About Us

John Marshall is Executive Director of the World Ethical Data Foundation and CEO of the World Ethical Data Forum, leading global organisations that work on the full range of ethical and practical issues around data and information. 

A graduate of Cambridge University with a background in philosophy, mathematics and literature, John has worked with various governments and organisations, including the UN, on a wide range of issues, including cybersecurity, AI and data governance, sustainability, and critical infrastructure. His work with the World Ethical Data Foundation has explored ways to overcome cultural and linguistic obstacles to international diplomacy, ways in which technology might be used to minimise corruption and coercion in the democratic process, and currently concerns the development of the ERA Project, a language-neutral, censorship-resistant international, analytical archive intended in to give visibility, longevity, structure, and efficacy to all information and data relating to human rights and fundamental freedoms.

Anna Babkina is the Head of Partnerships at the World Ethical Data Forum and Foundation.

Her research focuses on AI Ethics, privacy, and human-centric design. Among other things, she is involved in WEDF’s ERA Project, a language-neutral international standard of classification for — and the storage and protection of — all data and information relating to human rights. Anna is also currently working on developing the Open Standard for Responsible AI, a first-of-its-kind, continuously evolving framework for ethical AI development, driven by feedback from all stakeholders. Open Standard so far has gathered 30,000 points of feedback from 80+ countries and has been covered by CNBC, Advertising Week, Forbes and the BBC.

Prior to joining WEDF in 2018, she's been advising tech startups on responsible development, strategy and communications, and worked in several industries, developing expertise in international relations, consultancy, and project management for both multinational corporations and start-ups, starting one herself. In her free time, she's an avid reader with a passion for chess.

Sander Venema is an experienced software consultant/developer and author. He has a strong interest in free software & open-source, privacy-related topics, data, cryptography, programming and electronics. He is the director of software development company Asteroid Interactive based in The Netherlands, and also Data Security Officer for WEDF. He has also been active as a public speaker about these topics.

Mitch had his humble beginnings as a Digital Marketer who was exposed to two major problems: security and ethics. Embarking on a mission to solve these issues, Mitch has collaborated across multiple industries building compliant systems that help everyone understand their data and how we can best use it respectfully. With a passion for privacy, security, and technology, he designed a universally compliant video conferencing platform that stored no data leaving the server’s blank. Now, armed with the right knowledge and experience, Mitch is sharing what he has learned to create a community that makes a difference for the future of the internet. 

M. Smith is a cybersecurity researcher, writer and analyst. Smith's prior experience includes the study and analysis of state-affiliated hackers and groups, evolution of malware dissemination and the digital underground, with a specific focus on social engineering tactics, datatheft and how geopolitical/cultural landscapes affect individuals online.

Cade is the Head of Research at the World Ethical Data Foundation, and founder of New Design Congress and Para-Real Limited, an R&D research lab.

With a multi-disciplinary background in information security, interface politics and digital anthropology, Cade and his team study technology's macro-influence on subcultures, economic livelihoods, identity, conflict and ecological relationships. As New Design Congress' founder, Cade leads an ambitious research programme that anticipates how digital dependence creates brittle societies by accelerating risks across economics, infrastructure, identity, and ecology.

Cade’s expertise has informed projects across major institutions and civil society organisations – including the European Parliament, the Pontifical Academy of Sciences, PEN America and others – and his team frequently collaborates with research institutions, civil society, technology firms and environmental groups. Cade serves on the executive board of the Australian and New Zealand Society for Ecological Economics and the observer board of the Digital Credentials for Europe (DC4EU), a European Union Digital Europe Programme pilot.

Prior to founding New Design Congress, Cade was a security researcher at Tactical Tech, a Berlin-based NGO focused on digital rights. He contributed to Signal’s initial launch in the early 2010s, and headed a design-led security practice at SpiderOak, a pioneering zero-knowledge cloud storage company. From 1999 to 2006, Cade represented Australia in international disability swimming, and holds Australian and world records.

