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Nominating Committee | Members 2014

This page contains some background biographical information about each Nominating Committee member.

Members of the Committee

The members of the 2014 Nominating Committee are: Cheryl Langdon-Orr (Chair), Stéphane Van Gelder (Chair Elect), Yrjö Länsipuro (Associate Chair), Ron Andruff, Satish Babu, John Berryhill, Alain Bidron, Don Blumenthal, Veronica Cretu, Sarah B. Deutsch, Robert Guerra, Hans Petter Holen, Louis Houle, Juhani Juselius, Brenden Kuerbis, Bill Manning, John McElwaine, Russ Mundy, Vanda Scartezini and Fatimata Seye Sylla.

2014 NomCom Leadership Team

Cheryl Langdon-Orr – Chair

Photograph of Cheryl Langdon-Orr – Chair

About me:- Thirty(ish) years ago I left my Post-Grad research and career as a tutor in Physiology (continuing as Teaching Associate at the Asia Pacific Research Institute of Macquarie University during the early 2000 years) to operate our family owned micro enterprise, Hovtek Pty. Limited, see http://www.hovtek.com.au; and still do so today.

I am a telecommuter, and licensee of domain names in .au as well as in the global DNS, but most importantly, I am an avid end-user of the Internet for work and recreation. Twelve years ago we started a spin off project called BuildersNet, which was developed from some of the TQM (ISO-9002 etc.,) activities of Hovtek. Eight years ago this became a stand-alone Pty Limited Australian Company, and relies totally on the Internet to facilitate its operation http://www.buildersnet.com.au/. Our clients in Australia are Micro Businesses and SMEs - and internationally mainly SMEs and Government or Aid Funded bodies; We service and communicate with them almost exclusively online and the majority of our importation of raw materials and products as well as export documentation bookings etc. is now handled that way.

I believe the Internet should be seen as a public asset and needs to be developed and maintained as a cost-effective and accessible resource for communication, education, community, social and business opportunities by the Australian and wider global community; my work within ICANN with its remit as the coordinator of the unique identifiers (addressing) across i.e. in the Naming, Numbering and Nomenclature within the Internet Ecosystem with its commitment to a multi-stakeholder, bottom-up consensus driven policy development model is an essential part of this aim. In October 2012 I was appointed by the ICANN Board as tne 2013 NomCom Chair Elect and in 2013 have been coinfirmed as the NomCom Chair for 2014. Elsewhere within the ICANN Community I have served on a number of Working Groups, Work Teams and Task Forces (listed and linked below. My ALAC / At-Large Statement of Interest (SOI) is found here Cheryl Langdon-Orr SOI and my GNSO Statement of Interest (SOI) found here Cheryl Langdon-Orr GNSO – SOI;

My focus and ongoing interests are not specifically technical but rather more consumer and end user focused. Until May 2009 when the Council was dissolved I represent ISOC-AU in the Australian Communication Alliance Consumer Advisory Council) see http://www.acif.com.au/ with a keen interest in Policy Development, Access, Outreach and Regulatory issues. In late 2012 I was appointed as a consumer advocate representative to the Australian Communications Compliance (CommCom) Advisory Committee a new independent code monitoring (and reporting) body, that is to ensure that Carriage Service Providers (CSPs) in Australia are compliant with the Telecommunications Consumer Protection (TCP) Code.

I was an Individual Member (prior to the formation of our Chapter) of ISOC and am a Director of ISOC-AU (see https://www.isoc-au.org.au/) since being elected in 2001 I have served as Hon Treasurer from 2003-09, Hon. Company Secretary 2010 -12 and as a non Executive Director since then. see http://isoc-au.org.au/Organisation/Dirs.html

I am a Member of auDA, serving on its Board of Directors now for my fifth term of office in the Demand Class (User Interests) stakeholder category since October 2012 See http://www.auda.org.au/board/members/; previously I have worked on several auDA Policy Advisory Panels between 2000 and 2004, and serve as the Chair of the Domain Name Industry Code of Practice Committee, and Chair the auDA Board Governance Committee, and as part of the auDA Board Finance Committee.

