Nitte (Deemed to be University)
New Delhi (India), August 2: Dr. Saritha Arun Kumar nee’ Shetty, a cyber security expert from Mangalore, and alumnus of NMAM Institute of Technology, Nitte, has brought great glory to India in the crucial security realm. She was awarded The Princess Royal Silver Medal, also called the Oscars of Engineering, on Thursday, the 13th of July 2023, by HRH Princess Anne, Sister of King Charles, in London. The Royal Academy of Engineering presented this prestigious recognition to her in acknowledgement of her invaluable-critical contributions to shaping security in emerging areas such as the cloud, blockchain, and biometrics. Currently, Dr. Saritha holds the IBM Public Cloud World Wide Technical Leader in Security position.
“Saritha has established herself as a highly credible cyber security expert focused on the genuine threats to commercial and government organizations,” said Dr. Dave Watson, CBE, FREng, retired Director of IBM Research UK. “It is clear from discussions with current senior IBM people familiar with her work that Saritha is responsible for a very significant amount of security business. She is an exceptional talent.”
The Princess Royal Silver Medal celebrates outstanding personal contributions made to engineering in UK, by an early to mid-career engineer, resulting in market exploitation.
Speaking on occasion, Dr. Saritha said, “It is an honor to be recognized by the Royal Academy of Engineering. This award is so special and I will continue to put in my efforts to fill the skill gap in Security and do more for the community. Receiving the award from Princess Anne was such a special moment in my life and I will remember this as one of the biggest highlights of my career for the rest of my life.”
Security is vital in defence to protect the location and lives of troops. Dr. Saritha was an integral part of the $80 million UK/US International Technology Alliance research program, which was led by IBM and included the Ministry of Defence, the US Army Research Laboratory, and university and industrial researchers exploring cutting-edge technologies that could be utilized for defensive advantage.
Dr. Saritha led some of the security components of the program, building on international cybersecurity open standards. She introduced a framework capable of calculating the trust value of continuously streamed information in the security environment, which implements the controlled storage and use of information. Her work was highly commended by the military and resulted in multiple patents.
Blockchain has changed life on the battlefield and on how we do business and bank. Dr. Saritha has contributed to the success of the Open Trade Platform project. The platform connects buyers, sellers, and banks in a network using IBM blockchain technology. This helps them to simplify international trading and, as a result, breaks down trade barriers and grows wealth. She was in charge of the project’s security and was responsible for creating a strong and unique blockchain solution which is an advanced database mechanism that allows transparent information sharing within a business network. Along with this, she also integrated various other security features and cloud identity architecture.
Besides contributing to pivotal international projects, Dr. Saritha is passionate about volunteering. She is a member of IBM’s Academy of Technology, which is a group of around 600 elected technical leaders who promote technical growth across and outside the company. She runs popular patent incubator master classes in which she shares her knowledge of being an IBM Master Inventor and encourages others to come up with ideas for patents. Her classes result in new ideas and the submission of patenting disclosures. She also helps school and university students appreciate the importance of ideation and patenting and promotes STEM in primary and secondary education.
Dr. Saritha has won numerous awards, including IBM’s Super Hero Award for driving security innovation in 2019 and was listed among the Financial Times’ Top 100 BAME Technology Leaders for two years running and among the Top 10 Business Women to Follow in 2022 by The Inc Magazine.
Dr. Saritha graduated from the NMAM Institute of Technology in 2000 in the ECE domain and was the topper of her batch.
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