He served 32 ½ years in the United States Air Force and the Arizona Air National Guard, including 25 years spent flying every type model of F-16 ever built. In addition to flying, Dave also performed Chief Information Officer duties for the 162nd Operations Group in Tucson, AZ, supporting 5 flying squadrons with their IT requirements. His final post was leading US CYBERCOM’s Exercise Division from 2012-2015, developing both offensive and defensive exercises, and is the father of Cyber Guard, a whole of nation response exercise against cyber attacks against critical infrastructure that included DHS, FBI, DoD, State, and Industry participation. Upon retirement, he worked at the Electricity ISAC to build their Security Operations Center to provide cyber and physical threat information to the 4500 entities that generate, transmit and distribute electricity throughout North America. Following this, Dave spent 5 years at The Johns Hopkins Applied Physics Laboratory Critical Infrastructure Protection Group before coming to Battelle to support cyber-physical systems research in 2021.
Dave graduated from the USAF Academy in 1987 with a double major in Psychology and Middle East History, and a minor in Arabic. He later obtained a Master’s degree in Instructional and Performance Technology from Boise State University, an MBA in Strategic Leadership from Western Governor’s University, a Chief Information Officer certificate from the National Defense University, and a Doctor of Science in Cybersecurity from Marymount University. He maintains GIAC GICSP, GCIP, GPEN and GRID certifications.