This details my recent professional history. Some of which is anonymized due for security and respect for the company's information or signed MNDAs. Overall, I've been working with IT in some way roughly since late 2016. My most recent and prominent positions of the past few years are listed below.
Zero Day News (ZDN) Security is a passion-driven information technology & security consulting and management company.
I founded ZDN Security with the dual purpose of (a) distributing timely & crucial security info freely and easily for comprehensions' sake, and (b) to provide enterprise level consulting to those who wouldn't afford it, nor understand what they generally need, regardless of whether they're an SMB or a neighbor.
Regent Surgical is a 150 person company that partners with health systems and physician practices to provide management services to ambulatory surgery centers (ASCs). This includes clinical operations, IT, security, legal & compliance, RCM, FP&A, accounting, HR, data & reporting, and much more.
The expansive portfolio is comprised of nearly 3 dozen separate businesses who partner with a dozen individual hospitals and roughly half that many health systems, nearly 1k combine staff with ~150 physician partners, a little under 100 operating rooms, a little less procedure rooms, and ~80k visits/yr.
I was hired to optimize and lead the security program for Regent and help drive the security services provided to ASCs while managing both their and Regent's internal posture. In doing so, I oversaw the Regent's information security program and the successful completion of numerous security enhancements that pushed the envelope of their services. Some duties included managing Security Operations, internal security awareness & training, risk management, HIPAA Security compliance for corporate & ASCs, PCI DSS for ASCs, and overseeing a joint-led partner SOC team of 5. In Spring of 2024, I was appointed HIPAA Security Officer.
Smith Seckman Reid, Inc. (SSR) is a Nashville-based 500+ person engineering, design, and consulting firm providing professional services to clients all over the United States and across 5 countries. SSR manages dozens of ongoing impactful projects at a time ranging from critical infrastructure work with the US Gov't., stay transportation with the DoT, to even other profit-driven centers such as Sports & Recreation or private enterprise healthcare systems.
In my tenure leading security efforts for SSR, I was hired as their first full-time dedicated security professional with the intent of growing, optimizing, and laying the foundation of their security program. In that time, I oversaw the entire cybersecurity program (many aspects highlighted below), and was proudly able to poise their cybersecurity maturity posture to a new level. Apart from standard security duties, I drove implementation on multiple security projects to reduce firm-wide risk. Some of the standard security efforts I oversaw were:
GRC, including CMMC Level 2 compliance
NIST SP 800-171 audit & POA&Ms
Security policy & plans (IR, BC, DR, SSP, Strategic, etc.)
Managed and enhanced security applications & hardware (antivirus, SIEM, firewall, email firewall, Microsoft Defender, etc.)
Vulnerability Management (including automating CIS hardening evaluations & remediation projects)
Continuous Security Awareness Training & Phishing simulations
Firewall & Email whitelist/blacklist filtering and spam optimization
Yearly penetration test, incident response training, & TTX
Cybersecurity audits/questionnaires & third-party vendor risk management
Liaison with security vendors & MDR/XDR services
Daily SecOps related responsibilities included much of the below:
DFIR/Incident Response & Malware Analysis
Phishing email analysis, quarantine, and filtering
Sandboxing & application testing
Investigate events & incidents via the SIEM and other tools (e.g., Azure, Antivirus, Event Viewer, etc.)
Ballad Health is healthcare system in East Tennessee that was the result of a merger between Mountain States Health Alliance and Wellmont Health System. At the crest when employed, we protected 21 hospitals, over 200 ambulatory clinics, 700 different clinical and business applications, ~1k servers, ~15k endpoints, and a combined ~19k employees, med staff, providers, contractors, vendors, and non-employee staff across the enterprise.
Developed incident response workflows, playbooks, and security architecture via automation with SOAR and integrations to various security & infrastructure applications. Helped manage and led investigations into events and incidents using the SIEM, logs, and netflow data. Administered cloud-based vulnerability management tools to scan applications and servers for risks, prioritizing those and working with business owners through remediation. Participated in application technology reviews, internal risk assessments, and IT Security & IAM audits. Created a basic ticketing architecture to optimize common key security requests & workflows for IAM and Security requests.
Investigate security incidents using threat intelligence tools, VirusTotal, Talos, XForce, within the SIEM. Conduct Application IAM Audits & Risk Assessments, customize and automate incident workflows in the IBM SOAR platform, monitor offenses in applications such as QRadar and Cisco AMP, setup dashboards and scanning lists using Tenable Nessus scanners, work with Compliance, Project Management, and IT Leadership to ensure Security of PHI, PII, and PCI to NIST 800-53. Educate users to Security Best practice using KnowBe4.
Provided support and troubleshooting for applications and hardware, including higher tier troubleshooting and ticket queue management. This included user management (IAM) via Active Directory, Azure, and M365.
I assisted in shaping SOPs, documentation, ticketing standards, and overall optimization of service desk workflows. Worked as the primary weekend shift lead, managing and prioritizing queues, escalating incidents, training new employees, and providing prompt and appropriate resolutions during high-stress, urgent situations.
Shift/Team Lead; support and troubleshoot applications, servers, and hardware in a healthcare setting including EPIC, Soarian, and virtualization tech (VMware & Citrix), IAM using tools like Active Directory and Imprivata. Included some security focused log review using a SIEM, Active Directory, and Event Viewer to troubleshoot IAM.
Overall during this time, I commonly provided technical support for local churches, neighbors, schools, and organizations as requested, both on a volunteer and paid basis. This included setting up and configuring Windows 10, Audio/Visual systems, mobile devices with Office Apps, small networks and equipment, and accompanying maintenance as time progressed.
Until the end of 2021, I operated as Co-Owner of a global Minecraft Network known alongside a dear friend Tyson. The network averaged 750 unique weekly players, roughly 50-55k unique annually.
I joined the team as a volunteer helper and "worked my way up" to eventually become a Project Manager and paid developer. In my Project Management role, I led a global team of ~23 people speaking a variety of languages and living across numerous timezones. Our staff served as developers, game mechanics, administrators, moderators, and other paid & volunteer staff to run the network. After a couple years in this official capacity I stepped into a new role as the first and only Co-Owner, assisting Tyson in handling all aspects of daily operations, budgeting, staff management, and project management while he maintained focus on content creation and design as to continue to drive sales and increase profitability.
Our improvements and shift in leadership focus directly led to an annual ARPA increase of ~$5 per player overall, eventually averaging out to be ~$11 per player during normal playtime and ~$20 per player during holidays and events. Sadly, Tyson passed away around Christmas of 2021.
Primarily using Java and Python, I developed both private and public Discord Bots that were built with intent to (a) play music, (b) perform automatic moderation tasks, or (c) allow users to play simulated text-based RPGs (with quests!).
One of the most popular projects I worked on was a team-effort with a close friend, Amy, as we built and managed a music bot averaging ~3M global users. We hosted this via DO & OVH until hosting prices & public-use licensing for music for Discord both were drastically altered.
One of the most rewarding and enjoyable projects I created as a text-based game, delivered through the interface of a Discord Bot, designed to take a user through a fantasy dungeon and battle various monsters. During your encounters, you could perform many actions that you can in desktop games such as fighting, running, managing inventory, bartering, having conversation, buying add-ons/"DLCs" with actual money, raising pets, and completing quests for money and rewards. While it didn't grow to nearly as many users as the music bot, it still reached ~70k users primarily based in the United States and Germany who thoroughly enjoyed it!