Ben Johnson is CTO and co-founder of Obsidian Security, an identity-centric security start-up. Prior to founding Obsidian, he co-founded Carbon Black and most recently served as the company’s Chief Security Strategist. As the company’s original CTO, he led efforts to create the first EDR (endpoint detection & response) product and helped define the next-generation endpoint security space. Prior to Carbon Black, Ben was an NSA computer scientist and later worked as a cyber engineer in an advanced intrusion operations division for the intelligence community. In addition to Obsidian, Ben is currently a technical advisor to the US FISA Court and sits on boards of multiple security startups.

Johnson earned a bachelor’s degree in computer science from the University of Chicago and a master’s degree in computer science from Johns Hopkins University. He lives in Newport Beach, CA with his wife and three sons.