Katherine Zhou

Katherine (Kat) is a product designer at IBM and the creator of the project. She is passionate about leveraging tech to positively impact others by designing ethical, accessible, and inclusive solutions. When she's not wireframing or prototyping, she's writing and coding.

Kat is currently based in Austin, building IBM Security Connect, a cloud platform for security developers to integrate existing SaaS products that proactively protect enterprises from cyberattacks. Previously, she was in Washington, D.C., designing in the public service via IBM iX.

Her work in ethics began during her years at Duke University with the Kenan Institute for Ethics, which provided her grants to conduct extensive research with vulnerable populations in Santo Domingo and Dublin. As of today, she has spoken all over the country on the necessity of ethics in tech and how designers specifically can lead that movement.

Her hobbies include: developing , volunteering at the Austin Resource Center for the Homeless, hoarding secondhand books, catcalling dogs in Zilker Park, tickling the ivories, and traveling without Google Maps.

Kat can be found on Twitter @katherinemzhou, where she shares her thoughts on design, tech, and politics.

[Programming descriptions are generated by participants and do not necessarily reflect the opinions of SXSW.]