Meet the January 2024 Fellows: Alex Moix

Meet the January 2024 Fellows: Alex Moix

Senior Congressional Innovation Fellow Alex Moix will be joining forces with Senator Mark Robert Warner (D-VA) for the duration of his TechCongress fellowship. As a seasoned security engineer and technical intelligence analyst, Alex will focus on the areas of cybersecurity, technology, and telecommunications during his time in Warner’s office.

Meet the January 2024 Fellows: Brandon Read

Meet the January 2024 Fellows: Brandon Read

Meet Senior Congressional Innovation Fellow Brandon Read. Brandon will be working in the office of Senator Alex Padilla (D-CA) for the duration of his fellowship with TechCongress. As a technologist with experience in the private sector, Brandon will be focusing on responsible innovation and shared prosperity, with a focus on platform accountability, digital literacy, market fairness, and the implications of AI on workers and the economy.

Meet the January 2024 Fellows: Jhonatan Ewunetie

Meet the January 2024 Fellows: Jhonatan Ewunetie

Meet Congressional Innovation Fellow Jhonatan Ewunetie. Jhonatan will be working with the House Committee on Appropriations and Sub-Commitee on Transportation, Housing & Urban Development. His work will focus on emerging issues in transportation and HUD, including transportation data and autonomous vehicle regulatory policy.

Announcing the January 2024 Fellows

Since our beginnings in 2015, TechCongress has strived to place technologists in Capitol Hill to positively impact the future of tech policy. With the rapid growth of A.I., social media platforms, cybersecurity threats, and other technological developments, the need for adequate tech policy is greater than ever. The 2024 Congressional Innovation Fellows will apply their technical expertise and insightful backgrounds to support federal policymakers in addressing current challenges and contribute to the creation of a better tomorrow.

We are honored to host such a talented and diverse group of fellows, and will be highlighting each fellow in our cohort in the coming weeks.  Stay tuned to learn more about our fellows’ journeys to TechCongress, their areas of expertise, and where they’ll be working during the fellowship.

Jack Cable: Money Over Morals: A Business Analysis of Conti Ransomware

Jack Cable authored the first in-depth peer-reviewed research into the Conti leaks. We mapped over $80 million in new payments to Conti.

This paper was published in December as part of the APWG Symposium on Electronic Crime Research, for which we received the best paper award.

In February 2022, over 168,000 internal chat messages of the Conti ransomware group were leaked. Conti is one of the most prominent ransomware groups of all time. We sought to build a picture of Conti's (quite profitable) business based on on-chain analysis of Bitcoin payments.

To do so, we manually annotated all 666 Bitcoin addresses present in the leaks based on message context (our team included a native Russian speaker). We tag addresses as either a salary, reimbursement, or ransom payment address.

John Yaros: Idaho Dept. of Finance appoints Securities Bureau Chief

The Idaho Department of Finance announced John Yaros has been appointed the Securities Bureau Chief.

In this capacity, Yaros will manage a bureau of financial professionals who provide regulatory oversight for the more than 153,000 entities and individuals who are licensed or registered to offer securities and financial services to Idaho residents. While the securities bureau is focused on investor protection, education and enforcement of state securities laws, the bureau also licenses and regulates money transmitter companies, escrow companies and endowed care cemeteries.

RSA Conference 2023: The Future of Cyber Workforce - An Ecosystem View and Global Perspectives

Alumn Seeyew Mo was invited to participate in the RSA Conference 2023 as a panelist speaker.

The introduction of the US Cyber Workforce Strategy and EU initiative on cyber skills presents a critical opportunity to enable the workforce of the future – it also requires an entire stack, all hands on board approach. With new threats and requirements emerging, this panel of experts from government, industry and academia will distill latest developments and action needed to address these needs.

Meet the January 2023 Fellows: Andre Barbe

Meet the January 2023 Fellows: Andre Barbe

Recently, I was thrilled to accept a fellowship with TechCongress, an organization that helps bridge the gap between Congress and the tech industry by connecting technology experts with legislators and their staff. I am particularly excited about this opportunity because it allows me to combine my background in economics with my interest in artificial intelligence (AI) policy.

Meet the January 2023 Fellows: Andrew Eich

Meet the January 2023 Fellows: Andrew Eich

If you had asked me earlier in my life if I would be working on Capitol Hill, I would have never believed you. But this is an incredible way to fulfill my obligation of service to the country that has given me fantastic opportunities. The quote by President John F. Kennedy, "Ask not what your country can do for you – ask what you can do for your country," is a call to service. It creates the desire to give back in meaningful ways at whatever level you can, either through your local community or on the national level.