RSA has announced Zulfikar Ramzan as its new chief technology officer.
“Security is no longer an afterthought or relegated to a subset of the IT organization,” Ramzan said. “If the events of the past few years have taught us anything, it’s that security is mission-critical, and it has become a topic of discussion at the board level. As the threat landscape continues to evolve and more advanced threats are unleashed into the wild, it’s key to have an agile security strategy.”
Prior to joining RSA, Ramzan served as CTO of Elastica, where he leveraged machine-learning technologies and natural-language processing to enable customers to more securely access and use cloud services. Before Elastica, Ramzan respectively served as chief scientist of both Sourcefire, acquired by Cisco in October 2013, and malware analytics company Immunet, acquired by Sourcefire in 2010. He also previously served as the technical director of Symantec’s Security Technology and Response division, where he was the architect for the company’s reputation-based malware detection technology.
“Zulfikar’s depth of cybersecurity industry experience is a great addition to RSA—and we’re thrilled to have him on board as we drive the industry forward to better address emergent cyber threats,” said Amit Yoran, president at RSA, which is the security division of EMC. “Zulfikar’s vision of where the security industry needs to focus will push us to deliver solutions that address today’s security threats and continue innovating to help organizations better defend themselves tomorrow.”
Ramzan earned his Ph.D. in Electrical Engineering and Computer Science from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.
Ramzan added, “I’m excited to be part of an organization that is pioneering the future of security, and look forward to helping guide RSA as new threats—and threat platforms—emerge.”