Duncan Sparrell, MS

In his current role as principal at sFractal Consulting, Duncan leverages 45+ years’ worth of expertise in conceiving, developing, and delivering state-of-the-art software platforms into a boutique cybersecurity/software development consulting company he founded to make the world a safer place.

He graduated from RPI with Bachelor’s and Master’s Degrees in Electrical Engineering back when computers the size of buildings were programmed with punch cards. Duncan then joined AT&T Bell Labs before 80% of those alive today were born.

Duncan’s involvement in cybersecurity began in 1990 during Desert Shield/Storm. He subsequently created and led the first Security Operations Center (as well as coined the term “SOC”) and retired as AT&T's Chief Security Architect.

Never his full-time role, Standards work was a passion that followed Duncan throughout his career.

With the breakup of the Bell System, he was a founding member of ANSI Committee T1 and served as Secretary of Committee T1Y1.2.  Duncan has been contributing to the International Telecommunications Union (ITU) since 1980, including roles as Editor, Liaison, Rapporteur, and Working Party Chair in numerous ITU-T and ITU-D Study Groups. He has also contributed heavily and had leadership roles OASIS Technical Committees and Open Projects, the NTIA Software Transparency Task Force, and the CISA SBOM Working Groups. To a lesser extent, he has also participated in ISO, IETF, the ISSA Cyber Resilience Special Interest Group, the Open Source Security Foundation, I am the Cavalry, Undisruptable27, and numerous hacker conferences.

Working under the banner of his tagline “Think evilly, act ethically,” Duncan has authored numerous papers and secured 18 patents. He has been awarded the US Intelligence Community Seal Medallion (1994), the AT&T Science and Technology Medal (2010), and the OASIS Distinguished Contributor Award (2021). Duncan is also an IEEE Senior Member.

Duncan is currently enjoying a semi-retired status that affords him the opportunity volunteer most of his time to cybersecurity, standards, and supply chain organizations.

In his spare time he loves to travel (all 7 continents, all 50 states, 42 of the 63 National Parks, and numerous hacker cons!), research his ancestors, and design genealogy software in elixir.

For more info about Duncan, see https://www.linkedin.com/in/sfractal/