Work

Dr. Mic Merritt

Merritt Collective · Founder & AI Security Consultant

Research, consulting & security advisory · 2024–present

Through Merritt Collective, I conduct frontier-model cybersecurity evaluations, assessing reasoning, attack paths, exploitation workflows, and emerging offensive capabilities.

I design extended multi-turn adversarial trajectories spanning software exploitation, enterprise environments, critical infrastructure, industrial controls, and space systems. I score technical correctness, reasoning quality, trajectory progression, demonstrated impact, hallucinations, and unsafe behavior.

I review and refine other researchers’ evaluations for realism, consistency, capability boundaries, and harm.

I advise organizations on AI security, adversarial risk, governance, and the security implications of AI adoption. Visit Merritt Collective.

Areas of Expertise

Frontier-model cybersecurity evaluation
AI red teaming and multi-turn adversarial testing
Evaluation and benchmark design
Offensive cyber capability assessment
Cyber harm and risk frameworks
Agentic AI security
Adversary emulation
Critical infrastructure and industrial control systems
Cloud and Kubernetes security
Threat hunting and security automation
Team and program leadership

Career Highlights

Western Governors University · Cybersecurity Instructor

2023–2026 · Past role

Delivered advanced instruction in offensive security, cloud security, digital forensics, and related domains. Named the 2025 School of Technology Instructor of the Year. I am no longer affiliated with WGU.

Oracle Cloud Infrastructure · Senior Principal Security Engineer

2022–2023

Directed offensive-security and adversary-emulation operations against hyperscale cloud infrastructure, coordinating a seven-person red team. Partnered with platform engineering on multi-tenant Kubernetes security and translated offensive findings into security controls.

United States Department of Defense · Cyber Leadership

1997–2021

Progressive roles included Cybersecurity Director, Offensive Security Lead, Cyber Threat Hunting Lead, and security operations leadership. Built offensive-security education and threat-hunting capabilities and led teams across national-security cyber operations.

Education and Credentials

Education

Doctor of Computer Science, Cybersecurity and Information Assurance, Colorado Technical University
Post-Graduate Certificate, Cybersecurity Engineering, SANS Technology Institute
Master of Science, Cybersecurity and Information Assurance, Western Governors University
Post-Baccalaureate Certificate, Data Science, North Carolina State University
Bachelor of Science, Forensics, University of Maryland Global Campus
Multiple associate degrees in cybersecurity, information systems, and technology from the Community College of the Air Force

Certifications

ISC2 CISSP and SSCP
SANS GIAC (GPEN, GCIA, GCFA, GNFA, GCIH, GCTI, GICSP, GLEG, GSTRT, GSEC)
CompTIA (SecurityX, PenTest+, CySA+, Cloud+, Security+)
EC-Council (CEH, CHFI, CNDA)

Engagement

For executive advisory, research collaboration, or speaking inquiries, please visit Merritt Collective.
For training and educational offerings, visit MyByte.

Page updated

Google Sites

Report abuse