About
I solve the problems that cross layers
Hardware, firmware, software, infrastructure: I follow the problem wherever it goes, then make the finished system simple to use, deploy, and maintain.
At Rimstorm, that meant taking GovCon Enclave from concept through acquisition and building the teams and automation that operated it.
Origin story
I started at Lockheed Martin in signal processing and neural networks, building sonar feature-extraction algorithms and simulating cyber ranges with more than 10,000 virtual and physical nodes. The research taught rigor; the ranges pulled me toward systems whose failures had immediate operational consequences.
I moved from offensive security tooling into platform engineering, then became Rimstorm's first technical leader. Over five years, GovCon Enclave went from an internal idea to more than fifty production environments and the core platform behind the company's acquisition by BOOST.
Outside that role, I built Mistborn through 25 releases and more than 800 commits, publish vulnerability research, and maintain open-source security and local-AI tools. The common thread is practical: understand the system, make the tradeoffs explicit, and leave it operable by someone other than its author.
That same instinct shows up away from the keyboard. I'm the author of The Wrong Lessons, a nonfiction study of how vivid experience breeds false certainty, and why a few people manage to see clearly anyway.
How I lead
Practiced since 2006, written down at Academy Leadership's Leadership Excellence Course in 2021.
Share credit, own failures
My team gets an open door, candor, and a champion. Wins are shared; failures are mine to own. Team morale is my responsibility, not the team's.
Judgment over hierarchy
Knowledge and judgment are the ultimate source of authority. Every viewpoint gets heard before a decision, and the why gets explained after it, so alignment survives disagreement.
No surprises, no infighting
Bad news travels to me immediately, while it is still cheap to fix. We compete with competitors, never with each other. And families come first, for real.
The track record
- Eagle Scout (Middle Tennessee Council, 2001): the first long project I led to completion
- Zone leader in Toamasina, Madagascar (2006-2007): trusted at 19 with the safety of fellow missionaries on the cyclone coast, through category 5 storms, flooding, and communication blackouts
- Lockheed Martin Engineering Leadership Development Program (2012-2015)
- Leading engineering teams since 2015: built a cloud network automation product and trained the junior team that ran it day to day
- CTO at Rimstorm (2021-2026): built the engineering, development, and maintenance teams behind GovCon Enclave, from concept through acquisition
- Chief Architect, Secure Enclave Platform at BOOST, a Brydon Group company (2026-present)
The full philosophy is in Leading small teams that punch above their weight; the philosophy under load is the GovCon Enclave case study.
The workshop
My actual setup, not an aspirational one.
Environment
- Pop!_OS on a System76 Bonobo WS. Plenty of RAM and cores for VMs
- Vim + tmux for most editing; VS Code when I need visual debugging
- GitLab for everything: repos, CI/CD, issue tracking
Lab
- KVM/QEMU with virt-manager: the native Linux choice
- Isolated VLANs for malware analysis and exploit development practice
Workflow
- Hypothesis → prototype → break it → write down what failed → repeat
- Heavy use of Ansible for anything I might do twice
- Notebook-driven debugging: timestamped logs of what I tried and why
Debugging
- strace and ltrace before reaching for a debugger
- tcpdump/Wireshark for anything network-related, even when I think I know the answer
- git bisect for regressions; printf debugging when I'm impatient
Non-technical interests
The stuff that isn't on a resume but shapes how I think.
Family
Married with three small kids. Most of my free time is hikes through Manassas Battlefield, cushion forts, Dr. Seuss, Star Wars, and hide-and-seek. We speak Portuguese at home; my wife is from Brazil.
Languages
I speak Imerina Malagasy from my LDS mission in Madagascar. In 2008 I interpreted English to Malagasy for a live conference broadcast.
Running
7 marathons finished. Member of the Marine Corps Marathon Runners Club since 2023.
Other pursuits
Motorcycle enthusiast: Honda Shadow Spirit VT1100C.
NAME
steven - chief architect and platform builder
SYNOPSIS
steven [--security] [--automation] [--scale] [--leadership]
DESCRIPTION
Chief Architect at BOOST, a Brydon Group company. Creator of GovCon Enclave, the platform behind Rimstorm's perfect-score CMMC Level 2 assessment and 2026 acquisition. Founder of Stormblest. Builds automated platforms for cybersecurity and infrastructure.
OPTIONS
--security
Architecture that thinks like an attacker. CISSP + eCXD + OSCP.
--automation
2-hour deploys, not 2-week projects. Infrastructure-as-code.
--scale
50+ environments from one codebase. Customers self-serve.
