Independent Consulting Practice
Cybersecurity Consulting, Analysis, and Expert Support
Dr. Yerby provides independent cybersecurity consulting, expert analysis, and advisory support for complex technical, organizational, academic, and legal matters. His work focuses on interpreting evidence, identifying failures in systems and processes, evaluating cybersecurity practices, and communicating defensible findings to decision-makers.
Consulting engagements are selective, project-based, and focused on matters requiring experienced interpretation, independent judgment, and communication across technical and nontechnical audiences.
Engagements may support attorneys, executives, educational institutions, government organizations, investigators, and other professional decision-makers.
Cybersecurity Strategy, Failure Analysis, and Advisory Services
Independent advisory work focused on understanding cybersecurity weaknesses, organizational failures, governance issues, and technology-dependent business processes.
- Cybersecurity program and risk assessment
- Governance, security-control, and policy evaluation
- Analysis of technical, administrative, organizational, and process failures
- Review of cybersecurity findings, reports, recommendations, and competing technical explanations
- Evaluation of security architecture, system design, and control dependencies
- Business-process analysis involving technology, accountability, governance, and operational reliability
- Communication of findings to executives, boards, attorneys, administrators, and institutional leaders
- Pre-engagement scoping to help determine the appropriate type of expert, consultant, laboratory, or service provider
This work is advisory and analytical. It is not marketed as routine technical support, installation, configuration, or day-to-day systems administration.
Investigations, Digital Evidence, and Expert Support
Technical analysis and expert support for investigations, disputes, and matters involving digital evidence, electronic records, or competing technical interpretations.
- Technical assistance with investigations
- Independent review of digital evidence and electronic records
- Interpretation of forensic findings produced by other specialists
- Review and critique of technical conclusions, assumptions, and alternative explanations
- Targeted forensic examination when appropriate to the available tools, evidence, and agreed scope
- Identification of evidentiary limitations, unsupported assumptions, and documentation gaps
- Written reports, deposition support, and courtroom explanation when relevant to an accepted engagement
- Communication of complex findings to legal, investigative, executive, and professional audiences
Dr. Yerby has assisted with investigations and court matters through independent technical consultation, case assessment, evidentiary analysis, technical-discovery support, review of opposing expert reports, independent reporting, deposition support, and testimony when appropriate. Matters that require specialized forensic laboratory capabilities, emergency evidence collection, or high-volume recovery may require another provider or coordinated work with qualified specialists.
Software, Source Code, and Technology Analysis
Targeted technical analysis of software, source code, systems, records, and documented technology behavior.
- Source-code review tied to defined questions and scope
- Software-behavior and system-behavior analysis
- Repository and version-history review, including commits, branches, releases, and configuration changes
- Evaluation of whether observed behavior aligns with documented requirements, representations, policies, or allegations
- Review of technical reports concerning software and systems
- Analysis of system design, information flow, control weaknesses, and process dependencies
- Explanation of findings for legal, executive, academic, investigative, and professional audiences
Source-code and software engagements are targeted and question-driven. The practice does not represent unlimited development capacity, exhaustive review of every platform, guaranteed discovery of every vulnerability, or open-ended review of very large repositories without an agreed scope.
Cybersecurity Education, CAE, and Program Development
Strategic and substantive consulting for colleges, universities, schools, educational organizations, and workforce-development initiatives.
- Cybersecurity curriculum development and academic-program design
- Program review, evaluation, and structured improvement planning
- NSA Center of Academic Excellence in Cyber Defense preparation and knowledge-unit mapping
- CAE evidence identification, preparation, organization, and review
- CAE application, redesignation, and continuing-alignment support
- Course and curriculum mapping, assessment planning, and documentation development
- Student-learning outcome development and faculty development
- Workforce-preparation, competition, and experiential-learning design
- Grant development and grant-supported cybersecurity education initiatives
- Substantive outsourced project work for educational institutions
This category may include strategic advisory work, detailed project execution, or both. No representation is made that an engagement can guarantee accreditation, funding, designation, approval, or agency outcomes.
Engagement Approach
Engagements are project-based and defined by an agreed scope. Dr. Yerby accepts work only when the questions presented fall within documented areas of expertise and can be addressed through available evidence, records, systems, and methods.
Reviews are limited to the materials, access, time, and procedures included in the engagement. No particular finding, recovery result, regulatory approval, audit outcome, litigation result, designation decision, or organizational outcome is guaranteed.
When specialized laboratory services, emergency incident response, managed IT services, routine technical support, or capabilities outside the agreed scope are needed, Dr. Yerby may recommend or coordinate with other qualified providers.
Services are not legal advice or legal representation.
Professional Inquiries
To evaluate fit and scope, an initial inquiry should briefly include:
- Name and organization
- Nature of the matter and the primary question to be addressed
- Relevant industry, institution, system, or program context
- Expected records, evidence, data, documentation, or source code
- Anticipated work product and timeline
- Whether testimony, a written report, presentation, or on-site work may be required
- For legal matters, the law firm, represented party, jurisdiction, case caption, and anticipated litigation schedule
Please do not send confidential, privileged, protected, or irreplaceable materials until conflicts, scope, and engagement terms have been reviewed and confirmed.
Independent consulting services are provided by Dr. Johnathan Yerby in his individual professional capacity and not on behalf of Mercer University. Academic titles and institutional affiliations are provided for professional identification only and do not imply institutional sponsorship, endorsement, responsibility, or participation.
Depending on the timing, anticipated effort, and nature of the engagement, outside professional work may be subject to applicable university disclosure or approval requirements.