First Line Of Defense

With security among the most important business issues, many companies are creating new IT positions to take charge of both the technology and the politics.

By Deborah Radcliff

July 14, 2000 12:00 PM ET

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Computerworld - Paul Raines cut his security teeth in a very paranoid world. He was a handler of the keys used to launch Minuteman nuclear missiles for the U.S. Air Force. Several promotions later, he landed the responsibility for securing Air Force command and control communications.
"My real baptism in encryption came when I worked at the U.S. Postal Service between 1993 and 1996," says Raines, 42. There, he and his team developed the certificate authority infrastructure behind the Post Office's digital postage program. In the past two years, the postal digital certificate program has issued more than 500,000 certificates, which are used to authenticate downloads to, and draws from, a user's digital postage meter.

			Security Blanket Who: Paul Raines Title: Chief security officer Where: Federal Reserve Bank of New York Reports to: CIO Credentials: Raines represents information security for the Federal Reserve at the Bank of International Settlements in Switzerland; he's also a published security pundit and speaker on internal security policy, encryption and international electronic-banking issues. Salary: Chief security officers can expect $100,000 to $250,000, depending on the industry, according to Tony Carr, vice president of technical recruiting, networking specialty, at Pencom Systems Inc. in New York. Demand: Chief security officers are wanted at companies that have highly valued information assets or intellectual property and a Web presence. *Characteristics/Background:** • Had similar role in same or like industry, or is ready to step up a notch • Able to execute senior management responsibilities such as presentations, direct management, business development and executive teamwork • Political ability to leverage ideas, concepts and technology within changing global environments • Hands-on technical background • MBA, computer science degrees preferred * Source: Tracy Lenzner, president of Lenzner and Associates, a Las Vegas-based job placement firm for security managers

In 1996, Raines took a director-level security position at the Federal Reserve Bank of New York. With him, he brought two of his team leaders from the Postal Service - one to develop and supervise user policy training and enforcement and the other to hire and supervise a Red Team (four Federal Reserve security staff members who hack the Reserve's systems to test for vulnerabilities). The Blue Team, responsible for access controls and security services to the Reserve's business areas, already existed.
Combined, 23 of Raines' reports hold some type of information security job, but not many of these are direct reports, he says. He's too busy in executive offices, evangelizing and building interagency relationships, to form close relationships with these workers.
"The types of issues

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