Phil Venables (computer scientist)
Phil Venables | |
|---|---|
| Born | United Kingdom |
| Occupation(s) | Computer scientist, Chief Information Security Officer |
| Years active | 1992–present |
| Known for | Chief Information Security Officer at Google Cloud, former CISO and Chief Operational Risk Officer at Goldman Sachs, member of the President’s Council of Advisors on Science and Technology |
Phil Venables is a computer scientist who has held the position of chief information security officer (CISO) at Google Cloud since 2020. His expertise encompasses cyber and information security, as well as enterprise and technology risk management. Before joining Google, Venables occupied various senior roles at Goldman Sachs, including partner, CISO, and Chief Operational Risk Officer, and was a member of the Goldman Sachs Bank Board. Since 2021, he has served on the President’s Council of Advisors on Science and Technology (PCAST).
Early life and education
Originally from the UK, Venables completed his undergraduate studies with a B.S. in computer science with honors at the University of York in 1989. He then attained an M.S. in Computation and Cryptography from Oxford in 1990.
Career
Venables launched his professional journey in 1992 as Information Security Manager at Barclays Bank in the UK. In 1995, he advanced to become the global head of technology risk management at Standard Chartered Bank. Between 1997 and 2000, he served as CISO for Deutsche Bank London. Venables joined Goldman Sachs in 2000, where he was partner and CISO until 2017, then transitioned to Chief Operational Risk Officer until 2018, maintaining a directorship until 2020. He has been instrumental in founding several corporate and sector-wide cybersecurity initiatives.
Since 2015, Venables has been recognized as a life member of the Council on Foreign Relations. In 2016, he contributed to Barack Obama’s Commission on Enhancing National Cybersecurity.
Apart from his role at Google Cloud, Venables has held board positions at cybersecurity company HackerOne, supply chain technology firm Interos, and served on NIST's Information Security and Privacy Advisory Board. His non-profit involvement includes board memberships at New York University Tandon School of Engineering and NYU Stern School of Business’s Business Volatility and Risk Institute. He co-chaired Sheltered Harbor, an organization focused on consumer financial data protection, and co-founded the Center for Internet Security, serving on its board from 2014 through 2020.
In September 2022, Venables became a member of the cybersecurity advisory board for Ballistic Ventures, a San Francisco-based early-stage cybersecurity investment firm.
He holds multiple patents related to information security technologies, such as cryptographic currency virtual wallets designed for securities settlement and techniques for evaluating network susceptibility to cyberattacks.
Awards
Venables earned the Chartered Engineer designation in 1995, followed by Chartered Scientist status in 2002. In 2005, he was elected Fellow of the British Computer Society.
His honors include several awards from the 2008 RSA Conference, the FS-ISAC Critical Infrastructure Award in 2017, along with both the ISACA Wasserman Award and SINET Innovation Award received in 2019.