Our speakers

Work Package 5 leader - Educational and professional qualifications credentials.

Ben Brake has been head of the newly created "Digital and Data Policy" department at the Federal Ministry of Digital Affairs and Transport (BMDV) since March 1, 2022. In this role, the sociologist reports to Digital State Secretary Stefan Schnorr. Brake moves from IT service provider IBM, where he represented the company's political interests for around 10 years as head of the Berlin office. He began his career with stints in the German Bundestag and as personal assistant to the Federal Minister of Justice, Sabine Leutheusser-Schnarrenberger (FDP).

Jochen is a Director of Engineering at Google, currently responsible for making Chrome the most trustworthy and safest tool for browsing the web. He has worked on various parts of Chrome for the past 14 years, starting as a software engineer in the Munich Chrome team working on privacy features.

Prior to joining Google, he worked as a postdoc fellow at UBC in Vancouver. He received a PhD from the University of Freiburg in 2009 working on automata theory.

Manuel is Co-Founder and Chief Business Development Officer of Certifaction, the privacy-first eSigning solution with zero document knowledge, ideal for companies that want to digitize their processes while ensuring the confidentiality and security of their documents. Manuel studied banking and finance in St.Gallen (HSG) and Australia. Since childhood, Manuel has been passionate about IT and how it can be used to make life easier for everyone. As a management consultant, Manuel has led digitization projects across Europe. Manuel loves new challenges, both within Certifaction and during triathlons or mountain marathons.

Sławomir Górniak, CISSP, CISM, is a telecommunications engineer focused on network security. Since 2008 he works at ENISA (EU Agency for Cybersecurity), where he has been involved in the areas of standardisation, certification and electronic identification. He is a coordinator and co-author of multiple ENISA reports covering various aspects of information security. Currently he is responsible for the Agency’s actions in the area of standardisation and assures its liaisons with Standards Developing Organisations.

Oliver Hofer is an IT architect with a focus on exploration and innovation in PostFinance's TechLab. He has co-founded several startups and worked in various industries.

Bringing ING's innovation method PACE to life by solving customer'sproblems through research & design thinking. Working closetogether with FinTechs and colleagues across the bank to build new services and products for the digital world.

Fabian Knirsch is co-founder and CTO of sproof GmbH. In 2018, he received his PhD in computer science from the University of Salzburg and worked in research on security and privacy. Afterwards, he worked as a UAS professor at the UAS Salzburg until 2022. Fabian is a self-confessed "IT security enthusiast" and is burning for the common mission to provide the central platform and interface for digital signing in Europe.

Jörg Lenz is Head of Marketing and Communication at Namirial, one of the leading providers of qualified trust services in accordance with the EU eIDAS regulation.

Since 1999, he has been dealing holistically with the legal, technical, business and organisational requirements for the application of electronic signatures in the private sector as well as in public administration.

Jörg Lenz's specialist topics include the orchestration of signature workflows, procedures for identification and authentication including biometrics, digital identity, ID wallets and various procedures for generating electronic signatures and seals. He is intensively involved with the framework conditions for the use of these technologies for their application in regulated industries such as finance, telecommunications and energy supply as well as in public administration.

He contributes his expertise to the working groups and discussion groups of various national and international organisations. In doing so, he follows the design and revision of guidelines, regulations and laws - among others in the Bitkom working group on the application of electronic trust services. Currently, he is particularly concerned with the revision of the eIDAS Regulation.

Before playing a key role in founding and establishing Namirial's subsidiary in Germany from 2018, he worked as a signature expert in various roles in communication, business development and marketing at Softpro and Kofax. Jörg Lenz completed his studies with a degree in business administration. 

