Mozilla security boss bails

Snyder bids open source browser outfit buh-bye

By John Leyden • Get more from this author

Posted in Software & Security, 11th December 2008 13:06 GMT

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Mozilla's security chief, Window Snyder, is leaving the Mozilla Corporation at the end of the year.

Prior to joining the Mozilla Foundation’s business arm in September 2006 Snyder worked for Microsoft as a security strategist, playing a key role in overseeing Windows XP SP2, and before that at security consultancy @stake.

Snyder was given the role of "Chief Security Something-Or-Other" at Mozilla, a flippant take on standard senior security officer job titles. For the last two years she has acted as the public face of Mozilla's security efforts: publishing content on a security blog, appearing at conferences and talking to the press, as well as working on the introduction of security metrics for the open source browser.

Her role will be split between other Mozilla staffers pending the recruitment of a successor. Rumours have it that Snyder is off to join a start-up outside the information security space, but this is unconfirmed.

Snyder was a rare female role model in an information security world dominated by men. Joanna Rutkowska is one of the few high-profile female information security researchers left. ®

Bootnote

Snyder is the daughter of a Kenyan mother and a white American father, making her something of a mirror-image of President-Elect Barack Obama, who shares a similar heritage but with a Kenyan father and a mother from the Midwest.

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