Speakers

Geoff Connell, Director of Digital Services and Chair of the National Cyber Technical Advisory Group (CTAG), Norfolk County Council 
Geoff Connell is a highly experienced local public sector ICT manager who is responsible for technology and digital service delivery at Norfolk County Council. He has previously led teams in multiple London Boroughs to modernise and optimise ICT infrastructures, as well as delivering digitally enabled transformation programmes to implement new organisational delivery models. He is active in various national and regional collaborative bodies and chairs the Socitm Local CIO Council & the national Cyber Technical Advisory Group (CTAG).

Martin Peters, Detective Superintendent at City of London Police and Deputy Lead for the National Cybercrime Programme for the National Police Chiefs' Council
Martin Peters has 28 years’ police service, majority as a Detective in all ranks. He has extensive experience in covert policing, undercover policing, surveillance operations, cybercrime, fraud, money laundering and drugs investigations. A PIP3-SOC-SIO, accredited financial investigator and strategic cybercrime investigator and accredited Government counter fraud investigator.

National Cyber Security Centre representative

Paul Barnes, Head of Operations & Engagement - Cybersecurity, NHS England
Paul Barnes has worked in IT for a range of public and private sector organisations and has worked on the NHS England cybersecurity programme since 2017. His role encompasses working with the Department of Health and Social Care, Cabinet Office, NCSC and incident response teams within NHS England.

Billy Ruston, Response Specialist - Cyber Security, Local Government Association 
Billy Ruston is an experienced incident response specialist and has worked in various roles in both government and industry. He has recently joined the Local Government Association to lead the Business Continuity Reaction Exercise programme - a new LGA offering supporting councils to enhance their cyber incident preparedness and organisational resilience by working alongside key stakeholders to rehearse response plans, roles and responsibilities and information flows.

Calum Inverarity, Senior Researcher, Open Data Institute
Calum Inverarity's interests lie in the interplay between science, technology, and society, and the questions this asks of contemporary governance. His work at the ODI focuses primarily on privacy-enhancing technologies and how these can be used responsibly to help address societal challenges. He has previously worked with think tanks and research institutes in the UK and Belgium focusing on cyber security, economic policy, and conflict resolution. He received his MSc from the University of Amsterdam and completed his BA at the University of Leeds, having spent periods studying at the University of California, San Diego, and the University of Ghana.

Emma Velle, Cyber Security Specialist, Cisco UKI
Emma Velle brings over two decades of technology and cyber security industry. She started her career as a pre sales engineer before joining Cisco in 2005 as a Public Sector Systems Engineer. Emma relocated to Norway in 2014 but re-joined Cisco in 2018 as a cyber security specialist in Cisco's UK Public Sector team. In this role Emma is responsible for advising UK healthcare and local government clients on a range of cyber security matters. She is a regular external speaker and passionate about sharing her experiences to young women and girls about a career in cyber security

Richard McCue, Head of Technology, Staffordshire and Shropshire Health Informatics Service (S&SHIS)
Richard McCue has 20 years of experience in the tech sector and five years in his current role. Having a strong technical IT background, he leads dynamic teams responsible for IT service delivery, operational IT support, and Cybersecurity. He believes in creating an environment where people can continuously learn and develop in line with the ethos of SSHIS, where every individual is valued, and together, they achieve success.

Jamie Cross, Programme Manager – Bespoke Cyber Support, Local Government Association 
Jamie Cross has been helping councils to improve their cyber security at the LGA for the past five years. They’ve worked on/ led projects such as the 2018 Cyber Stocktake, 2019 Self-Assessment Tool, and the security testing of 10% of councils. More recently they have developed a new programme of bespoke cyber support for councils, including the Cyber 360 and Cyber Reaction Exercises, which are funded opportunities for councils to explore and test their cyber security culture –in a safe, friendly and constructive environment.

Rachel Downs, Senior Product Manager - Local Digital Team, Department for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities
As a senior product manager in the Local Digital team, Rachel Downs leads a number of cyber security workstreams to support councils with their cyber resilience. This includes an in-progress pilot of a cyber assessment framework for the local government sector, and a cyber support programme that has provided almost £20m in funding along with expert technical support to help councils address high priority cyber risks.

Henry Hughes, Chief Technology Officer, Jisc
Jisc is a not-for-profit organisation and believes education and research improves lives and that technology improves education and research. It provides managed and brokered products and services, enhanced with expertise and intelligence to provide sector leadership and enable digital transformation.

Dan Patefield, Head of Cyber and National Security, techUK
Dan Patefield leads the techUK cyber security programme, having originally joined techUK in August 2017 as a programme manager working across the cyber and defence programmes. He is responsible for managing techUK's work across the cyber security eco-system, bringing industry together with key stakeholders across the public and private sectors. He also provides the industry secretariat for the Cyber Growth Partnership, the industry and Government conduit for supporting growth across the sector. A key focus of his work is to strengthen the public-private partnership across cyber security to support further development of UK cyber security policy.