In 2008 and 2009 in addition to my work within APRALO and ALAC and specifically within the arena of communications consumer advocacy in Australia I was instrumental in the formation of a new National peak body to act as a co-ordinated voice of communications consumers Australian Communications Consumer Action Network (ACCAN) which is now an At-Large Structure (ALS) in the Asia Pacific Region of the ICANN At-Large Community

See http://www.accan.org.au/; http://www.minister.dbcde.gov.au/media/media_releases/2008/030; http://www.minister.dbcde.gov.au/media/media_releases/2008/061

I am also a member of Women On Boards (http://www.womenonboards.org.au/; and am both an individual and corporate member representative in ACCAN http://www.accan.org.au/; and an active member of the NSW Chapter of Females in Information Technology and Telecommunications (FITT) http://fifi1248.staging-iis7-2.netregistry.net/, now formally renamed Women in ICT Australia Incorporated (WICTA) under a new constitution.

For more details please see any or all of the following web sources:

http://about.me/cheryl.LangdonOrr

https://community.icann.org/display/~cheryl.langdon-orr/Home

http://www.womenonboards.org.au/my/profile/view?pid=1861

http://au.linkedin.com/pub/cheryl-langdon-orr/0/a93/956

 

Stéphane Van Gelder – Chair Elect

Photograph of Stéphane Van Gelder – Chair Elect

Stéphane is Chairman and Managing Director of Milathan LTD. (www.milathan.com) a provider of domain name and Internet intelligence. Services include evaluating domain name requirements and refining naming strategies, sourcing domain management partners, identifying new industry trends, analysis and participating in Internet governance processes, determining general online strategies and also providing senior management advice…

Previously, Stéphane was General Manager of Indom, a corporate domain registrar which he cofounded in 1999 and sold to Group NBT in 2010.

Stéphane has been active in Internet governance for years. He was a board member for the French registry AFNIC from 2004 to 2010. He was elected treasurer of ICANN's Registrar Stakeholder Group in 2008, and that group's European representative on the GNSO Council that same year. Stéphane was elected Vice Chair of the GNSO Council in 2009 and Chair the following year. He was re-elected as GNSO Council Chair at the 2011 Dakar ICANN meeting. Stéphane currently serves on ICANN's Nominating Committee and has just been selected by the ICANN Board to serve as that committee's Chair Elect for 2014.

Stéphane earned a Bachelor of Science degree in Computer Science from Sussex University (UK). He was a print and TV journalist for ten years before starting Indom.

 

Yrjö Länsipuro – Associate Chair

Photograph of Yrjö Länsipuro – Associate Chair

Yrjö is an independent writer, lecturer and consultant on Information Society and Internet issues, and Vice President of the ISOC Finland, with a career in television journalism, international broadcasting cooperation, public diplomacy and internet governance.

Länsipuro graduated from the University of Tampere, Finland, majoring in political science. Starting from the 60's, he worked first as print and then as television journalist for over thirty years, including assigments as bureau chief in New York, Moscow and Hongkong.

Engaged early on in international cooperation among news broadcasters, he participated in the planning and implementation of regional television news exchanges among the Arab countries and the Asia-Pacific as a part-time consultant for the German Friedrich-Ebert Stiftung (FES).

Joining the Foreign Service in 1992, he served as the Press Counselor of the Finnish Embassy in Washington, D.C and as Director General of the Department of Press and Culture of the Ministry for Foreign Affairs in Helsinki. Since 2005, he led Finland's participation in the WSIS process including national coordination of the implementation and follow up of the the WSIS outcomes at various fora such as ITU, Commisson on Science and Technology for Development and Internet Government Forum. He also represented the Finnish government on the Governmental Advisory Committee (GAC) of ICANN and served on the ICANN President's Strategy Committee.

After leaving the government service in 2009, Länsipuro continues his Internet Governance work as an independent professional, serving on the boards of ISOC Finland and the European Regional At-large Organization (RALO) of ICANN, as well as a member of core organizing groups of EuroDIG and Finnish Internet Forum.

Yrjö Länsipuro was a member of the ICANN Nominating Committee 2011-2012 and it's Chair in 2013.


