Rachel Wilson is a Managing Director of Morgan Stanley and Head of Wealth Management Data Security and Infrastructure Risk.
She is responsible for the protection and governance of all sensitive data across Wealth Management networks, applications, hardware and users in both physical and digital form. Rachel and her team work to secure data from all manner of loss, theft or compromise. They also manage all forms of infrastructure risk, including technology risk, business continuity, disaster recovery and resiliency and vendor and third party risk. In addition, Rachel is responsible for ensuring that all Wealth Management data meets regulatory and statutory privacy reuirements. Rachel advises Wealth Management leadership on data security and cyber risks, threats and mitigations and oversees employee and client education and engagement on privacy, data security and cybersecurity topics.
From 2017-2020, Rachel served as the first-ever Head of Wealth Management Cybersecurity. In this role, Rachel advised senior business and technology leaders on a range of cybersecurity issues, including secure code development standards, secure network architecture, vendor relationships, advanced persistent threat (APT) detection and mobile security. Her team drove innovation for new cybersecurity and authentication technology in the pursuit of protecting the integrity and confidentiality of Firm and client data. In 2019, Rachel was recognized by Morgan Stanley Wealth Management as part of the MAKERS Class, a program that honors women who serve as groundbreakers, innovators and advocates. She was also named one of the Top Women in WealthTech 2020 by ThinkAdvisor.
Prior to joining the Firm in 2017, Rachel spent 15 years at the National Security Agency (NSA), where she held several key senior executive-level leadership positions. Between 2008 and 2010, she ran NSAs counterterrorism operations and led a global enterprise in detecting and disrupting terrorist plotting against the U.S. and its allies. Between 2010 and 2012, Rachel served as NSAs Chief of Operations in the U.K., working out of the U.S. Embassy in London. In this role, she worked with U.K. intelligence services to counter terrorist and cyber threats to the 2012 Olympics. Returning to the U.S. in 2012, Rachel spent nearly five years leading NSAs cyber exploitation operations as the Deputy and then Chief of the Remote Operations Center within NSAs Tailored Access Operations. In this capacity, she led the planning and execution of thousands of cyber exploitation operations against a wide array of foreign intelligence, military and cyber targets, and served as the committing official for many of NSAs highest risk and most important intelligence gathering activities.