The RIPE Programme Committee is responsible for ensuring that the RIPE Meeting programme consists of interesting, relevant and inspiring content. We recruit, select and schedule the plenary of the RIPE Meeting.
Contact the RIPE Programme Committee: pc [at] ripe [dot] net
Biographies
Milad Afshari
Term ends: RIPE 86
Milad Afshari is from Iran and has a Bachelor of Engineering in Computer Systems Networking. He has over 8 years’ experience in the network engineering field and has been working for ISPs in Iran. Currently, he works for one of the mobile network operators MTN-Irancell as an Enterprise Network Solutions Development Engineer. Furthermore, he has also worked as a network/technical consultant for ISPs and LIRs.
In the last few years, Milad has taken part in many activities in RIPE and RIPE NCC related fields to further his knowledge and share this with companies and colleagues in his own country. He has participated in RIPE Meetings as well MENOG and ENOG regional meetings. Additionally, he received accreditation as an IPv6 trainer through RIPE NCC’s Train the Trainer programme in the Middle East.
Milad is also a member of PC teams in different communities, for instance, he is the co-founder and have been a PC member of IRNOG for 5 years and been a member of the MENOG PC team for more than 3 years.
Further information regarding his job experiences and skills are available on his LinkedIn profile.
Alexander Azimov
Term ends: RIPE 87
Alexander Azimov is a Network Expert for Yandex, where he focuses on the network monitoring, routing security and transport layer architecture.
Alexander also has an active role in the IETF where he co-authors several Internet-Drafts.
Dmitry Kohmanyuk
Term ends: RIPE 87
Dmitry Kohmanyuk graduated in 1992 from the Cybernetics Department of Kiev Taras Shevchenko University in Kiev (then Soviet Union, presently Ukraine), receiving a Masters Degree with honors.
He now resides in Kyiv, Ukraine and works as Chief of Strategy of Hostmaster Ltd, the registry for the .UA domain. He actively participates in the Internet community, attending local, regional and international forums, including RIPE, CENTR, ICANN, IGF and other meetings.
Dmitry speaks Ukrainian, Russian, and English (with a small set of Dutch words if needed.)
Dmitry has direct operational experience with networked Unix systems and router equipment, co-founding and running one of first Ukrainian ISPs back in 1991 (Communication Systems). His work included several technology start-up companies in the United States in the role of systems administrator, developer support and operations. He can write code and shell scripts, was a co-author of RFC 2319 and participated in the Ukrainian Unix Users Group.
He has been directly involved with Ukrainian ccTLD registration and operation since 1996, in both non-commerical and commerical forms, and continuously represented ccTLD with IANA. He sits on the board of Hostmaster. In the last two years, the local policy development process has restarted, community service has improved, IDNs have launched and operational migration to IPv6 was completed, as well as DNSSEC launch in March 2012.
Non-profit work includes IPv6 as well as DNSSEC promotion in the region, participating in UA-IX as a member of the technical committee and speaking with press to communicate about Internet technology, security and privacy issues. Two IGF-UA forums in Ukraine in 2010 and 2011 were organised with support from Dmitry and Hostmaster.
Franziska Lichtblau
PC Chair
Term ends: RIPE 86
Franziska got involved with the RIPE community in 2013 during her time as an Internet Measurement researcher at TU Berlin and the Max Planck Institute for Informatics. Her PhD focused on inter-domain traffic measurements, IXPs, security and Internet infrastructure. She has experience as a system administrator and is active in the free software community. She currently works as a DevOps engineer on cloud infrastrcture at SAP.
Brian Nisbet
PC Vice Chair, RIPE Working Group Chair Representative
Brian Nisbet is the RIPE Working Group Chairs representative on the RIPE Programme Committee. He has been active in the RIPE community since RIPE 48 and he currently co-chairs the Anti-Abuse Working Group. His day job is Network Operations Manager for HEAnet, the Irish NREN, where he mostly makes sure the packets are flowing in the right direction.
