An alumnus of the National Defence Academy, Indian Military Academy, Military College of Telecommunication Engineering and Indian Institute of Technology (IIT) Kharagpur, Col Nautiyal has held several key leadership and operational roles in both strategic and tactical domains. His career includes vital appointments such as Director (Project) at Air Headquarters, Deputy Commander of the Army Centre for Electromagnetics (ACE), Deputy Chief Signal Officer, Director Information Systems, and Commanding Officer of a frontline ICT unit in Srinagar (J&K), where he ensured secure, fail-safe communications for both military and civil administration, and delivered cybersecurity awareness training to more than 25,000 military personnel. Notably, Col Nautiyal has six years of specialised experience in the cyber domain during his tenure with Signal Intelligence Directorate at the Integrated Headquarters of the Ministry of Defence (Army), where he was involved in cyber related projects. He was involved in conducting red teaming, penetration testing, and cybersecurity audits, significantly enhancing the organisation’s cyber posture. His technical expertise is underpinned by a strong academic foundation, holding an M.Tech in Computer & Information Technology from IIT Kharagpur, and a B.Tech in Electronics & Communication Engineering from MCTE, Mhow. He has also received professional training in Network Security from Learning Tree International, USA, and was awarded a Gold Medal in the Automated Data Processing (SAP) course at MCTE, Mhow. For his exemplary service in Signal Intelligence Directorate at IHQ of MoD (Army), Col Nautiyal was awarded the Chief of Army Staff Commendation Card in 2005. Prior to joining CENJOWS, Col Vivek Nautiyal (Retd) was working with United Service Institution (USI) of India, New Delhi as a Senior Research Fellow where he made exemplary contributions as a Cyber Security Expert. He played a pivotal role in the Cyber First Responder (CFR) Program, an initiative of USI of India conducted in collaboration with CyberPeace and supported by Google.org. He was instrumental in spreading Cyber Security Awareness among thousands of military personnel, their families, NCC cadets and faculty members across the country. Col Nautiyal’s commitment to strengthening cyber resilience across Bharat, professionalism, passion for capacity building and exceptional instructional abilities significantly enhanced the outreach and impact of the program. At CENJOWS, Col Nautiyal focuses on emerging and disruptive technologies, cyber warfare, artificial intelligence and technology-enabled jointness in multi-domain operations. His work examines the strategic implications of technological transformation for national security and India’s pursuit of self-reliance in critical defence technologies.