Mr. Parkes is a retired SES with over 37 years of government service. He has held a variety of technical and managerial positions in the area of cyber defense and analysis. He started his career in the U.S. Air Force before being hired by the National Security Agency where he served in a number of technical positions within the Directorate of Operations between 1983 and 1997. In 1997, he transitioned to the Information Assurance Directorate (IAD) where he established, and became the first ever lead of the Computer Network Vulnerability Team (CNVT). This team provided computer network security consultations in support of USPACOM and its components. In 1999, he returned to NSA Headquarters to continue this work as an analyst within the NSA Blue Team. He served as Chief of the Blue Team from 2003 to 2008 when he became D/Chief of the Operational Network Vulnerabilities (ONV) office. The ONV worked to strengthen DoD and the national security communities’ operational networks through vulnerability assessments, in-depth technical analysis, Red Teaming and long-term integrated best-practice security solutions. In 2010, Mr. Parkes was named as a member of the Defense Intelligence Senior Executive Service and became Chief of the Mission and Technical Vulnerability (MTV) office; conducting Technical Security Evaluations of U.S. Government communications and operations. In 2011 he was appointed to stand up and lead the Operational Analysis and Mitigations Group, a critical new mission area charged with driving sweeping cyber security improvements for the Department of Defense and Federal Government.
Mr. Parkes currently serves as a Cyber Defense subject matter expert for Johns Hopkins APL. He provides expertise in Information Assurance and techniques for defending against the tactics, techniques and procedures of our cyber adversaries. Mr. Parkes functions as the lead of the Integrated Adaptive Cyber Defense (IACD) portfolio where he is responsible for the integration of commercial capabilities, defining innovative concepts and advancing the state-of-the-art in cybersecurity automation and information sharing.