Brian Chess is a founder of Fortify Software. He currently serves as Fortify’s Chief Scientist, where his work focuses on practical methods for creating secure systems. Brian holds a Ph.D. in Computer Engineering from the University of California at Santa Cruz, where he studied the application of static analysis to the problem of finding security-relevant defects in source code. Before settling on security, Brian spent a decade in Silicon Valley working at huge companies and small startups. He has done research on a broad set of topics, ranging from integrated circuit design all the way to delivering software as a service. He lives in Mountain View, California.
Jacob West manages Fortify Software’s Security Research Group, which is responsible for building security knowledge into Fortify’s products. Jacob brings expertise in numerous programming languages, frameworks, and styles together with knowledge about how real-world systems can fail. Before joining Fortify, Jacob worked with Professor David Wagner at the
University of California at Berkeley to develop MOPS (MOdel Checking Programs for Security properties), a static analysis tool used to discover security vulnerabilities in C programs. When he is away from the keyboard, Jacob spends time speaking at conferences and working with customers to advance their understanding of software security. He lives in San Francisco, California.