--leadership
Lead from the front. Share the wins, own the losses. Mistakes are tuition, surprises are debt. Speak up early and we'll figure it out.
SEE ALSO
Credentials
Education
M.S., Computer Science
Georgia Institute of Technology
B.S., Electrical Engineering
Brigham Young University
Research recognition
Microsoft Security Response Center (MSRC) bug bounty recipient and 2026 Special Mention
Recognized for reporting a Windows security vulnerability through coordinated disclosure.
Security certifications
CISSP
Certified Information Systems Security Professional
Broad security management certification covering 8 domains.
Active; issued Sep 15, 2021; expires Sep 30, 2027
Verify credentialOSCP
Offensive Security Certified Professional
Hands-on penetration testing under time constraints.
Active; issued May 22, 2021; does not expire
Verify credentialOSWP
Offensive Security Wireless Professional
Wireless network security assessment and exploitation.
Active; issued Sep 4, 2021; does not expire
Verify credentialeCXD
eLearnSecurity Certified eXploit Developer
Advanced exploit development on 32-bit and 64-bit Windows and Linux: bypassing DEP/NX, ASLR, SafeSEH, and stack canaries.
Active; issued May 3, 2022; does not expire
Verify credentialLeadership development
Leadership Excellence Course
Academy Leadership (2021)
Engineering Leadership Development Program
Lockheed Martin (2012–2015)
Scouting
Eagle Scout
Middle Tennessee Council, Boy Scouts of America. Board of review March 28, 2001.
Clearance
Former TS/SCI (2010–2023)
Amateur radio
Amateur Extra: KW4TD
Selected open-source contributions
Android port of ntru_endian.h in a post-quantum
NTRU cryptography implementation.
Three merged PRs: WireGuard IPv6 leak fix, DNS-over-HTTPS via cloudflared, upstream DNS hardening.
Archive-unpack bugfix for non-zip sources in the Python-to-APK build pipeline.
Non-interactive installer support for scripted Raspberry Pi access point deployments.
Work history 15+ years
boost-a-brydon-group-company BOOST, a Brydon Group company | bash Jan 2026 – Present
$ cat boost.log
Chief Architect, Secure Enclave Platform
Herndon, VA
- Named Chief Architect for the Secure Enclave Platform following BOOST LLC's acquisition of Rimstorm
- Architecting next-generation platform-scale delivery of secure enclave environments
- Leading secure platform architecture across the BOOST portfolio
rimstorm-inc-acquired-by-boost-llc-2026 Rimstorm, Inc. (acquired by BOOST LLC, 2026) | bash 2021 – Jan 2026
$ cat rimstorm.log
Chief Technology Officer
Herndon, VA
- Created GovCon Enclave from concept through acquisition, building the security platform for protecting CUI that became part of the BOOST portfolio
- Built and led Rimstorm's engineering, development, and maintenance teams as the company's first technical leader
- Built automation framework reducing enclave deployment from 2 weeks to 2 hours
- Scaled to 50+ production enclaves supporting hundreds of users
stormblest Stormblest | bash 2019 – Present
$ ./mistborn --status
Founder / Principal Engineer
- Created Mistborn: open-source zero-trust networking platform
- Solo-built and maintained 2020-2024 across 25 tagged releases
- Built on Debian + WireGuard with Nextcloud, Jitsi, Vaultwarden
- Designed reproducible deployments for non-specialist admins
redlattice REDLattice | bash 2018 – 2021
$ strings redlattice.bin
Senior Software Engineer
Chantilly, VA
- Built binary analysis and automation pipelines for advanced cyber operations
- Designed and built advanced testing harnesses for virtual and physical hardware
mantech-card ManTech CARD | bash 2015 – 2018
$ ansible-playbook deploy.yml
Principal CNO Software Engineer
Reston, VA
- Developed a cloud network automation product for network deployment and monitoring
- Trained and led a small team of junior engineers running the product day to day
lockheed-martin-atl Lockheed Martin ATL | bash 2009 – 2015
$ python3 research.py --extract features
Research Scientist
Manassas & Arlington, VA
- Engineering Leadership Development Program (2012-2015)
- Neural networks for sonar feature extraction; submitted IP on novel architectures
- Presented "Feature Extraction of Sonar Grams" at the NDIA Joint Undersea Warfare Technology Spring Conference (San Diego, 2010)
- Engineered cyber ranges of 10,000+ virtual and physical nodes
- Special Recognition Awards (2012, 2014, 2015)
Prefer the formal version? View my resume.
Say hello
I'm always happy to talk about security architecture, systems design, or whatever you're building. If you found something useful here, or if you think I got something wrong, I'd like to hear about it.