security field for over 20 years during which time he has served in various roles in IBM Security and Consulting and as the CISO at NASCAR. Mical also has provided Cyber security advisory for several boards and for the University of South Florida’s Executive Cyber Certificate Program. Mical has an undergraduate degree in Education and a Masters in Cybersecurity. Mical also holds several industry certifications including a CISSP and credentials from AWS.