Three innovators in fields of mathematics, public policy and security practices earn annual awards

By Ryan Huff, RSA® Conference Reporter

RSA® Conference 2008 officials announced Monday that a professor, congressman and risk officer are the recipients of its 11th annual awards program for three fields of information security. Computer science professor Arjen Lenstra won the mathematics award, which recognizes innovation and ongoing contributions to the field of cryptography. Congressman Jim Langevin earned the public policy award, honoring leadership in the field of cybersecurity public policy. Finally, Goldman Sachs executive Philip Venables is this year’s winner in the security practices field for outstanding achievement in the practice of security within an organization.

Lenstra is a professor at the Laboratory for Cryptologic Algorithms at Switzerland’s École Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne. He has made fundamental contributions to the design of integer factoring techniques, including the General Number Field Sieve – the most efficient classical algorithm known for factoring integers larger than 100 digits. Lenstra received his Ph.D. in mathematics and computer science in 1984 from the University of Amsterdam. He later worked for Bell Communications Research, Citibank, Citigroup and Lucent Technologies.

Langevin, a Democratic congressman from Rhode Island, is the chairman of the House Homeland Security Subcommittee on Emerging Threats, Cybersecurity and Science & Technology. In 2007, he held more hearings on cybersecurity than any other member of Congress in a single year. Langevin has helped make information security a top priority for the Department of Homeland Security.

Venables, managing director and chief information risk officer at Goldman Sachs, has influenced the company’s vision to change information security from a physical to a logical endeavor by shifting its focus to protecting the data itself. At Goldman Sachs, Venables launched a data protection, auditing and compliance initiative where he deployed enterprise rights management as a core strategy for information protection. Due to his dedication to persistent security, Goldman Sachs’ security infrastructure continues to be cutting-edge.