Lydia Payne-Johnson

Lydia Payne-Johnson is the Director of IT Security, Identity Management and Cybersecurity Risk at The George Washington University. In this role, Lydia is responsible for her teams’ service delivery, including alignment with the university’s digital transformation strategy. She is a dynamic, multi-talented executive with more than 35 years’ experience in regulatory compliance, risk, information security, data management, and consumer marketing across financial services, health information management, and higher education. She is a published subject matter expert, noted industry panellist, speaker, and mentor. She is an exceptional communicator and a culture change agent.

An effective leader, Lydia has been a Chief Privacy Officer and successfully led teams at Freddie Mac, Morgan Stanley, PwC, Verispan and CIT Group. She designed and led the implementation of privacy and cybersecurity policies, standards, risk and controls frameworks, and data classification schema, risk monitoring measures, data loss prevention, incident response, as well as privacy impact and third-party assessments. In addition, Lydia is adept at forging partnerships across businesses, IT, and service lines.

Early in her career, Lydia was Senior Vice-President and Global Advertising Director with Dean Witter Reynolds Inc. At Dean Witter, she was the primary driver overseeing creative processes for the firm’s highly successful, and globally recognizable media campaigns.

Lydia has a J.D. from New York Law School, is a Certified Information Privacy Professional (CIPP) and holds a certification for GIAC Law of Data Security & Investigations (GLEG). She is a graduate of the Executive Leadership Program of the Dartmouth College Tuck School of Business and holds certificates from KPMG’s Executive Leadership Institute for Women and the Securities Industry Institute of the Wharton School of Business