Speaker Biographies

Speakers

Moderators

Gianfranco Incarnato

Cyber Security Coordinator, Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Italy

- Born in Milan on the 16th of September, 1957.
- Married, one daughter


1985 Joined the Italian Diplomatic Service; assigned to DG Cultural Relations.

1987 Second Secretary at Italian Embassy in Mogadishu.

1990 First Secretary, Italian Embassy in Paris.

1995 Counsellor. Head of the Legal Office of DG Personnel (MFA), Rome.

1997 Italian Permanent Mission to the UN in New York (Disarmament, Peace-Keeping and SC).

2001 First Counsellor to the Italian Permanent Delegation to the EU, Brussels (PSC-ESDP).

2005 Assigned to DG Personnel and later DG Human Resources and Administration at the MFA in Rome.

2007 Promoted to Minister Plenipotentiary.

July 2009 Deputy Permanent Representative at the Italian Delegation to NATO, Brussels

August 2013 MFA Rome, Assigned to DG Political Affairs

To serve as Diplomatic Advisor to the Minister for the Environment, Land and Sea from September 24th 2013.

Zoran Stančič

Deputy Director-General, DG CONNECT, European Commission

Dr. Zoran Stančič is Deputy Director-General in the European Commission, DG CONNECT since 2009.

Trained as an engineer he started his professional career as a research assistant at the Department of Archaeology, University of Ljubljana. In 1994 he was employed as the Head of the Spatial Information Centre of the Scientific Research Centre of the Slovenian Academy of Sciences and Arts and Associate Professor at the Department of Geodesy. From 1990 till 2000 he was a research fellow or
visiting professor at the University of Arkansas, the Delft University of Technology, the University of Reading, the Boston University, the University of Trieste and the University of Paris. Zoran Stančič has published seven scientific books and a number of scientific papers on quantitative methods in archaeology and remote sensing.

During 1999 - 2000 he was Deputy Director of the Scientific Research Centre of the Slovenian Academy of Sciences and Arts.

From the year 2000 to 2004 he was State Secretary for Science at the Ministry of Education, Science and Sport in Slovenia.

In the period 2004 - 2009 he served as Deputy Director-General in the European Commission, DG Research.

Eugenio Orlandi

Deputy Director, Capabilities Department, Europol

Mr Orlandi received the Dr Ing. Degree in Electronic Engineering from Rome University in 1979. Since 2007 he is serving as a Deputy Director of Europol with the responsibility of overseeing Finance, Human Resources and Information Communications Technology. From 1980 to 2002 he worked at ACEA SpA, a power and water multi-utility, as a system software specialist; a project manager; an IT manager; a technology innovation manager. He also gained experience in M&A of industrial companies; privatisation and listing in the stock exchange. In 2002 he was posted as a Central Director to AMA SpA.

ICT security has always been at the centre of interest of Mr Orlandi. From 1983 to 1987 he was coordinator of the AICA Physical Security working group and in 1999 acted as the technical responsible for the Rome Y2K Energy supply project. Author of more than 70 articles and papers presented at national and international conferences in Europe, America and Asia, Mr Orlandi published 4 books and contributed to 3 books. The text Risk Engineering (1989) remained for several years the only book on ICT risk management in Italian language. In the Nineties it was frequently used by students of Bocconi University as a seminal text for their master theses.

Ivailo Kalfin

Member, European Parliament

Ivailo Kalfin is a Member of the European Parliament from the Group of the Progressive Alliance of Socialists and Democrats (S&D), and Head of the Bulgarian S&D Delegation from 2009 until January 2014. Mr Kalfin serves in the Committees on Budgets (of which he is the S&D Coordinator), Budgetary Control, and the one on Industry, Research and Energy. He was the Parliament co-rapporteur on the EU Multiannual Financial Framework 2014-2020.

Within the Industry committee, Mr Kalfin is mainly forking in the fields of ICT and energy. In relation to the first portfolio, he was the Parliament rapporteur on Critical Information Infrastructure Protection – achievements and next steps: towards global cyber-security (2011/2284(INI)) and on the proposal for a directive amending Directive 2003/98/EC on re-use of public sector information (2011/0430(COD)). He was also the S&D shadow rapporteur for the Network Information Security directive, on Digital Agenda and Broadband. He has also worked on files, related to Cloud computing, Internet of Things and Telecommunications.

