Writing the Next Chapter

Dark Reading is about to begin a new decade in its storied history, and we have some breaking news of our own to share.

Dear Reader,

One of my favorite assignments at Dark Reading, when I first joined the newly launched media site in 2006, was to interview and write human-profile stories about cybersecurity industry pioneers. Although I had already been covering the industry for a few years, this posed a unique opportunity to trace the roots of its organic evolution to the work and personalities of smart, curious, and creative researchers such as HD Moore, Marc Maiffret, Dan Kaminsky, Joanna Rutkowska, and so many others. It was a fun project that helped position Dark Reading as a trusted chronicler of the industry, and also laid the foundation for our reporting, sourcing, and deep perspective on a rapidly growing sector.

Celebrating Dark Reading’s 20th anniversary this year, with all the retrospective and forward-looking content the team produced, gave me the opportunity to contemplate what the next decade might look like for cybersecurity, for Dark Reading, and for my career. Dark Reading has grown up a lot since our days as a two-person shop, and I have had the privilege of building a team more than three times that size. The site offers more breadth and scope than ever, including our international-focused coverage with Dark Reading Global, our podcast, Dark Reading Confidential, and the launch of our CISO Advisory Board.

My team is strong, and so is Dark Reading at 20. It hit me during our celebrations that it’s time for a new challenge. So, after much reflection (and all kinds of emotions), I decided to leave Dark Reading and write a new chapter.

It has been a true honor and labor of love to help raise Dark Reading for two decades and to lead it as editor-in-chief for the past five years. I learned from the best, the late Tim Wilson, with whom I worked alongside for 15 years, and I have carried with me his mantra all these years that it’s about the people: the people on your team, the people you write about, and the people who read your work. I truly believe that Dark Reading’s laser focus on our team, our sources, and our readers is what makes it both a successful media brand and a special place to work.

I am grateful for getting to work with my incredibly talented team here at Dark Reading: Fahmida Rashid, Tara Seals, Becky Bracken, Rob Wright, Alex Culafi, Arielle Waldman, and Kristina Beek. This is truly a dream team of smart, creative, and dedicated journalists who love this brand as much as I do. We also have some of the top contributing writers in cyber media, Rob Lemos, Jai Vijayan, Ericka Chickowski, Liz Montalbano, and Nate Nelson, and our family of invaluable, eagle-eyed freelance copyeditors editors Gayle Kesten, Jim Donahue, and Conan Tobias. These colleagues are also my friends, and I will miss seeing them every day.

You will very soon hear more about (and from) Dark Reading’s next editor-in-chief, but I can say with the utmost confidence that my experienced successor is more than ready to take the brand into the next chapter, and I am really excited for them and for the team.

As for this soon-to-be-former editor-in-chief of Dark Reading, I will be taking a sabbatical through the end of the year and then launching a new business venture in early 2027. And you can be sure I’ll still be reading Dark Reading.

Thank you for your engagement, feedback, and loyalty to Dark Reading. Its best days are yet to come.