About PI - Principal Office Holders and Staff

16/12/2009

On our board of trustees we have some of the leading experts in the United Kingdom from across the political spectrum. The trustees oversee our staff and management practices and receive regular updates on our activities.

Trustees

Professor Ian Angell, leading technology and society theorist, academic, and commentator.

Professor Angell is a professor at the London School of Economics and Political Science. His growing reputation comes as the culmination of twenty years work developing a new perspective on information systems, stressing that the social, economic, and organizational issues are more important than the technological ones: even the very best investment in new technology can be a source of commercial risk, if the societal aspects are not managed properly. Undoubtedly it is Angell's radical and controversial views on the global consequences of IT that has brought him such a high-profile reputation as a 'futurologist' in business circles and in the media.

Karen Banks, international civil society expert.

Ms. Banks is the Network Development Manager for the Association for Progressive Communications, an international networked organisation (established in 1990) that focuses on the use of  information and communication technologies by civil society for social justice and development. She is a founding member of APC. In 1993, along with other women colleagues from the APC, she formed the APC Women's Networking Support Programme (WNSP), which led an all women team of 40 to the UN Fourth World Conference on Women in 1995, where they provided email and web access to over 10,000 delegates. She coordinated the APC WNSP from 1996 to 2004 when they were both awarded the Anita Borg Social Impact Award, an international prize that honors those who have caused technology to have a positive impact on the lives of women and society.

Kim Cameron, expert and engineer on security, privacy and identity technology policies.

Mr. Cameron is the Chief Architect of Identity at Microsoft, where he champions the emergence of a privacy enhancing Identity Metasystem reaching across technologies, industries, vendors, continents and cultures. Mr. Cameron is a Microsoft Distinguished Engineer.  He grew up in Canada, attending King’s College at Dalhousie University and l’Université de Montréal.   He serves on RISEPTIS, a high-level European Union advisory body providing vision and guidance on policy and research challenges in the field of security and trust in the Information Society.  He has won a number of industry awards, including Digital Identity World’s Innovation Award (2005), Network Computing’s Top 25 Technology Drivers Award (1996) and MVP (Most Valuable Player) Award (2005), Network World’s 50 Most Powerful People in Networking (2005), Microsoft’s Trustworthy Computing Privacy Award (2007) and Silicon.com’s Agenda Setters 2007.

Daniel Cooper, legal expert.

Mr. Cooper is a Partner in Covington and Burling, one of the world's largest international law firms. He advises on European privacy and data protection matters, as well as contentious and non-contentious intellectual property work and e-commerce issues. Mr. Cooper heads up the firm's London privacy and security practice, and advises clients on compliance with UK and European data protection and privacy legislation, including the UK Data Protection Act, Regulation of Investigatory Powers Act, Human Rights Act, and related EU directives, such as the EU Data Protection Directive and EU Electronic Communications Data Protection Directive. He has previously advised on privacy law and anti-doping procedures, and the practices of pharmaceutical companies in clinical trials.

Anna Fielder, international consumer rights expert.

For the last three years Ms Fielder has worked as senior policy advisor to the National Consumer Council (UK), now the new Consumer Focus, focusing on the digital environment and sustainability issues. She is also on the team of experts and lead author of several studies for Civic Consulting (Germany), which specialises in policy and economic studies for international and national institutions. She was previously the regional Director for developed and transition economies at Consumers International where she put issues related to online rights and data protection on the consumer movement’s priorities agenda and set up the Transatlantic Consumer Dialogue. She is author of a number of studies, including: Consumer Confidence in the Digital Environment, for the European Parliament IMCO committee (2007); Making the European internal market work for consumers (2007), and Fair game? Assessing commercial activity on children’s favourite websites (2008), for the NCC. Anna is also a steering committee member of the Civil Society Information Society Advisory Council to the OECD Information, Computer and Communications Policy Committee and co-ordinator of the sustainability standards area for the British Standards Institute Consumer and Public Interest Unit.

Dr Fleur Fisher, expert on healthcare ethics.

A former General Practitioner, Dr Fisher was previously the Head of Ethics Science and Information at the British Medial Association. She led the BMA’s campaign on Confidentiality of Identifiable Health Data, and led a successful joint bid for the National Centre for Clinical Audit (NCCA) with the Royal College of Nursing and 12 other professional organizations, becoming the first chairman of the NCCA’s Management Board. Dr Fisher is currently chairman of the BMA Foundation for AIDS, vice-chairman of the International HIV/AIDS Alliance, and co-chair of POPAN (Prevention of Professional Abuse Network).

Dr Steve Wright, human rights expert.

Dr. Wright is a Visiting Professor at the Praxis Centre for the Study of Information & Technology for Peace, Conflict Resolution and Human Rights and Senior Lecturer in the School of Applied Global Ethics at Leeds Metropolitan University. Prior to establishing this Centre with colleagues, he was the Director of the Omega Foundation (1989-2005); Principal Policy Officer, Manchester City Council working for the PTA on a range of public transport issues (1989-1995) as well as working as the first Head of Manchester City Council’s Police Monitoring initiative (1984 -1988). His work on torture and police technologies has led to awareness raising and policy changes around the world.

Staff

Simon Davies, Director

Simon is widely-recognised as the world's leading privacy advocate. Over his twenty-year career in privacy he has led campaigns and research initiatives around the world. He has done over 10,000 interviews in this period and has been quoted in nearly all leading media outlets. He is a Visiting Senior Fellow at the London School of Economics and Political Science.

David Banisar, Deputy Director & Director the Freedom of Information Programme

David is one of the world's leading experts on government openness and transparency. He wrote some of the seminal comparative texts on privacy (e.g. Privacy and Human Rights 1998-2000), open government (e.g. Freedom of Information Around the World 2006), Internet free speech (Silenced: Censorship and Control of the Internet, 2003) and media rights (e.g. Silencing Sources: An International Survey of Protections and Threats to Journalists Sources, 2007). He co-founded the Electronic Privacy Information Center, a Washington-based privacy organisation and was a Research Fellow at the Kennedy School of Government at Harvard University. He is also currently a Visiting Research Fellow at the University of Leeds School of Law and a Non-Resident Fellow at Stanford Law School.

Dr Gus Hosein, Policy Director

Gus is responsible for overseeing PI's work on anti-terrorism policy and international policy-making. He is a Visiting Scholar at the American Civil Liberties Union and a Visiting Senior Fellow at the London School of Economics and Political Science.

Nina Eschke, Researcher

Alexander Hanff, head of Ethical Networks Project

Barry Steinhardt, Senior Fellow

Nigel Waters, Senior Fellow

Maria-Martina Yalamova, Research Fellow

Related:
Privacy International and Transparency