Michael Allen is an NDIA Fellow specializing in Cybersecurity.  He was appointed as a Fellow in 2016. He presently is Managing Director at Beacon Global Strategies, LLC where he advises clients in the international security area on strategies that enable them to achieve their business objectives, both in the United States and around the world.

Mr. Allen served as the Majority Staff Director of the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence (HPSCI) from 2011-2013.  Under Chairman Mike Rogers’ (R-MI) direction, the HPSCI restored the process of an annual intelligence authorization bill to fund and give direction to the seventeen elements of the intelligence community, enacting measures for fiscal years 2011, 2012, and 2013.  The HPSCI also led the House of Representatives’ consideration of cyber security legislation, passing the Cyber Information Sharing Protection Act (CISPA) with bipartisan majorities in 2012 and 2013.

Mr. Allen has served in the White House in a variety of national security policy and legislative roles.  At the National Security Council (NSC), he served as Special Assistant to the President and Senior Director for Counter-proliferation Strategy from June 2007 to January 2009 under National Security Advisor Steve Hadley.  As Senior Director, he contributed to the development of the U.S. government’s policy on counter-proliferation issues, including on the Iranian, Syrian, and North Korean nuclear files; missile defense; civilian nuclear cooperation including the U.S.-India Civilian Nuclear Cooperation Agreement; U.S. exports controls; bio-defense; and WMD and terrorism.

As the Special Assistant to the President and Senior Director for Legislative Affairs from March 2005 to June 2007, Mr. Allen was the NSC’s chief liaison with the national security committees of Congress and led the confirmation teams of DNI nominees Negroponte and McConnell and CIA Director General Michael Hayden.

Mr. Allen worked in the legislative affairs office of the White House’s Homeland Security Council from December 2001 to February 2005. As Special Assistant to the President for Legislative Affairs, Mr. Allen was part of team that managed the White House effort to enact the Intelligence Reform and Terrorism Prevention Act of 2004, which created the Office of the Director of National Intelligence.

Mr. Allen received his L.L.M. with distinction in International Law from the Georgetown University Law Center, his J.D. from the University of Alabama (cum laud), and his B.A. from Vanderbilt University.

Mr. Allen is the author of Blinking Red: Crisis and Compromise in American Intelligence After 9/11. (Potomac Books, September 2013).