David Elliott is an affiliate at the Center for International Security and Cooperation and was the Director of its Consortium for Research on Information Security and Policy in 2000-02.  He has contributed, over a number of years, to the Center's work in information security, coauthoring several of its reports and the book The Transnational Dimension of Cyber Crime and Terrorism, published jointly with the Hoover Institution. He was also a contributor to the CISAC study and report: Security in a World with Expanding Nuclear Power.

Elliott served in senior positions in the government and the security research industry, including, as a vice-president, supervising the SRI International's Strategic Study Center and overseeing administration of the Jason group, and as a Senior Vice President at Science Applications International Corporation (SAIC).  He was for five years a senior staff member and Director for Science and Technology of the National Security Council, Executive Office of the President.

Elliott has been on the Executive Committee of the Army Science Board and chairman of its standing committee for strategic missile defense, a member of the advisory committee of the Strategic Defense Initiative office, a participant in several studies of the National Academy of Sciences, including the Post-Challenger Space Shuttle Utilization Review, an advisor to the Director of the Office of Science and Technology Policy in the Executive Office of the President, a consultant to the CIA's R&D program office, a member of the editorial board of the DARPA sponsored Journal of Defense Research, an affiliate of the Institute on Global Conflict & Cooperation of the University of California, and a member of the University of California, Davis, Board of Visitors for the School of Engineering,

Elliott was awarded the Department of the Army Outstanding Civilian Service Medal.  He has a Ph.D. in high energy physics from the California Institute of Technology.