Category: Thought Leader
Name: Askari Foy
Title: Managing Director
Company: ACA Aponix
Why nominated: The task of achieving regulatory compliance can be quite daunting, but through his time with ACA Aponix and the SEC, Askari Foy has provided companies with the steady rock-solid guidance they've needed to help them meet standards.
Profile: Currently the managing director at consulting firm ACA Aponix, where he oversees ACA's Global Regulatory Cybersecurity Practice, Foy brings 13 years of valuable expertise from his time at the Securities and Exchange Commission.
It was at the SEC – where he aided in the implementation of Regulation Systems Compliance and Integrity (SCI), a set of rules that are designed to monitor and improve the security and resiliency of U.S. securities markets and their critical technology infrastructure, before finishing his tenure as the associate director and head of the National Technology Controls Program within the agency's Office of Compliance Inspections and Examinations – that he developed cybersecurity risk-based examination and surveillance strategies for a program that evaluates cybersecurity mechanisms implemented by investment advisers, broker-dealers, national securities exchanges, clearing agencies, automated trading systems, and self-regulatory organizations, to ensure that they are federally compliant.
Ensuring that securities exchanges, clearing agencies, and automated trading systems were complying with Regulation SCI – which was adopted to reduce the occurrence of systems issues and enhance the Commission's oversight and enforcement – required ample collaboration between industry leaders, board members and senior management. To that end, Foy and a team of information security professionals led numerous outreach efforts to educate companies, while creating a listening forum to provide guidance and advice to companies seeking compliance.
Foy also worked with additional government agencies to not only avoid duplicative efforts in regulatory oversight of the securities market landscape, but also institute new intelligence-sharing opportunities.
During his time at ACA Aponix, Foy has illuminated how advances in technology, changes in business models and the ways technology is used create vulnerabilities in firms' systems – and worked tirelessly to reshape the mindset of the industry.
In addition to serving as a senior officer of the Atlanta Regional Office Examination Program within the SEC's Office of Compliance Inspections and Examinations, where he was responsible for overseeing the examinations of over 1,000 registered entities in five southeastern states to ensure compliance with federal securities laws, he also held management roles at both PricewaterhouseCoopers and Credit Suisse Asset Management.
What colleagues say: “Askari has had a venerable career in promoting cybersecurity and protecting capital markets through his work at the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) and in his consultative work at ACA Aponix. At the SEC, he took a pivotal role as Head of the Technical Controls Program and helped implement Regulation-SCI, focused on helping protect critical market infrastructures like the exchanges and large broker-dealers. We should all be thankful to Askari for his work on ensuring the integrity of capital markets through his work, as well as his work in helping alternatives managers directly through his consultative work, in which he has guided dozens of firms to an implementation of a stronger cybersecurity program.”
- Raj Bakhru, partner, ACA Aponix