Speakers

Mel is a multi awarded Digital Risk Leader, International Speaker and a Columnist at TechWatch PH. She is the Southeast Asia Regional Director and the Country Head and General Manager for Philippines for Gogolook, a leading Global TrustTech company. She is also the Security Governance Director in Global Anti Scam Alliance (GASA) based in Netherlands and the Vice Chair for Global Anti Scam Alliance Philippines Chapter. She is the Founder and President and President of the Philippines Chief Information Officer Association (PCIOA) and Chapter Leader for Women and Youth in Technology. She is part Executive Committee member of the ASEAN CIO Association. Concurrently, she is the Chairman and President of the Women in Security Alliance Philippines (WiSAP). Mel is a 2025 ACES Awardee for Most Inspiring Executives, 2024 Asia CEO Awardee for Woman of the Year and one of our country’s representative to speak on Sheconomy in the Women Economic Forum ASEAN 2025 held in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia.

She has more than 20 years experience in various areas of technology and cybersecurity on IT Project Management, IT Disaster Recovery and Business Continuity Management, IT and OT Infrastructure Management, IT Governance, IT Solutioning, DevSecOps, Cyber Defense Operations, Cyber Governance, Security Engineering, IT Audit, Data Privacy, Enterprise Risk Management and AI Governance and Trustworthiness.

Mel was appointed as the G100 Country Chair for AI, Data and Cybersecurity where she is supporting the G100 Mission on pushing the ethical use of AI in the Sheconomy. She is the only Contributing Author from Asia in Fight Fire With Fire – Proactive Cybersecurity Strategies for Today’s Leaders which was released in the US, Canada and APAC.

Mel has supported a number of Diversity, Equity and Inclusion Programs within APAC. She spearheaded several programs on gender equity and cybersecurity to various communities in the Philippines and within the region.

Mel has been featured as a technology and cybersecurity leader in many publications and has been well known in APAC on her contributions to the community on women empowerment and gender inclusion. Among these are but not limited to: DIGITMES ASIA, Technology Magazine, Cybersecurity Magazine, Energy Digital, Financial Times, NIKKEI ASIA and Enlit Asia. She has appeared in many local media outlets on promoting digital safety and women empowerment. Among these are Business World, Business Mirror, Inquirer.net, Manila Bulletin, Manila Standard, Philippine News Agency, PTV4 , TV5, GMA News, Radyo Pilipinas and DWIZ/Channel 23.

Some of her international awards are but no limited to:

• 2025 ACES Awards - Most Inspiring Executives
• 2024 ASIA CEO Awardee – Woman of the Year
• 2024 Transformational Woman in Digital Risk by Women’s Tabloid Magazine in UK
• 2024 Transformational CIO
• 2023 CISO of Year and Cyber Woman of the Year by Cybersecurity Awards in London
• 2024/2023/2022 Transformative CIO by ETCIO SEA 2023 CIO 100 by World CIO Series
• 2023 100 Most Influential Women in LinkedIn
• 2022 Security Leader of the Year by Women in GRC based in London
• 2022 Top 100 Global Security Leaders by Corinium Global Intelligence
• 2022 Top 1 CSO30 ASEAN Edition
• Top Woman in Security ASEAN in 2022
• 2022 Global Influencer by the International Security Journal (ISJ), UK and was cited by Technology Magazine, Energy Digital and Cyber Magazine as a leading CISO among global cybersecurity leaders.