# Andy Schwab (@andyschwab.link)

Profile: https://sifa.id/p/andyschwab.link
Headline: Operations & Trust

## About

I work on operational practice and trust infrastructure.
 
The same question runs through both: how do systems coordinate when interests differ, authority is distributed, and adversaries (including AI actors) may outnumber real participants by orders of magnitude.

On the operational side, this involves leading teams, managing processes, and designing the substrates that enable autonomy without chaos. I also advise community-led organizations on operating models and patterns.

On the trust infrastructure side, I'm developing Agency Graphs, a framework that treats identity as composite, trust as probabilistic, and roles as emergent rather than assigned. I'm applying it to moderation, trust, and team building in distributed communities, including the case for rebuilding authentication in environments saturated by AI actors.

Other work includes leading a VC-backed startup, US Army OCS command, tech leadership across venture and nonprofit, advisory work on gubernatorial technology committees, publishing on trust and IT management, and teaching in higher education.

## Experience

- **Supervisor (Sergeant) at Army National Guard** (2005 – 2009)
  Served in roles of increasing responsibility with a focus on developing others to perform complex tasks in challenging environments, including Broadcast Section Leader for a military Public Affairs team.
- **Datacenter Administrator at United States Department of Defense** (2011 – 2013)
  Deployed and maintained critical finance and administrative systems, network services, virtualization infrastructure, and customer support services in an Enterprise environment.
- **Head of Technology at Global Nonprofit** (2013 – 2017)
  Built a strong technical team, simplified and unified processes, improved technology integration, and increased collaboration and security across the organization.
- **Infantryman at US Army** (2001 – 2005)
  Learned that how we treat people really matters.
- **Consultant - Operational Design & Trust Infrastructure  at Independent Practice** (2026 – present)
  Working at the intersection of operational practice and trust infrastructure.
  
  Operational design: advising and supporting mission-aligned organizations on operating model design, particularly where the work is to enable autonomy at scale.
  
  Trust infrastructure: Continuing development of the Agency Graphs framework, a design approach to composite identity and probabilistic trust in decentralized systems. Current focus: applying the framework to adversarial AI environments and moderation challenges in ATProto-based systems.
- **Assistant Professor at New Hampshire Technical Institute** (2017 – 2020)
  Responsible for course development, instruction, and student services within the Software Development degree program, as well as departmental, student community, and governance activities.
- **Startup Engineer at Protocol Labs** (2020 – 2022)
  Directed technology operations for a globally distributed organization; led a team responsible for security, systems, and support in a fast-paced startup environment.
- **Owner, CTO at Unus Cygnus** (2021 – 2023)
  Employed decentralized, permissionless systems to preserve public data of civic and scientific value. This included instantiating a datacenter serving more than 1PiB of cryptographically verified, publicly accessible data from NASA Earth Exchange, Smithsonian Open Access, NASA Terra Fusion, NOAA NEXRAD, and other open data initiatives.
- **Founder & CEO at Sodal** (2024 – 2026)
  Building open tools to make digital collaboration faster and safer for everyone.
- **Owner at Schwab Communications** (2008 – 2012)
  Provided technology consulting, infrastructure support, and web development services for SMBs.
- **Section Manager (Lieutenant) at Army National Guard** (2009 – 2014)
  Roles included Platoon Leader, Public Affairs Officer, and Planning Officer. Conducted training and operations in the US, Southern Command, and Southwest Asia.
- **Operations Manager (Captain) at Army National Guard** (2014 – 2018)
  Roles included Company Commander, Senior Platoon Trainer, and Operations Officer.
- **Director (Major) at Army National Guard** (2018 – 2021)
  Director (Commander) of the Officer Candidate School, Georgia Army National Guard.
- **Security Engineer at Protocol Labs** (2023 – 2024)
  Researched, designed, developed, and deployed novel identity and security solutions for distributed teams. Focus was on enabling greater speed and safety for people working together outside of a traditional business hierarchy, including open source development projects, decentralized autonomous organizations (DAOs), and cross-startup collaborations involving thousands of independent participating entities.

## Education

- **US Army Infantry School** (2001 – 2002)
- **Defense Information School** (2006 – 2006)
- **Army Logistics University** — Combined Logistics Captains Career Course (QM), RC (2013 – 2013)
- **US Army Air Assault School** (2003 – 2003)
- **Army Logistics University** (2010 – 2010)
- **University of New Hampshire-Manchester** — Bachelor of Science - BS (2007 – 2009)

## Skills

- Information Management
- Organizational Leadership
- Leadership Development
- Leadership
- Operational Planning
- Training
- Security

## Publications

- Reflections on "Don't be evil" — blog.andyschwab.link (https://blog.andyschwab.link/3mnwslox5fk2l)
- Agency Graphs: A Design Framework for Composite Identity and Probabilistic Trust (https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.20040594)
- The Rise of the Adversarial Candidate — blog.andyschwab.link (https://blog.andyschwab.link/3mhsbmu2vds2z)
- Deus Ex Machina — blog.andyschwab.link (https://blog.andyschwab.link/3mehbdv7lgk2j)
- Weakness is not a Solution — blog.andyschwab.link (https://blog.andyschwab.link/3mehbardync2l)
- Context Matters — blog.andyschwab.link (https://blog.andyschwab.link/3mehb3j2cts2j)
- Open Source & Competition — blog.andyschwab.link (https://blog.andyschwab.link/3mehaxu2pwc2j)
- Perfectly Fragile — blog.andyschwab.link (https://blog.andyschwab.link/3mehatu3g4k2w)
- Rebuttal to "Why Crypto Just Won't Die" — blog.andyschwab.link (https://blog.andyschwab.link/3mehapm76ks2w)
- Marketing is the Mission — blog.andyschwab.link (https://blog.andyschwab.link/3mehala3wp22c)
- Leadership Predispositions — blog.andyschwab.link (https://blog.andyschwab.link/3mehafeomn22w)
- The Joy of AI Dread — blog.andyschwab.link (https://blog.andyschwab.link/3mehad5abkc2j)
- Privacy (or not) is a Systems Property — blog.andyschwab.link (https://blog.andyschwab.link/3meha5zukgs2w)
- Security is a UX Problem — blog.andyschwab.link (https://blog.andyschwab.link/3meha34wflk2j)
- The Risk of Enforcing the Status Quo — blog.andyschwab.link (https://blog.andyschwab.link/3meh7wumqds2j)
- The Economics of Deception — blog.andyschwab.link (https://blog.andyschwab.link/3meh7qrni3s2r)
- AI and Attorney Woo — blog.andyschwab.link (https://blog.andyschwab.link/3meh7cynnxs2q)
- Ultralight IT: A Guide for Smaller Organizations — Gordium Publishing (https://www.amazon.com/dp/0997869305)

## Volunteering

- Governor's Commission on Cryptocurrencies and Digital Assets at Office of Governor Christopher T. Sununu
- Industrial Advisory Board Member at University of New Hampshire-Manchester
- Governor Kelly Ayotte's Commission to Study Stable Tokens at Office of Governor Kelly Ayotte
- Founding Member at New Hampshire Blockchain Council

## Other profiles

- linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/andrewsch
- bsky: https://bsky.app/profile/andyschwab.link
- dns: https://andyschwab.link
- github: https://github.com/andyschwab