Cade resides in Berlin with his partner and two Shiba Inus, Ripley and Kodak.

Jessica Sun is a Human Rights and Technology Policy Analyst at the World Ethical Data Foundation. She is a Master in Public Policy (MPP) student at the John F. Kennedy School of Government at Harvard University, where she concentrates on international and global affairs and is a research assistant with the Carr Center for Human Rights Policy. Prior to graduate school, she was a program manager for PEN America’s Artists at Risk Connection (ARC) team, where she led advocacy and network-building activities and assisted at-risk artists and human rights defenders globally. She is interested in the intersection of migration, technology, human rights, and democracy, as well as building cross-sector partnerships for positive change. Jessica holds an honors B.A. in political science from CUNY Hunter College and CUNY Macaulay Honors College, with a certificate in public policy and minors in human rights and international relations. She was a 2022-2023 Community Fellow with the Institute for Nonprofit Practice and a PPIA JSI Fellow at U.C. Berkeley.

Zach is a cypherpunk, Linux enthusiast, automator of things and open source supporter who created Unredacted, a 501(c)(3) non-profit that builds Internet infrastructure and services to help people evade censorship and protect their right to privacy. He believes that information should be free, and with access to it, can help build a better world.

Ash designs, builds, and maintains scalable systems, both technical and interpersonal, that serve ambitious, distributed projects. With expertise across the full development stack and common sense, he empowers remote teams to build asynchronously without compromising reliability or privacy. A polymath, Ash draws from a broad base of disciplines — engineering, business, science — excelling in helping others overcome boundaries. At WEDF, he makes sure infrastructure remains scalable, resilient, efficient, and aligned with digital rights design principles.

Carey Lening, JD, CDPP writes, speaks, and consults on data protection, law, technology & fractal complexity in systems. Currently based in Ireland, Carey has over 20 years of experience in thinking about hard problems and helping people arrive on practical solutions. She posts her thoughts weekly on Substack, and has written for various publications since 2006.

Sarah Clarke is a technology governance specialist focused on cybersecurity, data protection, and novel technology risk.

Sarah won the Data Guardian category of the Security Serious Unsung Heroes awards in 2023 and has been listed as one of the 'most influential women in UK tech' for the last two years. She has been an independent GRC consultant for the last decade and is a former director and emeritus fellow of For Humanity, a non-profit creating AI audit and governance content. She is a guest lecturer at Manchester University and a contributor to the Association of AI Ethicists.

Sarah's role in WEDF is continuous contribution to the evolution of Open Standard for Responsible AI.

I'm thrilled to be the Community and Partnerships Coordinator (Africa) at the World Ethical Data Forum. Leveraging my background in technical field I'm passionate about building strong relationships and driving positive change. I'm dedicated to fostering collaboration and creating impactful partnerships across Africa, with a focus on building an ethical and inclusive data-driven future. Together, let's shape a better tomorrow. Join me on this exciting journey.

Jean Francois Itangayenda is a Rwandan PhD student at University College Dublin where he studies and researches Mobile Money’s impacts on communities in Rwanda. His expertise is in Fintech dynamics in East Africa, on how Mobile phones have exponentially grew to become indispensable tools for development in this area of the world and generally on Technology and Society.

He has lived in the U.S. and South Korea where he studied Technological systems management. He also is a published author for kids (Edition Persée (2015), Bakame Editions (2016, 2017).

He currently lives in Dublin, Ireland.

Jack is a brand and business strategist with a long standing interest in the ethical application of new technologies and a firm belief in people before products. He co-founded Social Media agency Telegraph Hill, working with partners such as Hewlett Packard, NBC Universal, The BBC, Nike and Red Bull. He then built Beta Alliance, an innovative creative agency focussed on using audience data, creative and digital media to put audiences first and get results.