Committee Members

(listed in alphabetical order by family name)

Ron Andruff – Commercial and Business Users Constituency (Small)

Photograph of Ron Andruff – Commercial and Business Users Constituency (Small)

In 1994, on behalf of the Foreign Policy Association (FPA), Ron Andruff undertook an eight-month assessment of emerging electronic media and new technologies that resulted in an acclaimed white paper he authored, widely distributed by the FPA, that provided a comprehensive analysis of the Internet and its impending, widespread impact. In 2004, as founder and president of Tralliance Corporation, Mr. Andruff spearheaded the last large scale test of new top-level domains with the .TRAVEL initiative; from its initial concept through to launch of the first "community-based" top-level domain. Tens of thousands of .TRAVEL domain names were registered under his leadership, an initiative that gained support from more than 140 travel trade associations in 9 industry sectors, across more than 70 countries.

With over 30 years of international marketing experience coupled with over 12 years of intimate knowledge of the intricate workings of ICANN, Mr. Andruff has brought the voice of business to ICANN and the Business Constituency on topics that affect industry on the Internet. He has served on numerous ICANN Working Groups and Teams as part of the Vertical Integration Working Group (VI WG), the Operations Steering Committee (OSC) dealing with restructuring of the GNSO, and on the GNSO Council Operating Procedures Work Team (GCOT), one of its sub-committees. Apart from his Business Constituency committee work, Ron currently serves as Chairman of the GNSO Standing Committee on Improvement Implementation (SCI) and Vice Chair of the IAG-CCT.

Ron Andruff is president & CEO, dotSport LLC, which is bringing to life www.lifedotsport.com, a sport-centric social media platform.

 

Satish Babu – ALAC Representative; Asia/Australia/Pacific Region

Photograph of Satish Babu – ALAC Representative; Asia/Australia/Pacific Region

Satish Babu is presently the Director of the International Centre for Free and Open Source Software (ICFOSS), India, and a past President of the Computer Society of India, an ICANN ALS. He is also a past President of the South East Asian Regional Computer Confederation (SEARCC) and a member of the Member & Geographic Activities Board of IEEE Computer Society. He is associated with several NGOs in the technology & development spaces.

Satish has had a 30-year career spanning the domains of Community Development; Disaster Management; Technology Development; Open Source & related domains; and the IT Industry. He has been an Internet user and advocate since 1993, and ran the first email service in the Kerala province of India in 1994 as a part of the UN Volunteer Project, IndiaLink. In 1997, he conducted a training program on Internet & online tools for associations of fishers in Latin America at the Catholic University, Lima, Peru, on behalf of an international network working in fisheries. He was cited in the IEEE Annual Report of 2005 for his work relating to setting up communication links after the 2004 Indian Ocean Tsunami.

Satish held several elected positions in the Computer Society of India--the country's largest (members as of 31 March 2013: 104,000) and oldest (founded: 1965) professional society in IT--including that of the Vice President and President. In his full-time job, he is the founding Director of ICFOSS, set up in 2009 by the Government of Kerala, India, as an autonomous institution with the mandate of promoting Open Source and related domains. He is also the founder and President (presently on Sabbatical) of an IT Company with offices in the US, Japan, Europe and India.

More details on Satish are available at: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Satish_Babu

 

John Berryhill – Registrars Stakeholder Group

 

Alain Bidron – ISP Constituency Representative

Photograph of Alain Bidron – ISP Constituency Representative

Alain is the Director of the Naming Addressing and Numbering Department of Orange Group (Formerly France Telecom).

He has 18 years of experience in this area at international level. He is engaged with ICANN since it was created in 1998 and has been participating to all ICANN meetings since ICANN 11 back in 2001.

Alain is an executive officer of the Internet Service Providers and Connectivity Providers constituency. He is also an active participant of RIPE.

 

Don Blumenthal – Registries Stakeholder Group

Photograph of Don Blumenthal – Registries Stakeholder Group

Don is Senior Policy Advisor to the Public Interest Registry, concentrating on security and stability, privacy, accountability and transparency, and abuse and other law enforcement related issues. In addition, he is a member of the ICANN Security and Stability Advisory Committee. Don also is an adjunct professor at the University of Michigan School of Information, where he has taught courses on information policy foundations, enterprise security planning, and contemporary privacy issues. Finally, he is a member of the Board of CAUCE, the Coalition Against Unsolicited Commercial Email (CAUCE), one of the first organizations to be active in combatting spam.

