[Chapter-delegates] Welcome New Internet Society CEO, Kathryn C. Brown

[Otunte Otueneh]

Welcome to Kathy Brown.
Many thanks to Lynn St. Amour.


Kind regards,

Otunte Otueneh 
ISOC Nigeria Chapter
 

-----Original Message-----
From: chapter-delegates-bounces at elists.isoc.org
[mailto:chapter-delegates-bounces at elists.isoc.org] On Behalf Of Bob Hinden
Sent: Thursday, December 19, 2013 8:01 PM
To: ISOC Chapter Delegates
Subject: [Chapter-delegates] Welcome New Internet Society CEO, Kathryn C.
Brown


On behalf of the Board of Trustees, I am very pleased to announce that we
have chosen Kathy Brown as the next Chief Executive Officer of the Internet
Society.

The ISOC Board conducted a very thorough search over 10 months to find the
best candidate to lead the Internet Society. Through our search process, we
identified and met with talented people from around the globe representing
leaders from our broad Internet community and across a large number of
industries. 

The Internet is facing many new challenges ranging from the NSA pervasive
surveillance, how the governance of the Internet should be structured, and
if the current open Internet model is sustainable.  The Board looked for a
person who can lead the Internet Society to meet these challenges and
decided that Kathy Brown is the person to do that.  She is a proven leader
with in-depth knowledge of global Internet governance policy; well
acquainted with the community, commercial, technical, government, and
non-government organizations that are stakeholders in the debate around the
future of the Internet; and a strong manager.  She has all of the qualities
we were looking for in the next CEO of the Internet Society.

Kathy joins the Internet Society from global strategy firm Albright
Stonebridge Group, where she was a senior advisor.  For more than a decade
prior, Kathy was Senior Vice President for Policy Development and Corporate
Responsibility at Verizon.  In that role, she helped Verizon identify and
navigate emerging digital issues and led its global corporate responsibility
initiatives, overseeing an investment of more than $60 million a year in
programs and grants that helped support Internet development. In 2010 she
partnered with ISOC to launch a highly successful forum on the Internet and
higher education in East Africa.  In addition, she served on Verizon's
corporate councils for the development of the company's online privacy and
content policies and promoted Verizon's Human Rights Statement and Supplier
Code of Conduct.

In her policy role at Verizon, she led the company's international public
policy engagement through a period of dynamic change.  She represented the
company in the successful adoption by the OECD of principles for Internet
policy making and was a member of the U.S. delegation to the ITU World
Conference on International Telecommunications treaty negotiations.  Kathy
joined Verizon from Washington D.C. law firm Wilmer, Cutler & Pickering,
where she was a partner specializing in legal and regulatory communications
policy.

Earlier in her career, Kathy served in U.S. President Clinton's
Administration where she was deeply involved in policy development that was
instrumental to the deployment and adoption of the global Internet.  She
served as Head of the Office of Policy and Development at the National
Telecommunications Information Administration and then as Chief of Staff to
Federal Communications Commission Chairman William E. Kennard.  At the FCC,
she managed the staff supporting Chairman Kennard's historic decision to
keep the Internet unregulated, to fund the E-rate, and to increase radio
spectrum availability to fuel wireless technology innovation. Before moving
to Washington D.C., Kathy held senior roles for 15 years in government
service in New York.

Kathy will start on January 1 and be based in the Internet Society's Reston
office.

In February 2013, Internet Society CEO Lynn St. Amour announced her decision
to step down at the end of her contract. Since joining the Internet Society
in 1998 and at the helm since 2001, Lynn has worked tirelessly and
passionately to establish the Internet Society as an internationally
respected expert on Internet governance, and technical, development, and
policy issues.  She has made ISOC what it is today.  The Board and I greatly
appreciate all her hard work and wish her the very best in her future
endeavors.  Lynn will continue to work with Kathy through the end of January
to ensure a smooth transition.

The press release, Kathy Brown's bio, and related material can be found at:

http://www.internetsociety.org

Thanks,

Bob Hinden
Chair of the Internet Society Board of Trustees