Who is Lisa Einstein, chief AI officer appointed by US cybersecurity watchdog?

The appointment comes amid growing concerns about security risks due to rapid adoption of generative AI tools.

CISA is a US government agency that has dealt with cybersecurity issues such as attempts to influence elections. (Image: Centre for New American Security/Express)

In a first, the US government’s cybersecurity watchdog has appointed a chief AI officer to identify and tackle cyber threats posed by AI while ensuring the safe integration of such tools with critical infrastructure such as power grids, water management systems, and banks.

Lisa Einstein was named as the AI head of the US Cybersecurity & Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA), which comes under the Department of Homeland Security.

“We will only reap the benefits of AI and avoid harms from its failure or abuse if we work together to prioritise safety, security, and trustworthiness. I am honoured to serve with the dedicated and talented CISA team to tackle this important challenge,” Einstein said after the announcement was made.

Einstein’s new position aligns with White House directives requiring all government agencies to appoint a senior employee to oversee their AI systems. US government bodies are also required to establish AI governance boards and submit annual reports detailing their AI systems.

Who is Lisa Einstein?

Einstein has previously worked at think tanks and has been advising CISA in handling AI threats in the cybersecurity space, according to a report by Axios. She played a role in drafting an AI roadmap for the agency and recently spearheaded a pilot programme that looked to evaluate the capabilities of AI cybersecurity tools in detecting software vulnerabilities.

“The best use of AI for vulnerability detection currently lies in supplementing and enhancing as opposed to replacing existing tools,” CISA found after the pilot project. It also concluded that AI tools can sometimes be unpredictable in ways that are difficult to troubleshoot.

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Einstein is further credited for bridging the gap between the government and tech companies by recently devising a four hour-long game where representatives Microsoft, Nvidia, and 50 other organisations had to respond to scenarios of AI security incidents.

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CISA’s appointment of an AI chief comes amid growing concerns about the security risks due to the rapid adoption of large language models (LLM) and other AI tools.

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“When you think about it, the most powerful technology of the last century was arguably nuclear weapons. The most powerful technology of this century is artificial intelligence,” Jen Easterly, the director of CISA, said last year.

“Nuclear weapons were built by governments that had the incentive to keep them safe. The incentives of those building AI is all about maximisation of profit and business competition,” she said.