Mr Kalfin holds Bachelor and Master degree in International Economic Relations from the University of National and World Economy, Sofia (1988) and Master in International Banking from the Loughborough University, UK (1999). He holds a honorary doctorate of the Loughborough University, UK. Since 2001 he has been Principal Lecturer on the BA course in International Finance and Trade at Portsmouth University, UK

Mr Kalfin was Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Foreign Affairs of the Republic of Bulgaria (2005 - 2009). He was elected MP in the 37th, 38th and 40th National Assemblies and was a member of the Budget and Finance Committee and the Foreign Policy Committee (1995-1997, 2000-2001 and in 2005). Ivailo Kalfin was Economic Affairs Secretary to the President of the Republic of Bulgaria (2002-2005). He ran as candidate for President of the Bulgarian Socialist Party (BSP) at the Presidential Elections in October 2011.

Mr. Kalfin is also member of the European Internet Foundation and sits in the Steering Committee of the European Parliamentary Financial Services Forum.

Anabela Gago

Head of Unit, Organised crime and relations with EMCDD, DG HOME, European Commission

Anabela Gago has recently joined DG HOME, European Commission, where she is currently heading the unit "Organised Crime", after four years as head of cabinet of Commissioner Andor, European Commissioner responsible for Employment and Social Affairs. Before she spent five years in the Cabinet of Commissioner Kovács (Taxation and Customs Union), where she was deputy head of cabinet and primarily responsible for relations with the European Parliament and for customs matters, in addition to non-portfolio issues such as Environment and Justice and Home Affairs. She has worked before for Commissioner Vitorino (Justice and Home Affairs) where her portfolio contained notably relations with other institutions, international and enlargement issues, Fundamental Rights. She also assisted her Commissioner during the Convention on the Future of Europe and has a solid experience in international competence issues and bilateral relations, specifically with the US.

During almost nine years in DG Environment, she participated in a number of major international negotiations, in particular on climate change, including the Kyoto Protocol process, access to information, transboundary movements of chemicals and waste. She has also been responsible for bilateral relations with a number of third countries, the Commission’s representative at the OECD Environmental Committee. Anabela Gago then moved to DG Justice and Home Affairs where she was responsible for enlargement negotiations, legal/institutional matters in the field of external relations and relations with the Council of Europe.

Prior to this, she spent two years in the Commission’s Legal Service.

Anabela Gago joined the Commission with the accession of Portugal in 1986, just after acquiring her degree in Law in Lisbon. In Brussels, she obtained a masters degree in European Law at the Université Libre de Bruxelles and studied International Relations at the Centre d’Etudes de Relations Internationales.

Having also worked upon arrival in the Commission as a translator, she speaks five languages fluently; Portuguese, French, English, German, and Spanish.

Jakub Boratynski

Head of Unit, Trust and Security, DG CONNECT, European Commission

Head of unit 'Trust and Security' responsible for cyber security matters within European Commission in Brussels (Directorate-General Communication Networks, Content and Technology), previously head of unit 'Organised crime and relations with EMCDDA' in the European Commission (Directorate-General Home Affairs), which has the lead responsibility for the fight against cybercrime, corruption, sexual abuse of children and confiscation of criminal assets. In relation to cybercrime he was involved in negotiation and drafting of two directives (on cyber-attacks and sexual exploitation of children), establishment of the European Cybercrime Centre (EC3) and drafting of the EU Cyber Security Strategy. Previously worked on EU relations with Russia (Directorate-General External Relations). Before joining the European Commission, he was a Director at the Stefan Batory Foundation in Warsaw and Policy Officer with the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees. Graduate of the London School of Economics and the University of Warsaw (international relations, law).

Heli Tiirmaa-Klaar

Head of Cyber Policy Coordination, European External Action Service

Heli Tiirmaa-Klaar coordinates EU external cyber relations at the European External Action Service. Prior to this position, she was seconded as a Cyber Security Policy Advisor to NATO where she helped to develop the new NATO Cyber Defence Policy and its Action Plan. She has been working on cyber security issues since 2007 when she led an interdepartmental working group to develop the national Cyber Security Strategy after Estonian cyber attacks. In 2008-2010 she coordinated the implementation of Estonia’s Cyber Security Strategy and managed the National Cyber Security Council. She oversaw the development of Estonia’s Critical Information Infrastructure Protection system and facilitated public-private partnerships at national level. She also worked closely with European Union institutions for the launch of the EU Critical Information Infrastructure Protection policy, as well as with other international organisations.