Prior to joining PIR, Don was a consultant in Ann Arbor, Michigan, specializing in information security natters. Before Ann Arbor, Don was at headquarters of the U.S. Federal Trade Commission, where his last assignment was to create and manage the Internet Lab, the agency's Internet investigations center. In addition, he provided legal and technical expertise for security and privacy investigations and policy projects and was involved in Internet governance initiatives. Prior to the Internet Lab, Don worked for the FTC in central IT and as a trial attorney. His career also includes time with another federal agency, in private practice, and on U.S. House of Representatives staff.

Don has been a frequent speaker on the topics of Internet and information security, Internet governance, and privacy. He also has been a major contributor to American Bar Association privacy, security, and cybercrime publications, as well as to the ITU Toolkit for Cybercrime Legislation, the Cloud Security Alliance's Security Guidance for Critical Areas of Focus in Cloud Computing, and the 2011 Recommended Security Guidelines for Airport Planning, Design & Construction prepared for the Transportation Security Administration.

Don was the recipient of numerous awards at the FTC, including the Award for Distinguished Service in 2006. He holds a J.D. from the University of Pennsylvania and a B.A. from Oberlin College. Don lives near Ann Arbor with his wife, Jane, Associate University Librarian and Director of the Taubman Health Sciences Library at the University of Michigan

 

Veronica Cretu – ALAC Representative; Europe Region

Photograph of Veronica Cretu – ALAC Representative; Europe Region

Veronica Cretu comes from Chisinau, Republic of Moldova where she runs the Open Government Institute (http://opengov.si.md/) and coordinates a civil society working group on E-Government/Open Government (part of National Participation Council). She is also a member of the civil society advisory board of UN Women Moldova.

Veronica has been recently re-elected as a member of the Multistakeholder Advisory Group (MAG) to the Internet Governance Forum (IGF). She's been a MAG member since 2012.

Veronica is currently a member of the civil society Steering Committee of the Open Government Partnership (OGP) and EURALO representative on the Nominating Committee (NomCom) at ICANN since 2013. Veronica is also a member of Board Candidate Evaluation Committee (BCEC) at ICANN, representing EURALO. She is a former At Large Advisory Committee Member (ALAC) at ICANN (2007-2008).

She brings more than 10 years of experience in the not-for-profit sector both in Moldova and abroad. Veronica was part of the Internet Governance Capacity Building Program team of DiploFoundation back in 2005-2007. She worked as critical thinking expert for Open Society Foundations in Liberia (West Africa), Turkey and Nepal during 2007-2010. She is actively involved in open government, open data, citizen engagement in decision-making related initiatives both in Moldova and in the region. She worked with the World Bank during 2011 on Open Government related initiatives in Moldova.

Veronica managed national scale initiatives and projects. Her areas of expertise include: Open Government, Community Development, Capacity Building (ToTs, etc), Internet Governance, Organizational Development, Project management, Health Education, Critical Thinking, others.

Veronica holds a postgraduate diploma in Diplomacy from Mediterranean Academy of Diplomatic Studies, University of Malta and currently completing her MA Studies in Contemporary Diplomacy with University of Malta.

 

Sarah B. Deutsch – Commercial and Business Users Constituency (Large)

Photograph of Sarah B. Deutsch – Commercial and Business Users Constituency (Large)

Sarah Deutsch is Vice President and Deputy General Counsel for Verizon Communications. Her current practice covers a wide range of legal issues in the areas of global intellectual property, including copyrights, trademarks and patents, Internet policy, liability, and Internet jurisdiction. She has also represented Verizon on a host of domestic and international Internet issues ranging from Internet governance, domain names, digital copyright issues, cybercrime and other international copyright and trademark issues.

Sarah was one of five negotiators for the U.S. telecommunications industry who negotiated service provider provisions that resulted in the passage of the Digital Millenium Copyright Act. She has participated in ICANN since its inception and was also actively involved with Congress in the passage of the Anti-Cybersquatting Act.

