Brian Acton (born 1972/1973) is an American computer programmer and Internet entrepreneur. Acton is the executive chairman of the Signal Technology Foundation, which he co-founded with Moxie Marlinspike in 2018. As of January 10, 2022, Acton also serves as interim CEO of Signal Messenger LLC. He was formerly employed at Yahoo!, and co-founded WhatsApp, a mobile messaging application which was acquired by Facebook in February 2014 for US$19 billion, with Jan Koum. Acton left WhatsApp in September 2017 to start the Signal Foundation. According to Forbes (2020), Acton is the 836th-richest person in the world, with a net worth of $2.5 billion. Acton grew up in Michigan, later moving to Central Florida where he graduated from Lake Howell High School. Acton received a full scholarship to study engineering at the University of Pennsylvania but left after a year to study at Stanford. He graduated from Stanford University in 1994 with a degree in computer science.