The Security Industry Association (SIA) has named five female biometrics leaders as recipients of the 2023 SIA Women in Biometrics Awards, a globally recognized program presented by SIA with support from sponsor IDEMIA and NEC Corp. of America and organizational and media partners AVISIAN, Biometric Update, FindBiometrics, Mobile ID World and SIA’s Identity & Biometric Technology Advisory Board and Women in Security Forum. The 2023 awardees, who will be honored at SIA GovSummit, SIA’s annual government security conference, are:

Larisa Boyko, director, quality assurance, advanced recognition systems, NEC Corporation of America

Larisa Boyko is an information technology professional with over 20 years of experience in the software development life cycle. As the director of NEC quality assurance (QA), she is also focused on operations process implementation and improvements, release and configuration management, root cause analysis and process improvements. She holds an MBA in finance and financial management and a bachelor’s degree in economics and is certified as a Scrum Master and Product Owner and lead auditor for ISO:9001:2015 and ISO 27001:2013.

Alicia Harrison, chief, stakeholder engagement, Office of Biometric Identity Management (OBIM), U.S. Department of Homeland Security (DHS)

Alicia Harrison has over 16 years of experience as a subject matter expert in the field of biometrics. She currently leads her organization’s stakeholder engagement team in support of OBIM’s role as the principal entity in DHS for biometric identity services that enable mission partner operations. Harrison is responsible for the coordination of stakeholder engagement activities and helps to identify biometric identity management solutions in support of existing OBIM stakeholders. As a business owner of the Automated Biometric Identification System (IDENT) playing a critical role in sharing biometric identity information for the U.S. government, she leads efforts that directly contribute to the security and defense of the nation. Harrison represents OBIM in numerous high-level departmental and interagency venues, demonstrating OBIM’s prominent leadership role in biometric management. Harrison holds a master’s degree in public and international affairs from the University of Pittsburgh and a bachelor’s degree in criminal justice from Gannon University.

Casey Mayfield, senior vice president, justice and public safety, IDEMIA

Casey Mayfield leads IDEMIA’s justice and public safety division, which delivers the company’s state and local hardware, software and Criminal Justice Information Services- (CJIS-)compliant solutions for criminal justice, law enforcement and enrollment services customers throughout the United States and Canada. She is a charter member of the customer advisory board, organized in collaboration with FBI Compact Council initiatives, and serves as the business line leader for the executive user board. She is also a member of the Women In Idemia network, in addition to numerous industry advocacy groups. Mayfield holds a bachelor’s degree in criminal justice from the University of Illinois Springfield. She is a former emergency medical technician and professional in human resources.

C. Maxine Most, principal, Acuity Market Intelligence

Strategic innovator, market visionary and forecasting guru Maxine Most is the founding principal of Acuity Market Intelligence, a strategic research and analysis consultancy recognized as the definitive authority on global biometrics market development. Throughout her 35-year career, Most has evangelized emerging technology on five continents. Since 2001, she has applied her unique ability to bring clarity to the unpredictable and volatile world of emerging technology to the rapidly evolving biometric and digital identity marketplace. Under her leadership, Acuity has provided strategic guidance to Global 1000s, established technology market leaders, startups, and a range of organizations in between. She is a graduate of the University of California San Diego with a multidisciplinary degree in mathematics and computer science and minors in visual arts and economics.

Bethany Retton, management and program analyst, Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI)

Bethany Retton has been involved in research and development at the FBI's CJIS Division for over 10 years. Her projects have included latent search best practices using FBI’s Next Generation Identification system, Universal Latent Workstation software and Latent Quality Metric software and the FBI’s iris pilot. Retton is a member of the International Association for Identification as a certified latent print examiner and the Organization of Scientific Committees for Forensic Science, working to develop standards for iris recognition. Prior to her employment at FBI CJIS, Retton worked as a forensic entomology research aid, adjunct professor, police officer, detective, biometric examiner and latent fingerprint examiner.

For more information, visit: securityindustry.org.