Sara is a problem solver with style. Sara's career started with a passion for making things beautiful. With a background in interior design, after a bachelor degree she did a Masters in Interior Design of Commercial Spaces and Retail and Postgraduate in Digital Communication and Content Creation. 
She then moved to the event industry and successfully coordinated a wide range of digital and in-person events with a passion for creating exceptional and unique experiences for speakers and audiences. 
With a natural curiosity and can-do attitude, Sara joined the World Ethical Data Forum and swiftly established herself as a central team member and trusted contact for all. Besides being a key part of the production team, Sara is also involved creatively in various initiatives and in building connections with WEDF speakers and partners around the world.

Deborah Olukan is an AI and Data Analytics Researcher for the World Ethical Data Foundation, committed to the development of ethical, creative and cutting-edge innovations to tackle global social challenges. She has a strong interest in AI and Robotics ethics, particularly around trust, safety, and governance. Deborah completed a PhD in Data Analytics and Society in at the University of Leeds. Her thesis examined the impact of Heterogeneity and Parameter Identification in Agent-based Models. 

Bruce Schneier is an internationally renowned security technologist, called a “security guru” by the Economist. He is the New York Times best-selling author of 14 books -- including Click Here to Kill Everybody -- as well as hundreds of articles, essays, and academic papers. His influential newsletter Crypto-Gram and blog Schneier on Security are read by over 250,000 people. Schneier is a fellow at the Berkman-Klein Center for Internet and Society at Harvard University, a Lecturer in Public Policy at the Harvard Kennedy School, a board member of the Electronic Frontier Foundation and AccessNow, and an advisory board member of EPIC and VerifiedVoting.org. He is the Chief of Security Architecture at Inrupt, Inc.

CORY DOCTOROW is a multi-award winning science-fiction novelist, blogger and technology activist. Co-editor of the popular blog Boing Boing, he contributes to many magazines, websites and newspapers. He is a special consultant to the Electronic Frontier Foundation, a non-profit group that defends freedom in technology law, policy, standards and treaties. Cory holds an honorary doctorate in computer science from the Open University (UK), where he is a visiting professor; he is also an MIT Media Lab research affiliate and a visiting professor of practice at the University of South Carolina’s School of Library and Information Science. Born in Toronto, Canada, Cory now lives in Los Angeles. His recent books include 2019’s Radicalized.

Anne-Marie Eklund Löwinder is the founder and CEO of her own consultant firm Amelsec. Before that she was the Chief Information Security Officer at The Swedish Internet Foundation for almost 20 years. She is one of Sweden’s leading experts on information and IT security. In 2013, Anne-Marie was the first Swede to be inducted into the Internet Hall of Fame.

She is a member of the Royal Swedish Academy of Engineering Sciences (IVA), Section XII, Information Technology. She is also a board member of the Swedish Law and Informatics Research Institute (IRI), of the Swedish Transport Administration, the Swedish Tax Agency, the Swedish Defence Materiel Administration, and a director of the board of .IE, the Irish Internet top level domain. She is a member of the information security council of the Swedish Civil Contingencies Agency (MSB) and she is appointed by the Swedish Ministry of Infrastructure as a member of the Swedish National Digitalisation Council.

In 2010 Anne-Marie was appointed and still serves as Trusted Community Representative by ICANN, in the role of Crypto Officer, where she participates in DNSSEC key generation for the internet root zone. She is also a member of The Registry Services Technical Evaluation Panel (RSTEP), a technical team under the GNSO (Generic Name Supporting Organization).

Anne-Marie has a degree in Computer Science from the University of Stockholm.

Serge Droz is a senior IT-Security expert and seasoned incident responder. Today he works as a senior advisor at the Swiss Federal Department of Foreign Affairs where he looks at the interface between cybersecurity, international law and peace.

He studied physics at ETH Zurich and the University of Alberta, Canada and holds a PhD in theoretical astrophysics. He has worked in private industry and academia in Switzerland and Canada in different security roles, at a national CERT in Switzerland or at Proton for more than 20 years.

Serge is a member of the board of directors of FIRST (Forum for Incident Response and Security Teams), the premier organisation of recognised global leaders in incident response.  In this role he actively participates in discussion relating to cyber security at various policy bodies, in particular related to norm building.

