Benjamin (Ben) Agner

Bio: Benjamin (Ben) Agner is an experienced IT and security leader, engineer, consultant, architect, and public speaker. He has an extensive track record of delivering secure digital transformation and innovation at scale through cloud enablement, zero trust security architectures, and modern (Agile/DevSecOps) team structures.

Professionally, Ben currently serves as the Global Deputy CISO and Head of Security Solutions Engineering at Unum, where he leads the Security Assurance, Security Solutions Engineering, and Governance, Risk, and Compliance functions globally. He also serves as the Security/GRC Lead for the Rocky Enterprise Software Foundation (RESF), which builds and maintains one of the most popular open-source enterprise Linux operating systems, Rocky Linux.

Prior to Unum, he served as the Director of Global Security Portfolio Management at Aflac, where his responsibilities included the management and modernization of the Global Security portfolio of services, the delivery of all M&A security activities, and serving as the security lead for the company’s vertically integrated portfolio companies in the US. He also served as the head of IT security and compliance at Empowered, a SaaS-based benefits management startup that was acquired by Aflac, where he was instrumental in securely scaling the company’s benefits enrollment platform from 50,000 to 15 million users and $1.5 Billion in annual revenue in under two years. Prior to that, he has more than 10 years of experience as a cyber security consultant, lead systems engineer, Big 4 compliance auditor and startup entrepreneur.