Skip to main content

The context you need, when you need it

When news breaks, you need to understand what actually matters — and what to do about it. At Vox, our mission to help you make sense of the world has never been more vital. But we can’t do it on our own.

We rely on readers like you to fund our journalism. Will you support our work and become a Vox Member today?

Join now

Tanium Names Ex-Googler Scott Rubin as First Communications Chief

Rubin is leaving Andreessen Horowitz for one of its biggest investments.

Via LinkedIn

Tanium, the heavily funded computer security startup, has named its first chief communications officer. Scott Rubin, who spent about eight years in communications jobs for Google and most recently worked for venture capital firm Andreessen Horowitz, started in his new role at Tanium today.

Rubin will be reporting directly to Tanium co-founder and CTO Orion Hindawi. He started in Google’s communications shop in 2008 as senior manager for policy and communications and left in 2014 after a stint as director of corporate communications and public affairs.

By moving to Tanium, he’ll kind of remain within the Andreessen Horowitz family. The VC firm was until recently the company’s only outside investor, pouring in a combined $142 million through last March. That was before TPG, T. Rowe Price and IVP participated in a $120 million round last fall. All in, Tanium has taken more than $260 million and was recently valued at north of $3.5 billion.

Rubin’s is the latest in a series of moves both on the strategy and personnel front. In June, Tanium named David Damato, a former executive with the security company FireEye, as its chief security officer and expanded its offices in Washington, D.C., where it does a lot of business with government agencies and defense firms. In July, it inked a strategic alliance with the consulting firm PwC.

Tanium’s software is a combination of an IT security and systems management tool aimed at large-scale corporate computing environments. The software can quickly scan and map out all the machines and devices running on a corporate network — IT managers like to refer to them collectively as “endpoints” — and track the software running on them. At its most basic level, it helps IT managers at large companies check on the status of the thousands of PCs, servers, printers and other devices on their networks. The software might ask a desktop PC in a far-flung branch office if it has its latest Windows patch, or command a glitchy server on the other side of the country to restart itself. That capability comes in handy when a company is under attack by hackers.

This article originally appeared on Recode.net.

More in Technology

Technology
The case for AI realismThe case for AI realism
Technology

AI isn’t going to be the end of the world — no matter what this documentary sometimes argues.

By Shayna Korol
Politics
OpenAI’s oddly socialist, wildly hypocritical new economic agendaOpenAI’s oddly socialist, wildly hypocritical new economic agenda
Politics

The AI company released a set of highly progressive policy ideas. There’s just one small problem.

By Eric Levitz
Future Perfect
Human bodies aren’t ready to travel to Mars. Space medicine can help.Human bodies aren’t ready to travel to Mars. Space medicine can help.
Future Perfect

Protecting astronauts in space — and maybe even Mars — will help transform health on Earth.

By Shayna Korol
Podcasts
The importance of space toilets, explainedThe importance of space toilets, explained
Podcast
Podcasts

Houston, we have a plumbing problem.

By Peter Balonon-Rosen and Sean Rameswaram
Technology
What happened when they installed ChatGPT on a nuclear supercomputerWhat happened when they installed ChatGPT on a nuclear supercomputer
Technology

How they’re using AI at the lab that created the atom bomb.

By Joshua Keating
Future Perfect
Humanity’s return to the moon is a deeply religious missionHumanity’s return to the moon is a deeply religious mission
Future Perfect

Space barons like Jeff Bezos and Elon Musk don’t seem religious. But their quest to colonize outer space is.

By Sigal Samuel