Serge is an active speaker and a regular trainer for CSIRT (Computer Security Incident Response Team) courses around the world.

Raegan has worked as a tech-policy expert in Brussels for well over a decade, in various roles including the Director of Public Policy at Mozilla, and before that, at AccessNow, and European Digital Rights (EDRi). Currently she is incubating a policy leadership initiative at Aspiration, to support and empower under-represented voices in the EU digital policy space. She is a board member of EDRi and the Digital Freedom Fund, and is a graduate of the University of Vienna and the University of Leipzig, where she received her Masters in Global Studies.

Serene is a concert pianist, ex-hacker, and creator of the Snowflake circumvention network. Years ago she integrated Snowflake into the Tor Project as its first use-case, in collaboration with colleagues across the community; since then having significant impact on internet freedom.

Previously, Serene taught herself to code at age 9, was hired by Google as a teenager, and became the first engineer of Google Ideas, as well as the first to quit; since then focusing on music, as well as numerous projects related to cybersecurity and otherwise.

Serene is an endorsed Bösendorfer Artist - the sole pianist without conservatory training - and concertizes regularly with orchestras around the world.

Casper Grathwohl serves as the President of Oxford Languages at Oxford University Press. Over the past 25 years, Casper has led a variety of areas of OUP’s academic publishing, overseeing the development of landmark scholarly digital projects such as Oxford Bibliographies Online and University Press Scholarship Online. Most recently he has led the transformation of Oxford’s dictionary program from a publisher of print dictionaries into one of the premier language data suppliers in the world, partnering with global tech giants as well as local advocacy groups to build out digital resources in under-represented languages. Casper holds a bachelor’s Degree in Classical Languages from Kalamazoo College and an MBA from the Stern School of Business at New York University.

Rob McQueen currently serves as the President of the GNOME Foundation, a 501(c)(3) dedicated to building a Free and Open Source desktop for end users based on Linux. He is also the CEO of the Endless OS Foundation, a US non-profit dedicated to solving the barriers that prevent equitable access to technology and the education and opportunities offered by the digital economy. Rob is an experienced company leader and engineering manager, and has been a user, developer and advocate for a Free and Open Source desktop for nearly 20 years.

Rob founded the leading open-source consultancy firm Collabora in 2005 and as founder and CTO grew it to 100 people over 10 years, working with top-tier technology clients such as Intel, Google, ARM, HP and Nokia to help them build successful strategies for developing products based around Open Source software. He worked with Endless first in 2015 as a managing consultant and joined the Endless management team full-time on 2016 to achieve a wider impact on the world with his technical and commercial skills.

Rob is based in Cambridge, United Kingdom, and has a MA (Hons) in Computer Science from the University of Cambridge.

Annie Machon began her career as an intelligence officer for the UK's Security Service, MI5.

She is now an author, media commentator, political campaigner, and international public speaker on a wide variety of issues: security and intelligence; ethics and democracy; privacy and internet freedoms; human rights; media freedoms; whistleblowers; secrecy legislation; totalitarianism and police states; and accountability in government and business.

In 2020 she was awarded the SA Award for Integrity in Intelligence by the Sam Adams Associates, a global group of ethically-minded intelligence, diplomatic and military personnel.

She served four years as the European Director of Law Enforcement Action Partnership, is a board member of the World Ethical Data Foundation, and an organiser of the critically acclaimed World Ethical Data Forum.

She has also featured in numerous films and TV documentaries including The Culture High, Digital Dissidents, The Mole: Undercover in North Korea, Disparaitre, The Secrets of the Spies, Espionnes, Stasi, and State of Control.

Annie has an MA (Hons) Classics from Cambridge University.

Her most recent book, The Privacy Mission: Achieving Ethical Data for our Lives Online, was shortlisted as a finalist in the Business Book of the Year Awards 2023.

Silkie is the Director of Big Brother Watch. She is a lifelong campaigner for the protection of civil liberties, particularly in the context of new and emerging technologies.

