The Pulse
OpenAI Hires Thomas Lind to Lead Cyber and Strategic Risk
Thomas Lind, a former official at the White House’s Office of the National Cyber Director, has joined OpenAI to lead cyber and strategic risk on its national security policy team, The Information reported. His appointment comes as OpenAI ex
AI.info Team · Written with AI ·
OpenAI’s $1 billion commitment to support frontline cyber defenders now has a new policy counterpart: Thomas Lind, a former official at the White House’s Office of the National Cyber Director, has joined the company’s national security team. Lind will lead cyber and strategic risk, according to The Information, which said an OpenAI spokesperson confirmed the hire.
The appointment brings into OpenAI a recent participant in the Trump administration’s work on AI policy and cybersecurity. Lind previously led AI policy at the Office of the National Cyber Director, or ONCD, a White House office that played a leading role in developing the administration’s June executive order on AI, The Information reported.
From the National Cyber Director’s office to OpenAI
Lind’s responsibilities at OpenAI sit within a national security policy team led by Sasha Baker, a former deputy under secretary of defense for policy in the Biden administration. The Information reported that Lind joined ONCD in April 2025 as senior director for intelligence and became its head of policy about a year later. He left the office in June, according to his LinkedIn profile, as cited by the publication.
Before his ONCD service, Lind worked as an intelligence officer at the National Security Agency, the report said.
“Tom is a key addition to our national security team, bringing expertise across AI policy, cybersecurity, and strategic risk,” Sasha Baker, head of national security policy at OpenAI, said in a statement to The Information.
A policy hire alongside a $1 billion cyber effort
OpenAI announced its Daybreak for Frontline Defenders initiative on September 3, committing $1 billion in subsidized access, training, technical support and partnerships. The company said the program is intended to help organizations such as utilities, local governments and community banks use AI tools to find vulnerabilities, assess threats and develop fixes. It also described a pilot with the Multi-State Information Sharing and Analysis Center for state, local, tribal and territorial cyber defenders.
Daybreak is a cybersecurity program; Lind’s reported remit is policy and strategic risk on the national security team. The two efforts show OpenAI building both cyber-defense services and a government-facing policy operation as federal agencies weigh how to assess advanced AI systems.
The June order sets a voluntary framework
The June executive order gives the National Cyber Director a role in the federal process for evaluating advanced models’ cyber capabilities and developing a voluntary framework for government access to certain models before release. It also calls for coordination between government and industry on vulnerability scanning and remediation. Those provisions help explain why experience inside ONCD could matter to an AI company expanding its national security work.
The order does not establish a licensing regime: it says nothing in the framework authorizes mandatory government licensing, preclearance or permits for developing or releasing AI models. Lind’s appointment adds experience from the office involved in that policy work, while the federal framework itself remains voluntary.