She has served at various managerial positions at the Estonian Ministry of Defence between 1995 and 2005, including the Head of Security Policy Analysis Division, Head of NATO Division and the Head of International Organisations Department.

In 2005-2007, she established the Department of International Studies at the Tallinn University where she introduced the International Relations and Security Studies programmes at graduate level. She has contributed to several academic journals and books.

David Francis

Chief Security Officer, Huawei UK

David Francis is Huawei’s Cyber Security Officer for the UK market. David started his career with British Telecom as an engineer and has held several positions in the IT sector in the UK and the US since.

Prior to joining Huawei, David was a Chief Operating Officer with an eCommerce platform. Also, he has worked for Symantec for over 9 years, of which the last 5 as Vice President of Operations. At Symantec, David was responsible for the SaaS / cloud operations unit, consisting of over 300 staff globally.

Working closely with government and local authority customers, he has a vast experience with cyber security challenges and requirements for both the public and the private sector.

Martin Borrett

Director, IBM Institute for Advanced Security Europe

Martin Borrett is the Director of the IBM Institute of Advanced Security in Europe. He leads the Institute and advises at the most senior level in clients on policy, business, technical and architectural issues associated with security. Martin leads IBM's Security Blueprint work and is co-author of the IBM Redbooks "Introducing the IBM Security Framework and IBM Security Blueprint to Realize Business-Driven Security" and "Understanding SOA Security" . He is Chairman of the European IBM Security User Group community and a member of the board of EOS, the European Organisation for Security. He is a Fellow of the British Computer Society, and a Chartered Engineer (CEng) and member of the IET. Martin has a passion for sailing and has represented Great Britain; he is also a keen tennis player.

Mike Loginov

Chief Strategist EMEA, Enterprise Security Services, HP

Mike is the Chief Strategist for Enterprise Security Services and has responsibility for the EMEA Cyber Security strategy for the Public Sector. His interests include EU Governmental relations and the Cyber Security Digital Agenda. He is a commentator on the evolving cyber threat landscape and the impact that the rapid growth of the internet has on society and organisations.

Prior to this role Mike was the CEO of a Cyber Security Group and co-founder of Executive Risk Magazine – Cyber Security & Risk for Executives. Mike has also served as UK Managing Director for an IT Global Services organisation where he ran teams of ethical hackers, CLAS, CHECK, Risk management and ISO27001 Consultants prior to this being aquired by KPMG.

Mike is a Certified Chief Information Security Officer (C|CISO) and security practice leader with over 30 years’ experience as a retained adviser and consultant to a number of corporates and organisations. He is also an Executive Director for the ISSA (UK) and is an executive member on pan government advisory boards and technology forums on digital security-related matters. He is Chairman of The Cyber Stratagist Forum a group of industry professionals that provides a thought leadership perspective on the bigger issues that affect government, business and society.

He has developed and delivered professional services and education security programmes as a senior director on large secure implementations at national level for household names and FTSE 100 organisations as well as into central government, criminal justice, policing and specialist security services on cyber security initiatives aimed at making the internet a safer place to work and conduct business.

Mike is a regular commentator and public speaker with the media. Previously as an Interim Senior Civil Servant Director (SCS Grade 2 – Military 2* General equivalent) he has worked into ministerial and programme board level in central government on large and complex government initiatives.

Mike was educated in the British Military where he spent the first ten years of his career as a communications technician working in international high security environments. He has worked with a range of government agencies and teams including; CEOP/SOCA, NPIA, MoD, MoJ, special forces, police, Big 4 consultancies and as managing director for a List X GCHQ accredited CLAS and CHECK facility.

Mike is an advisor to industry and government on Cyber Security Next Generation Design including big data analytics, threat monitoring and defence, VOC, SOC and CERT Initiatives and has conducted cyber breach audits on high profile compromised and hacked organisations. He is also an NLP Practitioner and Fellow of the Royal Society of Arts (RSA) and the Institute of Sales and Marketing Management and is a MENSA Top 1% member.

