The Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) is welcoming Peiter “Mudge” Zatko back to the agency as its new chief information officer (CIO) as of June, a DARPA spokesperson confirmed to MeriTalk.
Zatko, who first joined DARPA in 2010 as a cyber program manager, announced his new role in an Aug. 6 post on X, saying, “We all pulled off real magic the first time I was at DARPA … Let’s see if we can make an even bigger dent in the universe this second time around.”
During his prior tenure at DARPA, Zatko helped to stand up the Information Innovation Office (I2O) as the agency’s cybersecurity office.
“His track record of creativity in addressing critical cybersecurity and IT modernization challenges, as well as his experience as a former program manager, make him well-suited to our unique environment,” the DARPA spokesperson told MeriTalk.
Since departing DARPA in 2010, Zatko has served in a number of roles, including as the former head of security at Twitter. He made headlines in 2022 after he submitted and testified about a whistleblower complaint claiming Twitter misled regulators, the public, and lawmakers about its security practices.
However, that was not the first time Zatko made headlines. He also testified before Congress in 1998 as part of the groundbreaking L0pht hacking collective – one of the first groups to warn Congress that the internet’s security model was easy to attack.
More recently, Zatko served as a part-time senior technical advisor to the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA) to help work on its Secure by Design initiative. He also served as an “executive in residence” with cybersecurity firm Rapid7.