She works to uphold rights in the fields of state surveillance, policing technologies, big data, artificial intelligence and free expression online.

Before joining Big Brother Watch in January 2018, she was the Senior Advocacy Officer at Liberty where she led a programme on Technology and Human Rights and launched a legal challenge to the Investigatory Powers Act. She previously worked for Edward Snowden’s official defense fund and whistleblowers at risk.

Silkie is also an information security trainer and organises Cryptoparty London. She is the co-author of Information Security for Journalists.

Felix Maradiaga is the Director of the World Liberty Congress Academy and a former Defense Secretary General of Nicaragua. A former political prisoner and exiled opposition leader, he is a leading advocate for human rights and civil resistance. Maradiaga also serves as a Professor of the Practice of Democracy at the University of Virginia, where he teaches on global democratic ecosystems and civil society’s role in resisting autocracy.

I graduated from Law school and practiced law in Spain and worked for more than 9 years as EDRi's Head of Policy (October 2014-January 2024).

I advocate for the protection of citizens' fundamental rights and freedoms online. In the past, Diego gained experience in the International Criminal Tribunal for former Yugoslavia, the EU Fundamental Rights Agency (FRA) and the Free Software Foundation Europe. Previously to all that he worked as a lawyer in Spain. I was appointed to the expert group on digital rights set up by the Spanish Ministry of Energy, Tourism and Digital Agenda between 2017-2018.

I am a co-founder of the Andalusian human rights organisation and co-author of the Council of Europe's Study DGI(2014)31 "Human Rights Violations Online", prepared by EDRi for the Council of Europe and co-authored an op-ed in the New York Times, along with many other publications at the national and international levels.

Born in Babylon, Raised in Baghdad, Faisal Saeed Al Mutar experienced the villainy of extremism and authoritarian regimes firsthand. He survived the Iraq Civil War, the murder of family members, and several kidnapping attempts before becoming a citizen in the United States in 2019.

A practitioner of countering extremism and misinformation on an international scale, working first in Iraq and now all over the larger MENA region including Afghanistan.

He’s traveled to conferences and spoken on campuses across the globe on his experiences working to create an alternative narratives in the region. He founded the organization Ideas Beyond Borders, a non-profit dedicated to empowering people across the the middle east with access to new ideas and fresh perspectives with branches in The Kurdistan region in Iraq and Dubai.

Faisal received the “President’s Volunteer Service Award” from President Barack Obama and is part of the leadership network of the American Enterprise Institute.

Vince Lynch is CEO of IV.AI, The platform for AI Powered Decision Making. IV.AI is trusted by the smartest executives globally in 156 languages at companies including Netflix, Uber, Samsung, Disney, Walmart, Capital One, Estée Lauder, Telephonica, and Toyota.

Lynch has worked in the AI space for eleven years, he was host of the AI Review and has been featured in Wired, The Washington Post, TechCrunch, and Forbes discussing the value of NLP, managing bias, and deploying ethical AI. He previously worked with Spotify, Rogers, The Times of India, and Virgin.

Anish Mohammed is an accomplished multidisciplinarian who has worked as a medical doctor, bioinformatician, strategy consultant, blockchain researcher, and cryptographer. He had spend the first half of his career researching cryptographic algorithms and protocols at three different research groups. He has also worked as a strategy consultant for Accenture and Capgemini. His research interests include Privacy-Preserving Machine Learning and Ethics of AI, and he is also a member of the advisory board of the Institute of Ethics and Emerging Technologies. Acknowledged UAV addict. His interests mostly focused on navigation algorithms for unmanned vehicles. These days he more focused on projects that involve security vs scalability vs consensus of blockchain, using smart contracts for AI safety and Cryptoeconomics. He has been involved in designing or auditing half a dozen blockchain protocols and more than a dozen distributed applications. He was also an early advisor to Ripple, Adjoint, Ocean Protocol, Arteria, Devv, reviewer of Ethereum Orange paper, and was one of the founding members of the UK Digital Currency Association. He is the co-founder of Ethicsnet and co-founder of R2 Labs. He is an adjutant faculty at Harbour Space and the head of research at the Information Sciences Institute at SRH Berlin.

