All right, welcome everybody listening to Telecom Radio One and welcome to this new series, Dissecting Popular IT Nerds.

Today, I am pleased to introduce to you Don Cox. Don has helped, as he's,

Don has held numerous positions as both CIO and currently CISO, but really

Don has a long history of experience in all areas of business along with all of the

certifications and schooling that go with that. So really, Don,

I mean, you come with the whole package, something that is really not easy, takes years of

blood, sweat, and tears. So in short, I'd say you're kind of a big deal. Now, you know,

you've got over 40 recommendations on LinkedIn, which,

geez, man, that's, that puts me to shame. So, you know, without any further ado, why don't,

you've got a great backstory. Tell me, why'd you just tell me a little bit about your journey,

you know, from hacker to, to CIO to C-Sol. It's a great story, man. Why don't we just start there? Sure. Thanks for the

introduction and the compliments. Yeah, I kind of happened to cross the technology world.

My childhood dream was to be a police officer. So I spent a number of years in the military

growing up and learning what a police officer could be and serving my country.

And then about nine years after I started the military, I jumped out into local law enforcement in the Washington, D.C. area.

And while I was there, I was injured, and because of some of my college credits were computer-related,

they asked me if I wanted to go over and try this computer crimes unit that they were starting

up.

This is 1999.

And I said yes, and the rest of

history from there, got really intrigued and learned a lot about investigating intrusions and hacking

and then wanted to be able to testify in court as an expert witness. So I went back to get my college degree.

...