root777

ABOUT

About Ajit

I build and secure systems at the intersection of artificial intelligence, cryptography, identity, and financial crime.

The path has moved from AI and robotics research to security engineering, a consumer startup, data platforms, global payments, fraud technology, and now trust systems for the AI era. I have stayed close to the implementation throughout—even when the job became leading large organizations.

Along the way I became a 125+ patent inventor, wrote two books, published research, and spoke about the work. The timeline below is the useful version of the story; LinkedIn has the exhaustive one.

THROUGH-LINE

Each chapter left a primitive the next one needed.

The useful reading is not a sequence of roles. It is a compounding systems practice.

  1. 01CMU · GOOGLE

    Autonomy + scale

    AI decisions under uncertainty, followed by security systems built to operate across massive infrastructure.

  2. 02SKUNKLABS · PROGRESSIVE

    Product + data

    Founder-speed shipping, adversarial economics, cloud adoption, and large-scale data as operating infrastructure.

  3. 03VISA

    Identity + defense

    Tokenization, behavioral signals, and AI-native security products applied at global payment scale.

  4. 04WELLS FARGO · HEALTHEQUITY

    Fraud + trust

    Bank-scale fraud systems converging with identity, agent authority, and accountable AI.

TIMELINE

Research → building → operating at scale.

  1. 01

    HealthEquity

    Head of Fraud, AI & Trust Platforms

    Leading a converged fraud, identity, AI, and trust-platform function. Current work centers on AI-era fraud defense and the security, governance, and accountability of agentic systems.
  2. 02

    Wells Fargo

    Global Head of Fraud Technology & GenAI Claims

    Led global fraud-technology engineering and generative-AI claims in one of the world’s largest financial institutions.
  3. 03

    Visa

    VP, Cybersecurity Products, AI & Engineering · Distinguished Engineer

    Built machine-learning-driven security products and platform defenses at global payment scale. Became one of Visa’s most prolific inventors and one of roughly five Distinguished Engineers in its history.
  4. 04

    Progressive Insurance

    Data Defense & Big-Data Analytics

    Worked on big-data security, telematics platforms, and early enterprise cloud adoption as data became core operating infrastructure.
  5. 05

    SkunkLabs

    Co-founder & CTO

    Built and scaled a consumer startup to roughly 1.5 million monthly active users, including early fraud and bot defenses. The company was acquired.
  6. 06

    Google

    Senior Security Engineer

    Security engineering across internal infrastructure, cryptography, and automated malware detection.
  7. 07

    Carnegie Mellon · Florida Tech

    AI, robotics, and computer engineering

    M.S. work in artificial intelligence and robotics at Carnegie Mellon, connected to the DARPA Grand Challenge, following B.S. and M.S. degrees in computer engineering at Florida Tech.

BEYOND THE ROLES

The work leaves other traces.

BOOKS

Hadoop in Action · Learning Hadoop Security

Two practical books on large-scale data systems and securing them.

PUBLIC SERVICE

U.S. Department of Commerce · LAUSD

Chair of the NTIS Advisory Board and an advisor on secure, resilient systems.

TEACHING + TALKS

SANS · Black Hat · RSA · USENIX Enigma

Teaching and speaking about security, data platforms, behavioral biometrics, fraud, and AI.

RECOGNITION

ISE Executive of the Year · CSO50

Recognition for technical leadership and security products, alongside earlier malware and offensive-security awards.

SELECTED INVENTIONS

A small cut from 125+ global patents.

Proactive Defense of Untrustworthy Machine Learning System

US 12,361,281 B2

Microservice Adaptive Security Hardening

US 12,111,918 B2

Systems and Methods to Secure API Platforms

US 12,052,218 B2

Real-time Entity Anomaly Detection

US 12,301,687 B2

Elsewhere

LinkedIn GitHub Google Scholar X / Twitter