Dr. Armin Lunkeit studied microsystems engineering in Berlin at the current University of Applied Sciences and at the same time started to deal with hardware and software development. He received his doctorate from the Technical University of Berlin in the field of security engineering in software development. He began his professional career as a software developer at Kithara Software GmbH, focusing on driver development and test automation. In 2003 Armin Lunkeit joined OpenLimit SignCubes AG, where he originally worked as a software developer and later as a member of the management. He was responsible for setting up the development and testing departments and implemented a number of strategic projects for the company. These included Common Criteria-certified products for digital signatures, digital identities, encryption and long-term storage of digital documents. Prior to joining Rohde & Schwarz Cybersecurity, he was responsible for designing the security architecture for a smart meter gateway and a VPN connector for the healthcare industry. Both products were successfully evaluated and certified according to Common Criteria EAL 4+. At Rohde & Schwarz Cybersecurity, Armin Lunkeit was responsible for the network encryption product area with product lines from OSI layer-2 (Ethernet) and layer-3 (IP). His main areas of interest are requirements engineering, architectures and implementations of security-critical components and security-oriented testing. Armin Lunkeit teaches on behalf of the German Society for Information Security (DGI) and is a member of the ASQF (Arbeitskreis Software-Qualität und -Fortbildung), the GI (Gesellschaft für Informatik) and GfSE/INCOSE (Gesellschaft für Systems Engineering / International Council on Systems Engineering).

Dr. Markus Reichel (CDU) has been a member of the German Bundestag since October 2021. As a directly elected member of parliament, he represents the electoral district of Dresden 1. He is a member of the Committee on Digital Affairs and the Committee on Labor and Social Affairs. He also chairs the "Future of Work" working group of the CDU/CSU parliamentary group. Markus Reichel was born in Munich in 1968. After the fall of the Berlin Wall, he studied mathematics at the Technical University of Dresden from 1991. He then completed postgraduate studies in economics. In 1998, he received his doctorate in energy economics from the Technical University of Dresden. Prior to his mandate, Markus Reichel initially worked as a research assistant at the International University Institute Zittau. In 1999, he then founded his own company DREBERIS (Dresden Consulting for International Strategies). Since November 2019, Markus Reichel has been the district chairman of the CDU Dresden. He has been active in the Foreign Trade Committee of the Dresden Chamber of Commerce and Industry since 2014 and has headed the Saxony CDU's State Committee on Business & Innovation since 2015. Away from political life, Markus Reichel teaches the Japanese martial art Aikido on a voluntary basis.

Kurt Rindle holds a degree in computer science and a Master of Business Administration. Since the beginning of his career, he has been involved with technical innovations such as mobile computing, cloud, RFID and digital identities. He has contributed his expertise to his own startups, Apple, IBM, Siemens and the Norwegian company Signicat. Since 2023 he is working for Swisscom Trust Services as Strategic Growth Manager in Germany (and Europe). Advanced and qualified signatures and seals for companies are his current topic.

After successfully completing my studies as a mechanical engineer in design technology, I began my professional career with a CAD software manufacturer, where I gained my first sales experience in the acquisition of consulting projects.

Afterwards I changed to the telecommunication industry and to the sales department. In the following years, I consistently expanded my expertise in new customer and regular customer management through various sales channels. I took over sales management at VEW TELNET and Versatel Deutschland before T-Systems entrusted me with the management of a specialist sales department.

In addition to sales responsibility, my responsibilities there included team development, the introduction of sales processes including the necessary tools, and sales planning and management. The main focus was the target-oriented introduction and implementation of innovative sales processes and ideas, ranging from direct marketing and cold acquisition to strategic selling in both product and solution business.

Since 2002, I have been contributing my experience in the marketing of applications for electronic trust services. This includes software products and components for the generation and verification of qualified and advanced electronic signatures, seals and time stamps as well as for the evidence-proof long-term archiving of digital documents.

With this extensive wealth of experience, I am employed as Head of Sales and Marketing at intarsys GmbH, manufacturer of the Sign Live! product family (signature application component).

Adrian Wyss has been working in market development at PostFinance for over 10 years with a focus on digital services.

David Zeuthen ist Software Engineer bei Google und arbeitet im Android Security And Privacy Team in Cambridge, MA, USA. Er arbeitet an Real-World Identity und ist Autor und Betreuer einer Open-Source-Implementierung des ISO 18013-5-Standards für Android, der in mehreren mDL-Anwendungen, darunter Google Wallet, verwendet wird. 

David ist außerdem Mitglied mehrerer Normungsgruppen, die sich mit Real-World Identity befassen, darunter die ISO-Arbeitsgruppe, die ISO/IEC 18013-5:2021 für den mobilen Führerschein erarbeitet hat. David ist außerdem Mitglied des Technical Advisory Council der OpenWallet Foundation.