Karen Laughton

Karen graduated from Virginia Tech with a B.S. in Psychology in 2000.  She is the Vice President of Compliance Advisory Services at Coalfire Systems, where she leads a team focused on advising commercial organizations in preparation for assessments against Federal Risk and Authorization Management Program (FedRAMP), International Organization for Standardization (ISO), Service Organization Control (SOC), Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA)/Health Information Trust (HITRUST), and Payment Card Industry (PCI) requirements.  She has over 17 years of compliance experience in both the public and private sectors.  Karen assists C-suite executives of leading cloud service providers in building their go-to-market strategy for transitioning into the Federal market and determining the simplest, most cost effective path for achieving their business and technical/security goals.  She sets the vision and strategy for growing Coalfire's compliance and engineering capabilities to meet client needs and serves as a mentor to a rapidly growing team.  Karen is a Certified Information Systems Security Professional (CISSP) and Certified Information Systems Auditor (CISA).  She served on the board of a pediatric cancer non-profit, the Isabella Santos Foundation, for 5 years and still actively participates in the cause.  She also serves on the National Charity League and Young Men's Service League with her two teenagers and hopes and prays they eventually become Hokies one day!