Antonio Prado
Term ends: RIPE 89
An open source enthusiast, Antonio Prado is currently the Chief Technology Officer at AS59715, a local government body in Italy. He has been active in IT since 1993 and was an early adopter of IPv6.
A former MANRS ambassador and MANRS Steering Committee member, he recently co-authored the book “BGP, from theory to practice”, already available in Italian, to be published in English by the end of 2022.
Moin Rahman
Term ends: RIPE 89
Moin is currently pursuing his Masters Degree in Computer Security. He has 16+ years of professional experience running Network Operators in the Asia Pacific region. Before starting his Masters; he has been an active Community Member in the Asia Pacific region. He has joined and presented in multiple regional NOGs in AP region including APNIC, APRICOT, SANOG. He has also been a member of the PC for these conferences and recently have also chaired the APNIC54 PC. He is also an avid Community Trainer for APNIC and has conducted training on various topics including Network Security, System Administrations and IPv4/IPv6 Routing for the last 6+ years.
He is a big enthusiast and advocate of The FreeBSD Project. For more than 7 years now he has been a regular contributor and committer for ports/docs (bofh@). His primary interest is with ports but also contributes in the docs automation and the CI builds of the FreeBSD src tree.
When he is not doing anything he is in the mountains of Nepal for mountaineering or trail biking.
Khalid Samara
MENOG Representative
Khalid is a telecommunications and ISP expert with extensive experience in Internet, mobile, engineering and security technologies. He has acquired over a decade of experience in network planning, operations management, security and telecommunications policy development.
Khalid currently serves as PC Chair of the Middle East Network Operators Group (MENOG), an international forum dedicated to elevating communication and awareness about Internet best practices. Having been actively involved in providing consultation and advice to ISPs in the Middle East and Arab region, Khalid concentrates specifically on network strategies, design, Internet technology, and operations, as well as configuration and training. He has played a major role in training Middle East ISP and network engineers through MENOG roadshows and conferences.
Khalid is based in Jordan. Prior to his current role with ORANGE Telecom in the field of information security, he worked extensively with several regional and international telecom/ISP operators and has come to be considered a well-known face in the Internet industry in the Middle East.
Massimiliano Stucchi
Term ends: RIPE 88
Massimiliano “Max” Stucchi joined the Internet Society in 2019 as Technical Advisor for the European Bureau. His previous experiences are as a trainer and IPv6 Programme Manager at the RIPE NCC, and before that he was the founder and technical director of a small Internet Service Provider and Wireless Internet Service Provider in Northern Italy.
Max is a long time Unix fellow, with a specific love for FreeBSD and OpenBSD, which he’s been using for around 20 years now. His interest also cover BGP, Routing Security, DNS and of course, IPv6. If possible, he tries to contribute to the development of these technologies by participating in the IETF.
In his past, Max used to be an official football referee for the Italian Football Federation, but he quit when he moved to the Netherlands for work. Now, when he’s not in front of a keyboard, you can find him trying to get back in shape by running or racing remotely controlled cars.
Max speaks Italian, English, French, and is trying to improve his German.
He is based near Zurich, Switzerland.
Wolfgang Tremmel
Term ends: RIPE 88
After completing his degree at Karlsruhe University, Wolfgang started working as a network engineer in 1994. He went on to become head of network operations and peering manager at a range of ISPs.
In 2006, Wolfgang joined DE-CIX as Director Customer Support, a position he held for ten years. Since 2016, Wolfgang has been head of the DE-CIX Academy, making sure customers understand how BGP and other routing protocols work.
Jan Žorž
PC Vice Chair, SEE Representative
Jan Žorž is a VP of 6connect Labs, working on the development of various protocols and network solutions to accelerate the global deployment of IPv6.
Active in the RIPE community as a RIPE PC member, Jan is also SEE RIPE regional meeting chairman and a founder and a chair of SINOG, the Slovenian Network Operators Group. Several IETF RFCs author and one of the founders and member of the board of GNA (Global NOG Alliance). Jan is also active in its “Keep Ukraine Connected” initiative.
Previously worked with the Internet Society and served as a CEO of Go6 Institute Slovenia. Jan is based in Slovenia, EU.