 

Robert Guerra – SSAC Representative

Photograph of Robert Guerra – SSAC Representative

Robert is a civil society expert specializing in issues of internet governance, cyber security, social networking, multi-stakeholder participation, internet freedom and human rights. Robert is the founder of Privaterra, a Canadian based organization that works with private industry and nongovernmental organizations to assist them with issues of data privacy, secures communications, information security, internet governance and internet freedom. Robert also works as special adviser to The Citizen Lab and Canada Centre for Global Security Studies at the Munk School of Global Affairs at the University of Toronto.

Robert serves as a member of ICANN's Security and Stability Advisory Committee (SSAC), as well as a member of the US IGF Steering Committee. Additionally he has participated as a member of the official Canadian delegation at two UN World Summits on the Information Society (WSIS).

Robert has given numerous media interviews and often is invited to share his views on the challenges being faced by social justice organizations in regards to surveillance, censorship and privacy. He advises numerous non-profits, foundations, governments and international organizations, including Computer Professionals for Social Responsibility (CPSR), Taking IT Global, Diplo Foundation's Internet Governance and Policy Capacity Building Program (IGPCBP), and The Open Net Initiative.

 

Hans Petter Holen – Address Supporting Organization Advisory Committee

Photograph of Hans Petter Holen – Address Supporting Organization Advisory Committee

Hans Petter Holen from Norway is Deputy Chair of RIPE – the open policy forum for for the regional internet registry for Europe and Middle East, since 2013. He has been actively involved in RIPE and the Internet industry for over 20 years. His extensive and long-standing first-hand knowledge of global IP address policy creation was developed in the RIPE Address Policy Working Group, of which he was Chair from 1998 to 2007.

Hans Petter has also been part of ICANN's ASO Address Council aso.icann.org since its formation in 1999 until 2013 where he spent 10 years as Chair or Co Chair.

He has also been on the policy advisory board NORPOL for the Norwegian ccTLD for .no – Norid – from 2003 to 2013 and prior to that on the dispute resolution function NOK from 2001 to 2003 and is now serving on a strategy panel for NORID.

He is also a member of the Norwegian IPv6 forum and has been deputy chair of ISOC Chapter Norway from 1997 and part of the interim board tasked to rejuvenate the chapter in 2013.

Hans Petter graduated from The University of Oslo (1988) with a Bachelor's Degree in Computer Science with a year from University of York as part of the degree., He continued with further studies at the University Oslo, while working at the University Computing Centre administering the Norwegian EuNet node, name server for .no. In 1991 he was one of the founders of Oslonett AS, one of Norway's first commercial ISPs, and since has been working for other ISPs and content providers.

Since 2004 he has been working for Visma, a Nordic IT company, as IT Director and Managing Director for Visma IT & Communications until August 2013. He is now working with corporate IT projects in the Visma group.

He is also board member of Visma Personnel AS, a recruitment company in the Visma Group, and advisor to the board in the Visma companies Active 24 and Loopia, registrars operating in Norway, Sweden, the Czech Republic and other European countries.

On his spare time he plays the viola in the University of Oslo Symphony Orchestra and Norwegian folk music on his violin for folk dance groups in "Bondeungdomslaget i Oslo". He is also deputy board member of the society´s businesses the "Best Western Hotel Bonedeheimen" with restaurant "Kaffistova" and the craft shops "Heimen Husflid" and "Den Norske Husfliden".

 

Louis Houle – ALAC Representative; North America Region

Louis Houle - ALAC Representative; North America Region

Graduate of Laval University, with post-graduate studies in public administration where Louis worked 28 years and is now a senior advisor at IPSO-Québec Institute (IQI). IQI offers expertise in knowledge sharing within an organization and between organizations. IQI focuses on IT best practices, integrated information and document management and the use of open, flexible and scalable systems.

Louis also serves for Connect Quebec since 2007, an organization that focuses on High Speed Internet development in Quebec regions facing Internet accessibility deficits. Training and knowledge transfer is provided to create expertise and new skills in the regions.

Louis is president of ISOC Quebec Chapter (Internet Society). Louis contributed to the NARALO founding where he still serves as an At-Large delegate.

