Target hired former General Motors executive Brad Maiorino as its first chief information security officer (CISO), the retail giant said.
As the company’s new—and first—CISO, Maiorino will be responsible for Target’s information security and technology risk strategy. Maiorino is expected to begin his new role as CISO and senior vice president June 16. He will report to CIO Bob DeRodes, who took his post in April.
“I am looking forward to joining the Target team and helping them continue the progress they have made to be a retail leader in information security and protection,” said Maiorino.
As the CISO and information technology risk officer for GM, Maiorino was responsible for transforming the automaker’s global information security and IT risk organization. Prior to GM, Maiorino was the CISO at General Electric.
“Having led this critical function at two of the country’s largest companies, Brad is widely recognized as one of the nation’s top leaders in the complex, evolving areas of information security and risk,” DeRodes said in a statement.
In the wake of the massive data breach where criminals had compromised its point-of-sale systems and stolen payment card information for millions of consumers, Target was criticized for not having a senior-level security executive. There were also reports the security team missed alerts from existing systems.
In the months since, the company has been transforming its security organization and enhancing information security processes. New initiatives include enhancing account security, improving monitoring, segmentation, and logging, as well as adding application whitelisting on point-of-sale systems. Target will also accelerate the shift to chip-and-PIN technology to secure payment cards. The new payment terminals are expected to be in all 1,797 Target locations in the U.S. by September.
“As an organization, we have made a commitment to our guests and our team that Target will be a retail leader in information security and protection. We believe Brad is the right person to lead that charge,” DeRodes added.
Fahmida Y. Rashid is an accomplished security journalist and technologist. She is a regular contributor for several publications including iPCMag.com where she is a networking and security analyst. She also was a senior writer at eWeek where she covered security, core Internet infrastructure and open source. As well, she was a senior technical editor at CRN Test Center reviewing open source, storage, and networking products.