Mike is available to comment and provide a HP ESS View Point on strategic matters relating to Digital (Cyber) security and the impact of breaches, threats and solutions to help defend the Critical National Infrastructure (CNI), Government and Industry.

Carmine Rizzo

Technical Officer and Security Expert, ETSI

Carmine Rizzo has worked in the ETSI Secretariat in France since November 2007. He is the point of reference for security standardization activities and responsible for the supervision, coordination and promotion of ETSI security standardization work within and across various Technical Committees and Working Groups.

He obtained a Master Degree in Electronic/Telecommunication Engineering in Italy, followed by a Ph.D. in Radio Communications in the United Kingdom.

His professional background in the United Kingdom includes experience in the private sector for Nortel Networks as Data Communications Network Engineer, and over five years' experience in the international organization ECMWF (European Centre for Medium-range Weather Forecasts), working in an operational environment for the management of IT projects, services and security.

He has gained, and actively maintains, several professional certifications covering broad aspects of technical security and security management, as well as project management, change management, IT audit, control, and service management.

Graham Willmott

Head of Unit - Research Activities on Security, DG ENTR, European Commission

1982: Degree in Physics from Bristol University

1983-1995: Nuclear Electric/British Energy. Engineer in various U.K. nuclear power stations

1995-2000: European Commission, DG Environment. Responsible for development of assistance programmes to nuclear regulatory authorities in Central and Eastern Europe

2000-2004: European Commission, DG Environment. Member of team that drafted the REACH White Paper, subsequently leader of team that drafted the Commission proposal.

2004- July 2008: European Commission, DG Enterprise. Deputy Head of REACH Unit.

July 2008 – May 2013: European Commission, DG Enterprise. Head of REACH Unit.

May 2013 – date: European Commission, DG Enterprise. Head of Policy and Research in Security Unit.

Steve Purser

Head of Operations Department, European Union Agency for Network and Information Security (ENISA)

Steve Purser was born in the UK and attended the universities of Bristol and East Anglia where he obtained a BSc. in Chemistry and a PhD in Chemical Physics respectively. He started work in 1985 in the area of software development, subsequently progressing to project management and consultancy roles. From 1993 to 2008, he occupied the role of Information Security Manager for a number of companies in the financial sector. He joined ENISA in December 2008 as Head of the Technical Department and is currently responsible for all operational activities of ENISA.

Steve is currently a member of several Steering Boards and Advisory Committees, including notably the Steering Board of the CERT EU and the Programme Board of the EU Cyber Crime Centre. In the area of standards, he is the ENISA representative on the ISO SC 27 working group. As Head of the Core Operations Department, he regularly represents ENISA in international conferences on information security.

He was a co-founder of the 'Club de Securité des Systèmes Informatiques au Luxembourg' (CLUSSIL) and has frequently published articles in the specialised press. He is also the author of 'A Practical Guide to Managing Information Security' (Artech House, 2004).

Jaan Priisalu

Director General, Information Systems Authority of Estonia

Jaan Priisalu is director of the Estonian Information System’s Authority, where he is responsible for coordinating Estonia’s national cyber-security and developing the Estonia’s e-government platform. With over 15 years hands-on experience in dealing with cybercriminals and high-end cyber attacks, he is considered one of the world’s leading experts in defending both critical infrastructure and information assets. He also serves as deputy commander of the Estonian Cyber Defense League.

Previously, Mr. Priisalu has worked as the Head of IT Risk Management for Estonia’s largest bank, where he played a key role in successfully repelling the cyber attacks launched against Estonia in 2007. He has also been a CTO and engineer at several technology start-ups.

He holds masters degrees from Tallinn Technical University and the Université de Paul Sabatier in Toulouse, and is a Certified Information Systems Auditor (CISA).

The Estonian Information Systems Authority is responsible for coordinating national cyber security, administering IT-related public funds and developing public IT solutions, including much of Estonia's e-government infrastructure (used by the public and private sector and unique applications like e-voting). Along with Mr. Priisalu’s arrival in 2011, the EISA gained regulatory oversight over all government IT systems and private sector critical service providers.