 

Juhani Juselius – ccNSO Representative

Photograph of Juhani Juselius – ccNSO Representative

Juhani Juselius is the Head of the Products and Services at Finnish Communications Regulatory Authority (FICORA) and he is responsible for .FI ccTLD, telephone network numbering, undelivered mail service center and short term tv and radio licenses in Finland. Juhani has been registry manager for .FI since 2004 being responsible not only for technical and operational services but also for dispute resolution service.

In 2010-2013 Juhani was involved in a new gTLD project of TLD Registry Ltd that lead to submittal of 2 IDN and 1 ASCII applications.

Juhani has been the board member of the Council of European National Top Level Domain Registries (CENTR) in 2010-2012 and the Councilor for the ccNSO Council in 2009-2012. In addition Juhani holds the vice Chair position in HETKY – a significant ICT related association in Helsinki. Juhani has attended ICANN meetings since 2005.

Prior entering into domain name world Juhani was an Application Engineer in Imatran Voima participating a power plant project in Russia in 1995-1998. In 1998 Juhani joined Sonera, the largest telecom operator in Finland, serving as the Product Manager for various Internet related services. Some of them, like "Global IP" wholesale Internet capacity for international markets and "Private Label" dial access for domestic market Juhani commercialized from an idea on paper to the first completed contracts.

Juhani holds M.Sc. in Engineering but has studied Business Administration extensively as well.

When not at work, Juhani likes running, bicycling, paddling and just playing with kids and the dog.

 

Brenden Kuerbis – Non Commercial Users Constituency

Brenden Kuerbis – Non Commercial Users Constituency

Dr Brenden Kuerbis is a Research Consultant at Syracuse University's School of Information Studies and past Fellow in Internet Security Governance at the Citizen Lab, Munk School of Global Affairs, Unversity of Toronto. Kuerbis's research focuses on the governance and security of Internet identifiers (e.g., domain names, IP addresses). He is a contributor to the Internet Governance Project, a leading source for coverage and analysis of the management of critical Internet resources and political economy of global Internet policy that is widely read by governments, industry and civil society. Brenden is also a member of the Non Commercial Users Constituency (NCUC) at ICANN, having volunteered two terms on its Executive Committee, and as the past Communications Committee Chair of the Global Internet Governance Academic Network (GigaNet).

 

Bill Manning – RSSAC Representative

Currently Bill is DNS Operations manager for the "B" root server and a founding member of the root-operators group, ICANNs RSSAC. Bill is a RFC author in several areas - DNS, Routing, and address management and a previous member of ARIN AC and Board. He occasionally provides consulting for US/DoD, most recently on its most recent 5yr strategic plan. PhD Thesis on decomposable DNS services.

 

John McElwaine – Intellectual Properties Constituency

Photograph of John McElwaine – Intellectual Properties Constituency

John C. McElwaine is a partner in the Charleston, SC and Washington, D.C. offices of Nelson Mullins Riley & Scarborough focusing his practice in the cutting-edge fields of intellectual property, Internet, domain name and technology litigation and strategic counseling. In the area of litigation, Mr. McElwaine has been involved with numerous federal and state actions, as well as actions brought at the Trademark Trial and Appeal Board and arbitration proceedings under ICANN's Uniform Domain Name Dispute Resolution Policy (UDRP). His work in the area of strategic counseling involves advising clients on intellectual property matters, including the assignment, licensing and development of applications and other technology, as well as brand protection measures on the Internet and within online social media networks.

Mr. McElwaine is a member of the Intellectual Property Constituency and has served on the ICANN Working Group developing the High Security Top Level Domain Zone Certification and was a member of the Trademark Clearinghouse Implementation Assistance Group (IAG). He currently serves as the chairperson of the New gTLD subcommittee of the Internet Committee for the International Trademark Association (INTA) and is the 2013-2014 vice chairperson of the INTA Internet Committee.

 

Russ Mundy – IAB for IETF

Russ Mundy is the Principal Networking Scientist at Parsons (formerly known as SPARTA, Inc.). His primary responsibilities include research in the areas of Internet infrastructure security, network security, operations security and protocol development. He has responsibility for projects related to Internet infrastructure security, remote network management and their application to industries using the Internet. These efforts focus on all aspects of Internet technologies from initial research, prototype software development, to operational deployment of the technologies on the Internet infrastructure with particular emphasis on DNS and DNS Security (DNSSEC).

