Leadership Team

Michael Gianarakis is CEO of Searchlight Cyber, a leader in premptive cybersecurity. With over a decade in the security industry, Michael has built and led offensive security teams across Asia Pacific and Japan. In 2018 he co-founded Assetnote, a pioneering attack surface management platform acquired by Searchlight Cyber in 2025 – bringing best-in-class ASM capability into the PTEM platform. Michael is a respected security researcher and has presented at DEF CON, Black Hat Asia, BSides Las Vegas, Hack in the Box, AusCERT, Thotcon, 44Con, and OWASP.

Dr. Gareth Owenson is the CTO and Co-Founder of the company Searchlight Cyber, a leader in preemptive cybersecurity. Gareth completed his Ph.D. in Computer Science in 2007 and is a world leader in Tor dark web research. He advises governments, military, and law enforcement on dark web technologies and guides the development of a suite of technologies that have put Searchlight Cyber in the forefront of criminal investigative and intelligence efforts. Gareth co-founded Searchlight Cyber in 2017 to help governments, law enforcement – and today that same attacker intelligence is used by enterprises worldwide to see what attackers are planning and take preemptive action.

Shubham Shah is Chief Security Research Officer, having joined Searchlight Cyber following the acquisition of Assetnote, where he was Co-Founder and CTO. Shubham leads the global security research team whose findings feed directly into Searchlight Exposure – surfacing zero-day vulnerabilities in the tools organisations rely on, often months ahead of public disclosure. He remains a prolific bug bounty hunter ranked in the top 50 hackers on HackerOne, and has presented at various industry events including QCon London, Kiwicon, AusCert, BSides Canberra, and CrikeyCon.

Paul Ciesielski is the Chief Revenue Officer (CRO) at Searchlight Cyber, and is responsible for the company's global go-to-market strategy and overseeing sales and channel partnerships to drive international revenue growth. Ciesielski brings more than 20 years of experience in building and leading high-performance sales organizations within the cybersecurity and technology sectors.

Charlotte Rhodes is Global VP of Marketing at Searchlight Cyber, where she leads the company's marketing strategy across brand, content, demand generation, and communications. She has been instrumental in building Searchlight's profile as the category leader in Preemptive Threat Exposure Management (PTEM).

Timothy Hunt is the Vice President of Customer Success at Searchlight Cyber, where he leads the customer success function across the business. With over a decade in the information security industry, Tim has built and led global teams, which help organizations of all sizes understand their risk, strengthen their security programs, and get measurable value from their security investments.

Jo Compton is the Finance Director at Searchlight Cyber, responsible for the financial strategy, reporting, and forecasting across the business globally. Compton is a CIMA-qualified Chartered Accountant with close to two decades of experience leading finance teams within private equity-backed SaaS and technology businesses.

Ben Jones is the Co-Founder and former CEO of Searchlight Cyber. Ben started his career in defense and aerospace as an engineer designing unmanned aircraft. He transitioned into cybersecurity after recognizing the evolution of warfare towards virtual battlefields and the rapid growth of cyber threats to nations, organizations, and individuals. Searchlight launched in 2017 to help governments and law enforcement protect society from criminal threats across the dark, deep, and clear web. The company has since been involved in some of the world's largest dark web investigations and has now brought that same attacker intelligence and exposure management to enterprise security teams. As a strategic advisor, Ben supports the global cybersecurity firm in driving its commercial growth internationally and the development of its preemptive threat exposure management platform – equipping security teams with the visibility to neutralize threats before they become attacks.