Rising Cybersecurity Star Hopes New Blockchain Characters Will Get Girls Into Tech
Entrepreneur Ankita Dhakar, 27, is launching a world of
butt-kicking female NFT characters, called Cyber Cosmos
Warriors as she campaigns to increase the number of women
working in tech.
Dhakar is the award-winning founder
of international cybersecurity company SecurityLit, led from
the Waikato, and her new project is called
CyberCosmos.world.
Dhakar was this month announced as
one of three finalists in the Up-and-Coming Cybersecurity
Star category of NZ’s Information Security Association
awards, recognising her advocacy in trying to persuade women
to join STEM careers.
10,000 characters, which were
created in October, are available on CyberCosmos.world from
December 11. It’s part of Dhakar’s mission to inspire
100,000 more women worldwide into STEM careers or Metaverse
membership by the end of 2022.
“I want them to grab
this opportunity early and take advantage of it now,”
Dhakar says. “Women should dominate the metaverse, and
technology with it, at least in NZ if not
elsewhere.”
NFTs are non-fungible tokens, meaning
digital assets tradeable on the Ethereum blockchain. Every
NFT featured an exclusive artwork which gives rarity value
to it. The Metaverse –hyped by Mark Zuckerberg - is a
shared digital realm in which each person has an avatar, and
NFTs can be used to trade anything.
Dhakar believes
her NFTs can achieve three goals in one. The Girl Power
flavour of the artwork attached to each NFT should catch the
attention of school leavers; women taking over an NFT should
get returns on their investments; and each Cyber Cosmos NFT
increases the representation of women in STEM. “I’ve
found from many conversations with women that few are
familiar with NFTs and blockchain,” Dhakar says. “This
is what I hope to change with Cyber
Cosmos.”
CyberCosmos characters resemble a cross
between Xena: Warrior Princess and Black Widow. They come
complete with a detailed science fiction/cybersecurity
mythology in which intergalactic Amazons in the year 2070
form a team which battles to change mindsets about women in
the cyber field and the capability of women to provide
cybersecurity.
The characters represent the fearless
step Dhakar took when leaving India by herself to study
business and commerce in New Zealand in 2015, aged just 22.
After becoming fascinated by cybersecurity risks to
businesses, Dhakar founded SecurityLit in 2020, aged just
27. That year Dhakar won the Women in Security Aotearoa
‘Rising Star’ award, and was later named an IFSEC Global
Influencer.
Dhakar has no reservations about sharing
success this early in her career, and says she feels
CyberCosmos warrior-girls are ideal for young women who,
just like her, might not have fallen into a STEM career if
other women hadn’t encouraged her to follow her
dreams.
“I was a rebellious kid, my parents
weren’t happy when I came to NZ in 2015 to study business
because no one in my family went outside India!” Dhakar
says. “I’m a very passionate person so when I get into
something, I become wholehearted about it.”
MYOB’s
Women in Tech report 2019 found just 23% of NZ ICT workers
are women.
Dhakar encountered exactly this during her
business journey.
“It’s a male-dominated
workforce. A lot of people initially didn’t take me
seriously, but I stayed focused and honest with my vision
and today here I am.”
Dhakar says empathy and equity
are close to her heart. Once the milestone of 50% of sales
is achieved, $25,000 will be donated to an NZ charity
decided by CyberCosmos’s Discord
community.
“We’ll be organising events and
awareness campaigns and looking to provide employment and
internship opportunities to girls looking for that one
chance to get into STEM. One of the first steps will be
networking with other Women in Tech
advocates.”
Dhakar helped organise the challenges
for the most recent Waikato University Cyber Security
Challenge, and her company SecurityLit has a mentoring
programme which has already trained three female
interns.
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