The Estonian Cyber Defense League is the cyber unit of Estonia’s national guard. Founded in 2009, the ECDL’s membership contains much of Estonia’s uniformed, public and private sector IT security expertise.

Jos Dumortier

Professor of Law, Director Interdisciplinary Centre for Law and ICT, Head B-CCENTRE

Jos Dumortier is Professor of ICT Law at the University of Leuven (www.kuleuven.be), Director of the Interdisciplinary Research Centre for ICT and Law (ICRI) (www.icri.be) and Research Leader in the iMinds Security Department (www.iminds.be). With his research team he participates in a series of European and national ICT-related R & D projects in particular in the areas of privacy and identity management, information security and e-business. He is the co-founder and current head of the B-CCENTRE (www.b-ccentre.be) and a board member of FITCE Belgium (www.fitce.be).

Prof. Dumortier is also a member of the Bar of Brussels and partner in “time.lex”, a law firm specialized in information and technology law (www.timelex.eu).

He participates in the boards of several national and international scientific and business associations and is a member of various editorial and program committees. He is the editor of the International Encyclopedia of Cyber Law and the author of more than one hundred books and articles on legal issues related to the information society.

Freddy Dezeure

Head of Task Force, CERT-EU

Freddy Dezeure graduated as Master of Science in Engineering in 1982. He was CIO of a private company from 1982 until 1987. After joining the European Commission in 1987, he has held a variety of management functions in administrative, financial and operational areas, in particular in information technology. He has set up the CERT for the EU institutions, agencies and bodies in 2011 and he has been
Head of CERT-EU since then.

John W. Bird

Department of Homeland Security Attaché, US Mission to the EU

John Wallace “Wally” Bird has been serving as the Department of Homeland Security Attaché to the United States Mission to the European Union and the United States Mission to NATO since October 16, 2012.

Wally’s current responsibilities include the portfolios of coordinating Department of Homeland Security responsibilities such as border security, passenger name records, migration, data protection and privacy and cyber security. He currently chairs the U.S EU Mission, NATO and U.S. Embassy to Belgium Tri-mission Cyber Working Group. His last position was Deputy Chief of the International Operations Division, U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) in the Department of Homeland Security. The USCIS office is responsible for immigration benefits operations in 25 offices around the world, and administers parole and Cuban Haitian Entrant programs. Wally served as USCIS Field Office Director in Havana, Cuba from May 2004 through November 2006. He started his federal government career with the legacy Immigration and Naturalization Service (INS) in November 1994 as an Asylum Officer. Before joining INS, he practiced immigration law. His overseas experience includes working with USCIS refugee programs in Guam, Kenya, Ecuador, Costa Rica and Colombia. He graduated from the Harvard Senior Executive Fellows Program in March 2012 and the Organization of American States Inter American Defense College Class 47 in July 2008, and holds a Juris Doctor from Seton Hall Law School and a Bachelor’s Degree from Rutgers University. Wally speaks English, Spanish and French.

Ulrich Seldeslachts

Managing Director, LSEC (Leaders in Security)

Ulrich Seldeslachts joined LSEC - Leaders In Security, a European not for profit association representing the ICT Security Industry late 2006, to support the organization in its future growth strategy. With over 135 industry members, more than 7000 enterprise and government it security professionals connected, Ulrich runs a team of 8 security and innovation professionals in the Netherlands, UK and Belgium to further develop the collaboration between ICT security industry, research and public authorities.

LSEC is active in FP7 and Competitiveness and Innovation Programs in Europe and on a number of other research projects, where it brings industrial expertise to the research table, connecting to user communities and end users.

LSEC is a partner in FP7 projects:

- IPACSO, on the development of an innovation framework for cyber security and privacy;
- FIRE, bringing together cyber security research and industry;
- IWT project Nebucom, together with Agoria ICT (business federation of ICT companies) and Sirris (industrial developments) on the development of secure cloud solutions for industry. ACDC, the European anti-botnet pilot action in charge over the pilot developments.

Ulrich will also be stressing the importance of International cooperation for Cyber Security from the Building International Cooperation for Trustworthy ICT project perspective.

