SolarWinds appoints Justin Henkel as chief security officer

SOFIAH NICHOLE SALIVIO

News Editor

SolarWinds has appointed Justin Henkel as Chief Information Security Officer. He joins the software company from OneTrust.

Henkel takes on the role after nearly five years at OneTrust, where he began as Head of the CISO Centre of Excellence and later became Deputy CISO. His work focused on enterprise risk, resilience, and security operations.

The appointment brings in a security executive with experience across government and private-sector roles. Henkel also served as an intelligence officer in the United States Air Force from 2001 to 2025.

Before OneTrust, he held cybersecurity leadership roles at CME Group and iSIGHT Partners, focusing on threat intelligence. His background also includes vulnerability management and third-party risk.

Henkel takes on the remit as organisations face a more complex security environment and growing pressure to manage cyber risk across large, distributed technology estates. SolarWinds sells observability and IT management software to customers operating hybrid and distributed systems.

Security background

Henkel’s career spans military intelligence, financial services, and corporate cybersecurity. That mix is relatively uncommon in senior information security appointments, particularly at software suppliers serving a broad base of enterprise and public-sector customers.

He holds a master’s in intelligence studies, focused on political and military intelligence, from the American Public University System. He also has an executive certificate in technology and operations from MIT Sloan School of Management.

The leadership change also reflects how software groups are placing greater weight on senior security roles as cyber governance becomes more closely tied to operational decision-making. Boards and executive teams are giving resilience, threat monitoring, and third-party risk closer scrutiny.

SolarWinds remains closely associated with cyber resilience in the market’s eyes following the far-reaching security breach disclosed in 2020, which drew sustained attention from customers, regulators, and the wider technology industry. As a result, clients and partners are likely to watch senior security hires at the company closely.

Sudhakar Ramakrishna, President and Chief Executive Officer of SolarWinds, linked the appointment to the company’s security posture and broader technology direction.

“As the threat landscape grows more complex and threat actors more sophisticated, we need a CISO who has operated at the highest levels of both public and private sector security,” said Sudhakar Ramakrishna, President and Chief Executive Officer of SolarWinds.

“Justin’s breadth of experience across government and industry makes him exceptionally well positioned to strengthen our resilience posture as we continue to push the boundaries of what’s possible in AI-driven IT.”

Broader remit

The reference to AI reflects a wider issue facing technology suppliers and their customers as they bring new automation and machine learning tools into production systems. Security leaders are being asked not only to defend infrastructure and applications, but also to assess how those tools affect data handling, access control, and incident response.

At SolarWinds, the Chief Information Security Officer role sits at the intersection of internal security, product trust, and customer assurance. That can include oversight of resilience planning, threat intelligence, security operations, and governance processes that large customers increasingly expect to review.

Henkel described the move as coming at an important moment for the company.

“I’m proud to be joining SolarWinds at such a pivotal moment,” said Justin Henkel, Chief Information Security Officer of SolarWinds.

“I see a company that has shown both singular resilience and genuine innovation, and I believe together we’ll set a new standard for operational resilience that helps our customers confidently accelerate in the age of AI.”

His appointment comes as software companies continue to compete for senior security leaders with experience in intelligence, cyber operations, and enterprise risk. Demand has risen as customers ask tougher questions about how vendors secure products, manage vulnerabilities, and respond to incidents.

That pressure has extended beyond regulated sectors such as finance and government into mainstream enterprise software, where procurement teams often expect more detailed information on security controls and resilience measures before signing contracts.

Henkel’s background in threat intelligence may be particularly relevant in that environment, as companies try to move from reactive incident handling to a broader view of attacker behaviour, supplier exposure, and business continuity. His experience in both the Air Force and private-sector security teams gives him exposure to the cross-disciplinary risks many companies now face.

He joins SolarWinds after serving as Deputy CISO at OneTrust and following a military career that ran from 2001 to 2025.