This SiliconANGLE article highlights Ellison Anne Williams’s journey to becoming a startup founder and CEO, a path fueled by “math and grit.”
Excerpt: Women are a minority in tech, with an average of three men for every one woman. When it comes to cybersecurity, the imbalance is even more acute.
A 2020 report shows that female cybersecurity experts are outnumbered five to one by their male counterparts. Inside the National Security Agency, cybersecurity’s inner sanctum, the ratio is anyone’s guess. So the fact that a woman not only entered, but conquered and emerged victorious, from the NSA and with the rights to market the ultimate encryption treasure is a feat worthy of attention.
How did she do it? “Math,” said Ellison Anne Williams (pictured), founder and chief executive officer of Enveil Inc. “Math and grit.”
Williams spoke with John Furrier, host of theCUBE, SiliconANGLE Media’s mobile livestreaming studio, during the RSA Conference in San Francisco. They discussed her time at the NSA and how homomorphic cryptography provides the missing link in the cybersecurity chain.
The treasure Williams carried from the NSA is one that has often been described as the “Holy Grail” of cryptologists: Homomorphic encryption. Developed within the NSA by researchers wanting to maintain security for data in-use, the technology enables data to be handled securely while remaining encrypted.
Read the full SiliconANGLE spotlight here.