Eric W. Schmidt began his professional career in the United States Air Force. As an officer, he served as an electrical engineer managing the Air Force’s electromagnetic radio spectrum at the national level in Washington DC and later supported coalition forces while deployed to Saudi Arabia during Operation Desert Storm. The last eight years of his Air Force career he served as federal law enforcement agent assigned to the Air Force Office of Special Investigations conducting criminal investigations and providing counterintelligence operations support throughout the United States and Europe. In addition to his operational duties, he was also the chief technical advisor to the Department of Justice for development of new national legislation regarding search warrants for computer evidence and the Air Force liaison and technical advisor in a sensitive national security investigation led by Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI). Eric retired as a field-grade officer after serving for 21 years. At his retirement from active duty he was serving as the Director of Computer Crime Investigations and Operations providing operational oversight and leadership for all high technology criminal and counterintelligence investigations and operations for the Air Force.

After retirement Eric became an information security consultant with Ernst & Young LLP Security and Technology Solutions practice. As a senior manager, he was responsible for all aspects of developing and operationalizing both the physical security and network incident response program services for Ernst & Young LLP. After three years as a security consultant he was recruited to be the first-ever Chief Information Security Officer (CISO) for the Indiana University School of Medicine and later the CISO for Indiana University Health Sciences. His responsibilities included leading various information security initiatives within the School of Medicine and IU Health Sciences to ensure the school remained is in compliance with University and affiliated entity security policies and procedures, as well as state and federal regulations regarding the security of electronic information. After 12 years at IU, he joined Butler University as the school’s first CISO. At Butler he is responsible to both the university CIO and CFO for providing leadership, strategic direction, and coordination for the university-wide information security initiatives. Eric has a Bachelor of Science degree in Electrical Engineering from The Ohio State University and a Master of Science degree in Technology from Purdue University. He is both a Certified Information Systems Security Professional (CISSP) and a Certified Information Security Manager (CISM).