Additionally, Mr. Mundy is an active participant of the ICANN and IETF communities. Russ has over thirty years of experience with development, implementation and operation of numerous networking and computer systems.

 

Vanda Scartezini – ALAC Representative; Latin America/Caribbean Region

Photograph of Vanda Scartezini – ALAC Representative; Latin America/Caribbean Region

Electronic engineer with several specializations, more than 35 years in management positions in ICT public and private sector, with several years of Board experience in national and international relevant nonprofit organizations; have worked in important positions in public sector: twice as National Secretary for Industrial Technology and National Secretary for Information Technology Policy, and once as President of Brazilian Patent Office – developing specific policies and being responsible for the approval of two relevant bills – Patent Law and IT Law; has acted as advisor to the Economic Development Secretariat for the São Paulo State Government, developing projects for manufacturing clusters using technology, still running today; Acted also as UNDP Consultant for the State Reform Program under the Ministry of Administration and State Reform.

In the private sector has being participating in the last 30 years in join public & private projects related to ICT field, in legal activities in software and intellectual property disputes, acting as advisor in lawyer offices and environmental companies as well as directly working as consultant in ICT projects to International Agencies in areas as e-commerce policy, environmental policies, best practice and market; has work with States/ Federal Government, including write, advise and/or approval of bills related to Integrated Circuits, Electronic Crimes, Information Technology Law, Software & Copyright and Agricultural Varieties Laws. She has also acted as an expert for several missions at WIPO, IADB and UNCTAD.

Chair of the Board and CEO of ALTIS, a software and service outsourcing facility in Bahia (northeast reagion of the country) to promote higher level employment in that region; Partner at Polo Consultores Associados and IT Trend, both consulting companies, in the market since 1986, recently coordinate a e-waste project policies in the country, a partnership with Ministry of Science and Technology and World Bank-InfoDev, two relevant projects on e-commerce for Mercosul & European Union, has been advising international companies in the ICT local market and investments in Brazil, and co-coordinate a group of companies to promote Brazilian Agrisoftware export.

Has also helped ICT companies to set up their manufacturing plants in Brazil, helping SME local companies to absorb transferred technologies, creating and applying specific methodology for Micro and SME as well as organizing local productive arranges and innovation groups;

In the R&D area has been involved with the setup of several and relevant R&D centers in the country, being responsible for the implementation of the ICT infrastructure and general organization. Nowadays is Chair of the Board of FITEC (www.fitec.org.br) an ICT research & development center, and board member of two others. Vanda has also organized two business associations: ABIMI – microelectronics related industry and NEXTI – ICT Executive Women Association.

Has been volunteer working with ICANN Since 2000 – Internet Corporation for Assigned Names & Numbers, (www.icann.org), a multi-stakeholder model nonprofit organization, having acted as country representative (2000-2004), member of the Board of Directors (Dec 2004 – Dec 2007) , part of the group responsible to create, organize and start up the Fellowship Program from 2006 – term ends in 2010, ALAC – Vice Chair (Dec 2007 - Nov 2009) representing Latin American and Caribbean, Board Member representing ALAC/At Large community (Nov 2009-Dec 2010) and SSAC member - Security & Stability Advisory Committee 2010-2012. As SSAC member was elected to NomCom for 2011 term. Has also been member of CGI.br (2000 – 2004), the responsible organization for the Brazilian country code - .br - , also organized as a multi-stakeholder nonprofit organization in December 2002. Is also member of the Nominating Committee to elect Board of Trustees´ members of ISOC – 2011, was the Chair of the 2012 NomCom, served as the ALAC – LAC representative to the 2013 NomCom, and is a LAC STRATEGY member/ LAC SPACE chair.

Vanda has represented Brazil in several forums as WIPO/ WTO/ MERCOSUR/ FTAA/ Iberoamerican and United Nations, presenting Brazil's policies, specific laws (Patent and IT) and regional agreements, as Declaration of Florianopolis.

