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Clarence Chio
Cofounder, CTO, Author, and Lecturer in Applied Machine Learning
Clarence Chio is a prominent entrepreneur and technologist who is currently the Cofounder and CEO of Coverbase, a company he founded in 2023 that automates business due diligence to enhance trust and visibility in inter-company networks.1
Professional Background
Clarence has an impressive track record in the tech industry:
Previous Ventures::
- He co-founded Unit21, a company that solves anti-money laundering problems. Unit21 has raised over $90 million, generates $10 million in revenue, and employs over 100 people.1
Work Experience::
- CTO/President and co-founder of Unit21 (2018-present)2
- Senior Software Engineer at Shape Security (2014-2017), which was later acquired by F5 for $1 billion2
- Held positions at various companies including Oracle, Intel Corporation, Zazzle, and SanDisk2
Academic Roles::
- Lecturer at UC Berkeley's School of Information, teaching applied machine learning in the MICS/MIDS graduate program2
- Received the Distinguished Faculty Award in 2023 for the MICS program2
Education and Skills
- Holds B.S. and M.S. degrees from Stanford University in Computer Science3
- Proficient in English and Chinese (native or bilingual proficiency) and has elementary proficiency in German2
Other Achievements
- Author of "Machine Learning & Security" (2018), published by O'Reilly Media and available in multiple languages2
- Former member of the Forbes Technology Council (2021-2023)2
- Participated in the Macro Engineering Fellowship, gaining expertise in blockchain and smart contract development2
Clarence Chio is known for his expertise in both infrastructure and AI, making him a versatile engineer capable of tackling complex technical challenges.2 His current venture, Coverbase, aims to revolutionize the way businesses conduct due diligence and manage risk in their inter-company relationships.1
Highlights
“Third-party risk teams need more teeth… and that’s not on them.”
TPRM has a huge PR problem. The function is so commonly written off as "deadweight" in infosec. Not much attention is paid to it beyond what is required for compliance. Companies invest way more in the security within their perimeters than outside, even when so many breach attack vectors start from vendors, suppliers, and external libraries.
It’s understandable. TPRM teams aren’t frequently empowered to make business-impacting decisions today because leaders don’t believe that they can effectively predict which vendors / libraries are going to cause the next breach. Third-party risk assessments today are not effective enough to do that.
I started on this journey because I think this is the biggest strategy-to-reality misalignment across all of cybersecurity.
🙇♂️ Thanks Lucas Moody for working with us to transform third-party risk into an impactful and important part of infosec strategy! 💪
Companies like eBay, Twitter, and Rubrik have bred so many top security leaders across the industry over the years. Why?
As the CISO at Alteryx (and prev Rubrik, Palo Alto Networks CISO + security leadership at Twitter, Intuit, eBay), Lucas Moody shared with me the unique challenges he faced at eBay back in the day, where the traffic they were pushing was a meaningful % all internet traffic, and where a lot of the problems faced were unprecedented.
There were simply no standard "market solves" that addressed them.
This meant that teams had to build novel solutions in-house + take bets on early stage external tech that wouldn't get mainstream adoption for years. Leaders of these teams were forced to develop the acumen of early-stage investors - a "Buyer VC".
This is a key strength of top security leaders like Lucas, who seeks alpha by making early investments in solutions thanks to his unique ability to foresee industry problems ahead of everyone else.
