“The Internet is Magic”
The Internet Engineering Task Force (IETF) is an open community of network designers, operators, vendors, and researchers concerned with the evolution of the Internet’s architecture and smooth operation. Organized in 1986, the IETF produces open standards that are the cornerstone of a vibrant Internet that many of us have the luxury of taking for granted.
As the next billions of Internet users come online, they will come from countries like Argentina, Brazil, China, India, and Kenya. The Internet Society Fellowship to the IETF provides technologists from these countries and more the opportunity to have a voice in the development of open standards, and to connect with Internet pioneers and peers. Since its inception in 2006, the Fellowship programme has provided nearly 225 awards to individuals from more than 50 countries from developing and emerging economies.
As one former Fellow from Venezuela noted, “The Internet is magic. It makes it possible for me to stay in touch with my family while I am in a different country. There is so much I can do and, because of this Fellowship, I now understand more of what goes into making it work.”
The IETF technical community this week in Toronto will be actively engaged in the ‘nuts and bolts’ of what makes the Internet work. It is that critical work that makes the magic happen — and we are grateful for all that it enables, including the connections across boundaries, unbounded innovation, and better opportunities and access for everything from education to health care. To that end, we congratulate this meeting’s Fellows.
Over the years, participation has become increasingly competitive. An important factor in considering an applicant’s selection is a demonstration of how they will apply their learnings to their regions and local communities — and bring that magic home.
Here is more about the experiences and interests of the 11 new and returning Fellows selected for the IETF 90 meeting in Toronto and ISOC’s 25th cohort of Fellows to IETF:
Shabbir Ahmed (Bangladesh) is a Professor at the University of Dhaka. He also works as a Consultant to DrikICT (an ISP in Bangladesh), and is a Chapter Leader in the ISOC Bangladesh Dhaka chapter. Shabbir holds a BSc. in Applied Physics and Electronics, MSc. in Computer Science, and a Ph.D. in Computer Science and Engineering. His research interest includes routing challenges in DTN, data mining techniques, and IPv6 deployment and operations. He is a long-time follower of the IETF MANET working group at the IETF. Shabbir was previously a Fellow to IETF 84.
Abhijan Bhattacharyya (India) currently works as a scientist in the Innovation Lab of Tata Consultancy Services, where he is involved in R&D and works on protocols for resource constrained domains to help Tata create reusable solutions for Internet of Things (IoT) use cases. Abhijan is passionate about learning new technologies and applying the knowledge towards creating innovative solutions. He is currently subscribed to the CoRE, ACE, and DTLS-IoT working groups in the IETF.
Jeferson Campos Nobre (Brazil) is a Ph.D. student at Federal University of Rio Grande do Sul, Brazil. He is a member of Computer Networks Group, working on network management, and is a Lecturer at the University of Vale do Rio do Sinos. His core interest is in distributed and autonomic network management, and he is involved in NMRG and network monitoring related working groups (LMAP, IPFIX, IPPM). His Ph.D research is in the areas of autonomic distributed control of active measurement mechanisms based on the IETF standards One-Way Active Measurement Protocol (OWAMP) and Two-Way Active Measurement Protoco (TWAMP).
Nicolas Fiumarelli (Uruguay) currently works at LACNIC and specializes in Software and Network Engineering. He is presently involved in the development of RPKI policies and algorithms and how they apply to protocols such as SIDR and IDR. He maintains that the technical community has a strong role to play in the IANA transition, and is following those developments closely. He is also currently performing research on elliptic curves and artificial intelligence at the Universidad de la República in Uruguay.
Giuseppe Gangi (Venezuela) is a Software Developer and Free Open Source Software consultant and advocate. He is very excited about participating in the IETF 90 Meeting and is looking forward to becoming more involved in standards development as the basis for establishing himself as a leader and contributor to society.
Fahima Ahmed Khan (Pakistan) currently works in Security & Compliance and Information Assurance at Grameenphone Ltd of Telenor Group. Her role is to assess and validate the security of network and application systems, monitor and identify security incidents and ensure compliance with Sarbanes-Oxley (SOX), ISO27001 and other information systems control frameworks. Fahima holds a BSc. in Computer Engineering and a MBA. She is also qualified as a Certified Information Systems Auditor (CISA), and as such has strong interest in security-related IETF working groups such as NEA, OAUTH, SACM, and TLS.
Frank Maginga (Tanzania) is a Network Planning Engineer with specific focus on Next Generation Networks (NGN) and IP/MPLS Networks at TTCL, a telecom operator in Tanzania. His main responsibilities are to design, plan, and develop efficient networks and infrastructure for TTCL to meet business and service goals. He is interested in QoS techniques and end-to-end performance measurement on the Internet, and is subscribed to the LMAP working group.
Hugo Morillo (Venezuela) is currently employed as an IT Advisor at Pricewaterhouse Coopers Venezuela. He possesses a BSc. in Systems Engineering. Hugo is passionate about new technologies, software development, online gaming and production of short-films. His particular interests in regards to the IETF are IPv6 operations and web security.
Tirumaleswar Reddy (India) is a Technical Lead at Cisco Systems, where he works on firewall and cloud-based Security as a Service (SaaS) features. He has 12 patents pending approval at the U.S. Patent Offices, and is conducting research in the areas of Security, WebRTC, Privacy and AEON (Application Enabled Open Networking). He is also an active contributor to the PCP, TRAM and RTCWEB working groups at the IETF.
Tauqeer Safdar (Pakistan) is a Ph.D. student at University Technology PETRONAS Malaysia. He is a member of the Computer Networks Group, working on network routing, IPv6, MANET and security. He is also a Lecturer in the Department of IT Networking, Higher College of Technology, Muscat, Oman. He is passionate about routing and network management, especially issues related to routing security in IPv6. He is active in ISOC chapters in both Malaysia and Pakistan, specifically working on IPv6-related issues. He is involved in the MANET, IPv6 and Routing working groups in the IETF, and has also co-authored a number of RFCs. Tauqueer is a previous Fellow to IETF 86.
Nestor Michael Tiglao (Philippines) is an Associate Professor of Electrical and Electronics Engineering at the University of the Philippines in Quezon City, Philippines. He holds a BSc. in Electrical Engineering, MSc. in Electrical Engineering, and a Ph.D. in Electrical and Computer Engineering. He is currently working on a wireless sensor network project for smart grid applications. Nestor is passionate about education and using technology such as the Internet for improving the overall quality of life and for building a better society. Nestor has previously been a Fellow at IETF 81 and IETF 85.