Prior to LSEC, Ulrich has started the European branch of SprintClearwire the North-American Wireless Broadband operator, founded by Craig Mc Caw. Ulrich was responsible for the development of 7 broadband wireless operations throughout Europe. Ulrich has an experience in business and corporate development, and company innovation. He led the Venture Capital company of the Belgian incumbent telecoms operator Belgacom between 1998 and 2003. He aims to use his experiences to solidify the further growth of Information Security business throughout Europe with worldwide recognition of the it security expertise of Europe.

Luca Compagna

Research Architect, SAP Product Security Research

Dr. Luca Compagna joined SAP in 2006. He is part of the Product Security Research at SAP where is contributing to the SAP research strategy and responsible for various internally- and externally-funded research projects. He received his MSc in Informatics Engineering from the University of Genova and his Ph.D. in Computer Science jointly from the University of Genova and Edinburgh. His area of interests include cyber-security, security engineering, automated reasoning, security testing, and their application to industrial relevant scenarios. He contributed to various projects on information security and he has published various scientific publications in his area of interest.

Fabio Martinelli

Senior Researcher, Instituto di Informatica e Telematica, National Research Council, Italy

Fabio Martinelli is a senior researcher of Institute of Informatics and Telematics (IIT) of the Italian National Research Council (CNR) where He leads the security project. He is co-author of more than two hundreds of papers on international journals and conference/workshop proceedings. His main research interests involve security and privacy in distributed and mobile systems and foundations of security and trust. Since 2004 He is in the board of directors of the international school on Foundations of Security Analysis and Design (FOSAD). He founded and chaired the WG on Security and Trust management (STM) of the European Research Consortium in Informatics and Mathematics (ERCIM). He is currently chair of the WG 11.14 in secure engineering of the International Federation of Information Processing (IFIP). He usually manages R&D projects on information and communication security and in particular He is currently the Project Coordinator of the EU Network of Excellence NESSoS on the engineering of secure Future Internet services. He is the co-chair of the Italian technological platform in homeland security (SERIT) and He chairs the WG3 on Research and Innovation of the Network and Information Security (NIS) Platform promoted by the European Commission.

Martin Mühleck

Technical Officer, Trust and Security Unit, DG CONNECT, European Commission

Martin Mühleck is officer of the Trust and Security Unit in DG Connect of the European Commission. For the last four years, he is involved in EC policies in the field of cybersecurity and online privacy. In addition to his policy activities, the formulation and implementation of related EU research & development programmes (FP7 and Horizon) are part of his responsibilities.

After his studies in Berlin, Stirling, Lublin and at the College of Europe (Natolin), he worked for a Brussels-based consultancy and a European governmental association, before joining the European Commission in 2008.

Paul Adamson

Senior European Policy Advisor, Covington & Burling

Paul Adamson is the editor-in-chief and founding publisher of E!Sharp, an on-line magazine on Europe and Europe’s place in the world. He is also Senior European Policy Advisor at Covington and Burling.

He is a member of Rand Europe’s Council of Advisors and is on the advisory board of the polling/think tank YouGov-Cambridge, the Washington European Society and the American Security Project. He is also a member of the advisory group of British Influence, a new organization promoting the UK's role in the European Union and chairs the Trans-Atlantic Business Council working group on communications and public outreach.

He is a trustee of the Citizenship Foundation, a patron of the University Association of Contemporary European Studies (UACES) and a member of the UK Academy of Social Sciences.

Earlier in his career he founded the consulting firm Adamson Associates, which was sold to WeberShandwick and the "think-do tank" The Centre, which was sold to Edelman.

In 2012 he was awarded the Order of the British Empire (OBE) ”for services to promoting understanding of the European Union”.

Giles Merritt

Director, Security and Defence Agenda

Giles Merritt is the Director of the Security & Defence Agenda (SDA), the only Brussels-based security and defence think-tank.

A former Brussels Correspondent of the Financial Times (FT), Giles Merritt is a journalist, author and broadcaster who has specialised in the study and analysis of public policy issues since 1978. He was named one of the 30 most influential “Eurostars” by the Financial Times, together with NATO Secretary General Anders Fogh Rasmussen, European Commission President José Manuel Barroso and
European Commissioner Neelie Kroes, to name but a few.

