Aotearoa New Zealand Celebrates Cybersecurity Excellence At The 2023 iSANZ Awards

The highly-anticipated 2023 iSANZ Awards, Aotearoa New Zealand's premier event honouring exceptional contributions to the cybersecurity and information security (InfoSec) field, took place last night in Wellington.

The 9th annual awards ceremony celebrated individuals, teams, and organisations that have demonstrated excellence, innovation, and leadership in ensuring the safety and security of people and networks against malicious cyber activities.

Alongside the category awards, a prestigious Hall of Fame Award was presented to recognise an individual's longstanding dedication to the information security industry.

Kendra Ross, Chair of the iSANZ Board, highlights the significance of the awards in showcasing the remarkable efforts and accomplishments of our world-class information and cyber security sector.

"We continue to be impressed by the achievements of all the entrants, finalists, and winners, who represent some of the most skilled and dedicated professionals in the information security field," she says.

The winners of the 2023 iSANZ Awards are:

Senior Cyber Security Professional of the Year: Philip Whitmore, Partner – Cybersecurity, KPMG

The judges’ commented on Philip's invaluable contributions to the cyber security community in New Zealand by establishing successful consultancy practices and fostering the next generation of professionals. His commitment to community outreach and thought leadership has significantly enhanced the local cyber security landscape, benefiting both businesses and practitioners.

Security Team of the Year: BNZ Cyber Governance Team

The judges’ were impressed with BNZ's enhancement of their security program encompassing people, processes, and technology - along with its dedicated commitment to research and technology projects, and a metrics-driven approach to diversity.

Project / Awareness Initiative of the Year: Ministry of Education

The judges' commented on the Ministry's consolidating of security efforts across the sector, bringing together a range of activities to have clear oversight of threats and vulnerabilities. They were impressed with the planned and coordinated way that thousands of staff, students, educational systems, and data are being protected from digital threats.

NZ Secure Development Team of the Year: BNZ Pixie Mob

The judges' were impressed with BNZ's technical DevSecOps pipeline, extending its positive impact beyond the organisation and partners through automated security enhancements; also noting the team's technical proficiency and emphasis on developer onboarding, which demonstrate their role as security advocates.

Start-up or New Business of the Year: Outfox

The judges' commented on Outfox’ serving the often overlooked small to medium business sector - also noting their strong commitment to workplace diversity encompassing both gender and neurodiversity.

Up and Coming Cyber Security Star of the Year: Megan Young

The judges were impressed with Megan's achievements in just three years at Spark, where she has demonstrated exceptional proficiency across multiple domains along with her work to foster a positive team environment.

In addition, the distinguished Hall of Fame Award was presented to Tony Krzyzewski - a distinguished figure in the information security industry.

With a career spanning over four decades, Tony has made first-class contributions to the information security landscape encompassing operations, network design, and technology innovation. As a Global Cyber Alliance Ambassador and New Zealand's Convenor for the International Standards Organisation SC27 Committee, his international contributions have been outstanding.

The 2023 iSANZ Awards would not have been possible without the generous support of our sponsors Datacom, Spark, Kordia, SailPoint, CheckPoint, Nextgen Group / Veracode, NCSC, Tesserent, Cyber Cure, Bastion Security Group, Duo, ZScaler and PrivSec Consulting. The iSANZ Board would also like to extend its gratitude to supporting partners NZITF, KBI Media, and Hannah Shand Art.

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