Elle Zesky

Elle Zesky is a current student in the Nonproliferation and Terrorism Studies program she has concentrations in financial crime and the Russian language, she possesses a Bachelor of Arts from Mercyhurst University in Intelligence with concentrations in Human Intelligence and Cyber Security. She possesses a second Bachelor of Arts from Mercyhurst University in Russian Studies focusing on culture and linguistics. She also attended Cambridge University in London England and focused on War Studies and Writing for Intelligence. She also was awarded the Melikian Fellowship Scholarship from Arizona State University where she studied the Russian language. 

Elle has also worked in many facets of the Intelligence Community, primarily working as an analyst in the areas of counter-human trafficking, area studies, GIS analysis, and linguistics. She has also worked in the private sector as a Business Intelligence Analyst at National Grid where she led a team of data analysts within Business Adoption and Management. She has an extensive background in Information Technology as well as in Cyber Security through companies like MCPc where she worked as a Cyber Security Analyst within a Secure Operations Center. 

Elle is primarily focused on the Cyber Security sector. Elle focuses on topics such as emerging technology like Quantum Computing, Cryptocurrency, Blockchain Technology, Countering Extremist Content Online, AI, Encryption, and Responsible Platform Governance.  She is also passionate about Cyber Humanitarianism topics such as Capacity Building, Community Outreach, Gender Representation, and Equity within STEM fields. 

Elle currently serves as the Cyber Collaborative Graduate Assistant where she works to bring cyber opportunities, speakers, as well as events to campus. Within the Cyber Collaborative Elle also hosts, edits, produces, and recruits for the Cyber Collaborative Podcast, “The Collab”, she also writes and edits the Cyber Collaborative blog, “Bytes”. She also serves as the MIIS student liaison to The Cipher Brief. She also co-coached the MIIS 2021 Cyber 9/12 team, hosted by the Atlantic Council, where the team was awarded ‘Best Teamwork’! Elle is also the President of the MIIS chapter of Women in International Security and she was newly named the President of the MIIS Cybersecurity Student Working Group (CSWG)! Elle recently was also hired as a Graduate Research Assistant at the Center on Terrorism, Extremism, and Counterterrorism (CTEC) and is working on their Extremist Content Monitoring Project!