With defence and security now critical issues in Brussels, the SDA raises awareness by anticipating the political agenda and focusing attention on European and transatlantic security and defence policies and challenges. The SDA’s Co-Presidents are Jaap de Hoop Scheffer, former Secretary General of NATO, and Javier Solana, former EU High Representative for the Common Foreign and Security Policy.

Merritt is also head of the SDA’s sister think-tank Friends of Europe, whose debates and reports cover the whole spectrum of non-defence topics, and Editor-in-Chief of the policy journal Europe’s World. Published three times a year, Europe’s World is the only pan-European publication that offers policymakers and opinion-formers across Europe a platform for presenting ideas and forging consensus on key issues. It is published in partnership with a coalition of over 150 think-tanks and universities worldwide, and has a readership of 120,000 senior decision-makers and opinion-formers.

Merritt joined the Financial Times in 1968. From 1972 he was successively FT correspondent in Paris, Dublin, Belfast, and Brussels, until leaving the newspaper in 1983. Since 1984 he has been a columnist for the International Herald Tribune (IHT), and his articles on the editorial page of the IHT range widely across EU political and economic issues.

Martin Porter

General Manager, Edelman Brussels and Chair, Edelman Europe Public Affairs

Martin Porter is Managing Director of Edelman | The Centre and was a co-founder of The Centre, Brussels’ first think-do tank, before it joined the Edelman network in March 2010. Since April 2012, he has also taken on the role of overseeing Edelman’s EMEA Public Affairs practice.

He is closely involved and highly active in consulting activities, where he specialises in strategic advice and high-level Public Engagement support especially in areas related to the low carbon economy, sustainability and risk management issues.

His track record during his 15 years of EU public affairs activity in Brussels includes advocacy and communications campaign design and support to companies, associations, coalitions, NGOs and governments involved in the above areas to created shared value outcomes that deliver public goods as well as private enterprise benefits.

With a Doctorate in Political Science from the University of Bath and a first class joint honours degree in Modern Languages and European Studies from the same university, he is also a visiting fellow of the School of Public Policy at UCL, a Board Member of UCL’s European Institute, and a Senior Associate of the Cambridge University Programme for Sustainability Leadership.

A British national, he speaks English and French fluently, with conversational Italian and German. Married to another graduate of Bath University, Nikki Pattison (who is half British, half Austrian), with whom he has three children, he is a constructively critical, pro-European Liberal Democrat who lives by the motto ‘healthy body, healthy mind’ – combining a love of many sports (he notably plays and coaches hockey and runs marathons) and ‘the great outdoors’ with a passion for learning, reading, teaching and enjoying others’ company, especially where fine food and drink are involved.

Peter Warren

Chairman, Cyber Security Research Institute

Peter Warren chairs the Cyber Security Research Institute. He is an award-winning freelance journalist specialising in technology, undercover investigations and science issues. Every week he presents the UK’s only independent radio talk show devoted to technology in society, PassWord with Peter Warren on Resonance 104.4FM www.resonancefm.com. In demand as a speaker and thought leader, he has recently presented a 75-page report on ‘Ethics in the Digital World’ to EU decision-makers in Brussels and he has been asked by both the UK Government and Opposition to contribute to cyber security policy. Peter has given academic talks at Oxford University and Royal Holloway, University of London and he is the author of two books on cyberwarfare.

The former technology editor of Scotland on Sunday and the Sunday Express and an associate producer for BBC2, he has worked across a variety of media, including the Guardian, the Daily Mirror, Evening Standard, the Sunday Times, the Sunday Express, Sunday Business, Channel 4, Sky News, the BBC and specialist magazines. He has also advised a number of PR agencies on their technology clients. In 1996 Peter was runner-up in the UK Press Gazette Business Awards for Technology Scoop of the Year. A guest speaker on Technology Ethics to the European Union’s Information Society Technologies conference in Helsinki, Peter, who lives in Suffolk, is an acknowledged expert on computer security issues.

In 2006, Peter won the BT IT Security News story of the year prize for his work exposing the practice of discarding computer hard drives containing sensitive business and personal data.

In 2007, Peter won the IT Security News story of the year prize again for work done with Future Intelligence showing that Chinese hackers had broken into the UK Houses of Parliament.

In 2008 Peter won the BT Enigma Award for services to technology security journalism.