Alessandra Sala is the Director of AI and Data Science at Shutterstock, Technology Advisory Board Member at CeADAR, the Ambassador of Women in AI in Ireland, and a board member of Nokia AI and Ethics. In the past Alessandra was a Head of Analytics Research at Nokia Bell Labs. She has more than ten years of experience in research and innovation, in both academia and industry, specifically on advanced analytics and ML, customer experience, AI-based automation of cloud applications, and machine learning for networks automation. She has strong experience with a wide range of telco products and systems while managing diverse teams in multiple locations. Alessandra has been the recipient of several technical awards and has been selected by three leadership and innovation programs. In 2017 Alessandra received the ITP Innovator of the Year award for her record of transferring innovation from research to business. She is an editor of IEEE Transaction on Network Science and Engineering special issues, a judging committee member for several international conferences, journals and internal innovation competitions, and serves as an advisory board member for the World Ethical Data Foundation.

Dr. Saeed is a futurist, thought leader, author and a public keynote speaker. He has been into many positions: the founder and former Director General of the Emirates ID Authority, and a former member of the scientific advisory committee of the UAE Space Agency.

Currently, He is the director of the Center for Futures Studies at the University of Dubai, a visiting lecturer in Responsible AI at Oxford University, president of the UAE Robotics and Automation Society (RAS), and member of the Global Future Council of the World Economic Forum (WEF) on future of Metaverse.

Dr. Saeed is co-authored the book Digital Nation: How the UAE is building a future based on tech innovation. He has written several articles and reports that were published in Harvard Business Review Arabia, MIT Technology Review Arabia and Dubai Policy Review Journal. He has been invited to speak at prestigious universities and international platforms including the University of Oxford, the University of Cambridge, the WEF, the UN, and OPEC.

His interest for the last 5 years covers areas including future foresight, digital transformation, Responsible Artificial Intelligence, AI & Data Ethics, and studying the impact of emerging technologies on businesses and society. He is a certified data ethics facilitator from the Open Data Institute in the UK since 2021.

Meg Fisher currently serves as a founding partner of Santa Fe AI Partners. She is widely known as a technology evangelist through her efforts as Senior Adviser for Code for America, as well as Apple’s Community Education Initiatives in her home state of New Mexico.

As a technology, product, and operations leader, she has helped create some of the most transformational products and services for education, media, and technology industries including Apple's App Store, iTunes U, iBooks Store (Apple Books), and Everyone Can Code's App Development with Swift. At Apple, she also ran the US Enterprise Carrier Engineering team, including Technical Enablement for Application Development and Machine Learning.

Meg earned a Bachelor’s of Science from the University of Kansas (KU), a Master’s of Business Administration from the University of California Los Angeles (UCLA), and a certificate from Oxford University in Artificial Intelligence.

Abir is Accenture’s Chief Data and AI Officer in the Middle East with over 13 years of experience in developing and executing national data and AI strategies to drive economic development, citizen outcomes, and innovation.

Abir has led several multi-year national programs including National Data Governance, AI Centers of Excellence, Smart Nations, and Proactive Government working with senior executives and decision makers in close collaboration with wider ecosystems.

Throughout her experience, she has been instrumental in the development of national data regulatory frameworks and policies across the Middle East regarding data privacy, classification, sharing, revenue generation, open data, freedom of information, and AI ethics. 

Manojna Yeluri is the Asia regional representative for the Artists at Risk Connection. She is an entertainment and intellectual property rights lawyer. She founded Artistik License, a legal and business consultancy for artists and creative professionals in 2013, and has been working closely with the independent arts and music industries since. She holds a Masters Degree in Entertainment, media and intellectual property rights law from the UCLA School of Law, and graduated from the NALSAR University of Law in Hyderabad, India with a BA.LLB (Hons) degree.