Rafal Rohozinski

Rafal Rohozinski (born 26 January 1965) is a Canadian expert and practitioner active in the fields of digital resilience, cyber warfare, and the globalization of armed violence. He is the co-founder of SecDev Group and Secdev Foundation, the founder of Zeropoint Security, and currently a senior fellow [1] at Canada's Centre for International Governance Innovation. He is also a founder and principal investigator of two significant cyber research initiatives: the Infowar Monitor,[2] a joint project between The SecDev Group and the Citizen Lab, Munk Centre for International Studies, University of Toronto, which examined and documented emerging trends in cyber warfare; and, the OpenNet Initiative,[3][4] a collaboration with the Citizen Lab, Berkman Center for Internet and Society at Harvard Law School the Advanced Network Research Group at Cambridge University (now the SecDev Group) and the Oxford Internet Institute, which documents patterns of Internet censorship worldwide. He is a principal investigator and co-author of the 2009 Ghostnet study examining Chinese cyber-espionage.[5][6][7]

Rohozinski is a founder of several companies active in developing new approaches to digital risk and resilience. He is the CEO and Principal of the SecDev Group,[8] a Canadian digital risk agency that among other things developed the concept of armed violence for OECD.[9] He is also CEO Zeropoint Security,[10] a cyber risk and security[11] start-up. Rohozinski was formerly the director of the Advanced Network Research Group, Cambridge Security Programme, University of Cambridge (2000-2008),[12] a Ford Foundation Research Scholar of Information and Communication Technologies (2002-2004), and a senior visiting fellow at the International Development Research Centre (Canada), where he developed conceptual approaches to the studying the telegeography of conflict zones, including case study of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.[13] Between 2007 and 2011 he served on the board of the Estonian E-government Academy.[14] He was a two term Board member of the Canadian Association for Defence and Security Industries (CADSI), and, sits on the board of the Canadian International Council (CIC).[15] He was also a senior fellow for cyber security and future conflict at the London-based International Institute for Strategic Studies.[16]

Rohozinski is the author of numerous studies and published articles on topics relating to the security and development dimensions of the information revolution including two studies for the Centre for Strategic Leadership, US Army War College: Shifting Fire[17] examining "information effects" in counterinsurgency and stability operations, and New Media and the Warfighter (the latter based on a case study of the 2006 Hizbullah-Israeli conflict). Rohozinski is the co-editor and contributor to Access Denied: the Practice and Policy of Global Internet Filtering (MIT press)[18] and a follow-up volume entitled Access Controlled examining the emergence of complex information controls in the Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe countries, including an analysis of strategic cyber-war dimensions of the Russian-Georgian conflict.[19] He has also published on Stuxnet and its implications for warfare in cyberspace,[20] and, together with Robert Muggah, defined the concept of open empowerment as a driver of economic, social, and criminological change in Latin America.[21]

Rohozinski’s research and professional activities focus on geopolitical risk and resilience. His work was foundational to the methodology,[22] that and research conducted by OpenNet Initiative and the Infowar Monitor as well as the digital risk models developed by the SecDev Group and Zeropoint security. He is a frequent speaker and lecturer who held an appointment at US Joint Special Operation University and is currently a faculty member with the G100 Network "Leadership in the Digital Era" program.[23]