Twitter's chief information security officer, Michael Coates is leaving the company. Coates had announced his decision internally about three weeks ago, but there was no external announcement. Coates is leaving the company to start his own venture. News of his departure was first reported by The Verge.
Coates confirmed the move in a Twitter post.
Twitter has been an amazing ride, but as I mentioned internally a few weeks back, my time is coming to an end. I’m confident to leave the program with an amazing security team. What’s next? I’m off to co-found a security startup - hope to share more about what we’re doing soon!
— Michael Coates (@_mwc) March 21, 2018
Coates who joined Twitter in 2015, oversaw the protection of data on the platform. At Twitter, Coates’ interim replacement is Joseph Camilleri, a senior manager for information security and risk. Camilleri previously filled in for Coates last year when the latter was on paternity leave.
Additionally, Google’s head of information security engineering Michał Zalewski announced on Twitter he was leaving after nearly 11 years. Also, Facebook’s chief security officer, Alex Stamos, announced that he would be leaving the company.