Professor of Fundação Getulio Vargas- FGV Rio de Janeiro - Management Business Administration, first teaching MBA regular courses on Intellectual Property for Business and nowadays teaching in company MBA courses on Science, Technology & Innovation Management; is being involved as MBA professor on IT & Sustainability new program from University of São Paulo –USP, teaching IT Public Policies.

Is honorable member of several associations as ISP´s (ABRANET.org.br), Software (ABES.org.br) and e-commerce (Camara-e.net), honorable Citizen of Rio de Janeiro awarded by the Legislative Assembly, Technology Benefactress of Brazilian Army, and has been awarded in the ICT field several times., including as "Brazilian most influent women in ICT" 2007 award, from the most important business newspaper in the country at the time –Gazeta Mercantil.

Outside of the country is member of WTN (World Technology Network), DNS Women (Women Internet Movement) and NACD (National Association of Corporate Directors –USA).

Vanda has organized several IT events and seminars, author and co-author of books and papers and patent granted in 1983.

 

 

Fatimata Seye Sylla – ALAC Representative; Africa Region

Photograph of Fatimata Seye Sylla – ALAC Representative; Africa Region

Madam Fatimata Seye Sylla holds a Master of Science from the Media Lab at Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), a DUT in Computer Science from IUT du Havre in France, a Certificate of Business Administration (CGE ) from CESAG, a regional post graduate management school in Dakar

After 10 years of experience in the Government of Senegal, she has run the USAID "Digital Freedom Initiative" (DFI) program to bridge the digital divide in Senegal. She has capitalized a great deal of leadership activities as Director of private companies in the field of information and communication technologies (ICT) and worked as an expert consultant for several foreign and international organizations such as MIT, UNESCO / BREDA, UN / ECA, ITU, IDRC, UNDP, AAWORD, Francophonie, UN/DAW, ENDA, USAID, etc.

Ms. Seye Sylla is author of several publications and studies in the fields of ICT and education, gender and development, ICT and democracy, Internet governance, mobile banking. She is a founding member of many ICT related associations (ISOC, OSIRIS, FOSSFA ACSIS, Régentic, Bokk Jang), and was nominated member of the At Large Advisory Committee of Internet Corporation for Assigning Names and Numbers (ICANN / ALAC) from November 2007 to November 2009 and Chair of ALAC / AFRALO from 2009 to 2013. Fatimata joined the ICANN NomCom 2014.

From October 2008 to September 2013, Fatimata Seye Sylla was appointed the National ICT Coordinator to connect to internet Senegalese hundreds of middle schools within the USAID -EDB (basic education) project and support access to quality education.

In October 2013, Fatimata is reelected President of the Bokk Jang NGO in Senegal.

Domain Name System
Internationalized Domain Name ,IDN,"IDNs are domain names that include characters used in the local representation of languages that are not written with the twenty-six letters of the basic Latin alphabet ""a-z"". An IDN can contain Latin letters with diacritical marks, as required by many European languages, or may consist of characters from non-Latin scripts such as Arabic or Chinese. Many languages also use other types of digits than the European ""0-9"". The basic Latin alphabet together with the European-Arabic digits are, for the purpose of domain names, termed ""ASCII characters"" (ASCII = American Standard Code for Information Interchange). These are also included in the broader range of ""Unicode characters"" that provides the basis for IDNs. The ""hostname rule"" requires that all domain names of the type under consideration here are stored in the DNS using only the ASCII characters listed above, with the one further addition of the hyphen ""-"". The Unicode form of an IDN therefore requires special encoding before it is entered into the DNS. The following terminology is used when distinguishing between these forms: A domain name consists of a series of ""labels"" (separated by ""dots""). The ASCII form of an IDN label is termed an ""A-label"". All operations defined in the DNS protocol use A-labels exclusively. The Unicode form, which a user expects to be displayed, is termed a ""U-label"". The difference may be illustrated with the Hindi word for ""test"" — परीका — appearing here as a U-label would (in the Devanagari script). A special form of ""ASCII compatible encoding"" (abbreviated ACE) is applied to this to produce the corresponding A-label: xn--11b5bs1di. A domain name that only includes ASCII letters, digits, and hyphens is termed an ""LDH label"". Although the definitions of A-labels and LDH-labels overlap, a name consisting exclusively of LDH labels, such as""icann.org"" is not an IDN."