OPEN PRIVACY RESEARCH SOCIETY - Key Persons


Cecylia Bocovich

Job Titles:
  • Advisory Director
  • Developer at the Tor Project
Cecylia is a developer at The Tor Project where she works on detecting and circumventing state censorship, and implementing censorship circumvention tools. She was previously a member of the Cryptography, Security, and Privacy (CrySP) research group at the University of Waterloo. Her PhD research there addressed a broad range of privacy issues with a focus on censorship resistance.

Cynthia Khoo

Job Titles:
  • Director
Cynthia is a digital rights lawyer at Tekhnos Law and digital policy columnist at The Monitor. Her work combines copyright, privacy, freedom of expression, and Internet regulatory law and policy, specifically where they impact human rights and civil liberties. She is particularly interested in technology ethics and the intersection between online platforms, intermediary liability law, and justice for marginalized communities.

Dan Ballard - Treasurer

Job Titles:
  • Director
  • Treasurer
Dan is a developer focused on security and privacy through decentralization. He wants to ensure next generation social tools are high quality, consent enforcing, support more complex human interaction, and are made accessible to everyone, especially those who need them most. His latest work involves bringing decentralized IM to Android.

Erinn Atwater

Job Titles:
  • Director
Erinn is a PhD candidate in the Cryptography, Security and Privacy (CrySP) lab and the Centre for Applied Cryptographic Research at the University of Waterloo. Her research interests revolve around the obstacles that prevent widespread deployment of end-to-end encryption. Her thesis includes work on usable encrypted webmail, protecting keys across multiple devices, and creating compulsion-proof technology.

Marcia Díaz Agudelo

Job Titles:
  • Designer and Illustrator from Colombia
  • Staff Designer
Marcia is a Designer and Illustrator from Colombia who lives and works in Canada. She has an interest in anthropology, technology and history. Through her work she tries to transform complex topics into thoughtful and meaningful graphic narratives.

Norman Shamas

Job Titles:
  • Director
Norman Shamas is an activist and educator whose work focuses on human-centered information and digital security and privacy. They work with activists globally and have a particular focus on sex workers, queer, trans*, and gender nonconforming communities.

Sarah Jamie Lewis

Job Titles:
  • Executive Director
Sarah is an anonymity & privacy researcher who believes technology, protocols and systems should empower people. Her work is focused on consent, metadata resistance and decentralization. She previously ran the dark web mapping OnionScan project, and promoted stories that document how privacy impacts marginalized & at risk communities in her book Queer Privacy.