Daily Recap: 25 November 2013
Akwaba to Abidjan!
Welcome to AFRINIC – 19.
After two days of training sessions and tutorials, Monday began with the panel discussions of the week.
Internet Governance
The Internet Governance panel opened to a full house and comprised of 4 presentations. Ibrahima Guimba Seidou of SES started with his presentation on “Connecting Africa - how satellite can help social and economic development”. He was followed by Koffi Fabrice Djossou, who updated the community on the Dot Africa top level domain launch Strategy. Yves Miezan Ezo of SMILE – CI gave an interesting presentation entitled “L’Afrique à l'heure de l'économie de la connaissance », after which Adiel Akplogan wrapped up the session with a presentation on the recent International/Regional challenges faced by Internet Governance among which the Montevideo statement, the /1net dialogue and how to engage all stakeholders in Internet Governance discussions. Among the important issues raised were:
- How to connect the 300-700 million Africans unconnected (satellite, fiber, cost effective solutions)
- How to be active/independent actors of the e-economy via libre software?
- How do we prepare the African region to plan for WSIS+10 and the new sustainable development goals going forward.
Not all the questions got answered and we encourage continued discussions at for example national and regional IGF among other fora to put Africa back on the IG map. Some information about organisations in IG can be found here: http://www.afrinic.net/en/community/ig
AfGWG
The AFRINIC Government Working group (AFGWG) met for its 8th edition. 3 presentations were delivered to an open audience, by Adiel Akplogan, CEO AFRINIC, Ernest Byaruhanga, Policy Liaison Manager, AFRINIC and Jean Robert Hountomey of AfricaCERT. They talked about AFRINIC and the reasoning behind establishing the AfGWG, the AFRINIC Policy Development Process and the Role of AfricaCERT in the regional Internet ecosystem respectively.
The AFGWG was established to help the Government community come with specific questions to the rest of the community and establish an ongoing dialogue on Internet public policy issues. Apart from the biannual face to face meetings, there is a mailing list specific to the group where discussions take place.
Cyber Security
Internet security is one of this year's hot topics. It was a subject debated at the recent IGF in Bali. AFRINIC plays a leading role in strengthening and promoting Internet security In Africa. We encourage DNSSEC deployment in the region and offer DNSSEC training courses to our members and the community. AFRINIC also manages and publishes Reverse DNS (rDNS) zone data for the IP space it allocates or assigns to members. We also promote the use of RPKI – Certification throughout the region to further increase the security of Internet infrastructure (http://www.afrinic.net/en/initiatives?Name=Value). Our presenters today talked about the various components of Cyber Security and its importance.
Valdez Nzalli gave insightful presentations on Internet penetration in Africa and privacy issues related to the Internet. Stephane Konan concluded the Cybersecurity session with a presentation on detailing a platform dedicated to fighting cyber criminality in Cote D’Ivoire.
In addition, our sponsors, MTN and Amanah gave presentations on the MTN Foundation and The Spirit of Entrepreneurship respectively, to conclude the day.
Trainings
IPv6 for Managers
While parallel with the plenary, the training sessions continued with one on IPv6 for Managers, conducted by Hisham Ibrahim, our IPV6 programme manager. The session always aims at closing helping business executives evaluate IPv6 strategically as well as support their technical people in deploying it. The AFRINIC IPv6 programme information can be found here: http://www.afrinic.net/en/services/ipv6-programme
AfricaCERT
“Having succeeded yesterday during the first training sessions and having their CSIRT fully operational, participants went today through technical issues. They got prepared to communicate with each other in confidence by using PGP. They browsed topics like Internet threats, Malware types, Hacking techniques, Underground economy mechanisms”, explained Jacques Houngbo, AfricaCERT Trainer.
On the technical level, incident handling security tools are of importance, reason why a large part of the day was devoted to it. Participants shared knowledge about the large variety of tools they were using each. The spectrum is quite large and not every tool fit all needs and circumstances.
Although participants were more conversant with technical issues, this was an opportunity for them to sense the legal dimensions of their activities at CSIRT. Law enforcement, compliance with regulation, protection of critical infrastructure and acting for national security, all this can sometimes balance with individual privacy or with the extent of damage some bad acts are having on business. More information on AfricaCERT is available here: http://www.africacert.org/home/
FIRE programme
The Fund for Internet Research and Education (FIRE) Programme is hosting a grant proposal writing workshop in Abidjan from the 25th until the 26th of November 2013. The FIRE Programme has selected 15 attendees located in six Francophone and Lusophone countries to receive additional support for capacity development to improve the quality of project proposals presented to potential donors, sponsors, or investors.
The first day, the participants were introduced to the FIRE programme’s Grants application system. They were afterwards trained on various ways and methods to express their Project Problem, solution and Methodology. The famous 5 Ws and an H (What?, Whom ?, Where ?, Why ?, When? and How?) were considered as the stepping stone to start the session.
AFRINIC Welcome Cocktail…Good times…
The Welcome Cocktail, sponsored by MTN was a great opportunity for the delegates to unwind and have a good time by the pool. Everyone had a chance to relax at the end of a busy and successful first day during the cocktail.
Special thanks to our Sponsor MTN Cote D’Ivoire.
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