Logo
Jane Lute Headshot
Report a problem with this profile
[email protected]

Jane Lute    

Former Deputy Secretary of Homeland Security & Special Advisor to the Secretary-General of the UN; Strategic Director, SICPA SecurInk

Jane Holl Lute has dedicated her career to preventing terrorism, enhancing global stability and security, and helping those in crisis. It says something about the times in which we live that Lute now focuses on cyberterrorism, the source of today's most menacing threats to nations, businesses and individuals. Audiences praise Lute for grounding her remarks about cybersecurity in her roots as a United Nations Peace builder and Assistant Secretary-General of the U.N. responsible for comprehensive on-the-ground support for humanitarian operations in crises. She has also served as Deputy Secretary of the Department of Homeland Security where she was responsible for the day-to-day management of the Department's efforts to prevent terrorism and enhance security, secure and manage the nation's borders, administer and enforce U.S. immigration laws, strengthen national resilience in the face of disasters, and ensure the nation's cybersecurity.

Lute is currently strategic director for SICPA SecurInk, a privately held Swiss company that provides security solutions to protect the integrity of most of the world’s banknotes. Lute serves as director on the board of Union Pacific Railroad, Marsh McLennan Corporation, and Shell plc. Previously, Lute served as Chief Executive Officer of the Center for Internet Security, an operating not-for-profit organization and home of the U.S. Multi-State Information Sharing and Analysis Center (MS-ISAC) providing cybersecurity services for U.S. state, local, tribal and territorial governments.

Speech Topics

Making Sense of Security in the Cyber Age

While security is typically something that modern societies assign to their governments — governments run the police, the military, make the laws, etc. — there have been no clear or consistent assignments to governments for security in cyberspace. Indeed, governments everywhere are struggling to define and assert their own proper role in cyberspace as the Internet expands at the rate of over 100 new users per minute. How well are nation-states, international institutions, or even the major multinational corporations coping with these developments? What lessons from the post-War decades of institution building and economic development endure and which have not made it out of the 20th Century intact? Drawing on experience in international, national, and homeland security, Lute offers a policy perspective on security in the Cyber Age.

Cybersecurity for the Rest of Us

What exactly is happening in cyberspace? Is the Internet really changing everything? Just how reliant are modern societies on global connectivity, instantaneous access to seemingly limitless information, and deeply pervasive automation that runs everything? What are the social effects of this connectivity — or example, is all of cyberspace ‘public?’ What does it mean to speak of personal privacy or personally identifiable information? What are the most significant political implications of the worldwide ‘cyber awakening’ that is accompanying the ongoing, organic, and instantaneous expansion of the Internet? What is happening at the key intersection of technology, power, and wealth?

Homeland Security and You

Created a dozen years ago in the wake of 9/11, the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) has no problem with brand name recognition. It is continually challenged, however, with brand name understanding. Why do we have DHS? What does it do? How does it work? How will we know it’s succeeding? Is there a difference between National Security and Homeland Security?

Understanding the Global Supply Chain of Trouble: Lessons from Homeland Security

Pandemics, natural disasters, manmade crises, riots, organized crime, war. How do countries cope with challenges that seem to outsize the ability of any government to handle? Drawing on over three decades of operational and policy experience at the national and international level, Lute talks about how governments around the world work behind the scenes of military and diplomatic relations to solve problems every day.

How Do Wars End?

Why do wars end when they do? Why do some wars, it seems, never end? What factors combine to prevent wars from ending? How do events far removed from the battlefield often come to influence policymakers to prolong or preemptively conclude war?

Preventing Violent Conflict

Given mankind’s history of warfare, is it possible to think realistically about how a war might be prevented? Why do certain factors combine to unleash widespread violence in one setting, while in another, war is avoided? How should we think about the outbreak, spread, or resumption of violence in order to preclude wholesale slaughter? Is there a role for civil society, the private sector, or even individuals in preventing the outbreak of violence?

Show more speech topics
The Key to Raising Girls: A Lifetime of “Life Lines”

Working Women and Women Who Work: Does the Difference Matter?

Performance Peacekeeping: The Role of Technology and Innovation in Global Peace Operations

Show less speech topics

Related Speakers View all

More like Jane