IFIP President Mike Hinchey highlighted the role of technology in enabling progress towards the United Nations Sustainable Development Goal (SDG) #3 “Good Health and Well-Being” during an address to the Korea Computer Congress (KCC 2021) at Jeju Island last week.
Hosted jointly by the Korean Institute of Computer Scientists and Engineers (KIISE) and IFIP, the event took the theme of “Unimagined Futures: Healing and Recovery with K-SW” and was one of the first of many events this year which will mark IFIP’s 60th Anniversary.
Speaking from his home in Ireland, Professor Hinchey told delegates that, as a result of the COVID pandemic, the United Nations 2021 SDG Pulse report due out next month is expected to emphasise SDG #3 as a major issue. Hinchey said part of this goal is:
- Health monitoring via emerging technologies;
- Remote contact / diagnosis / treatment;
- Population and disease monitoring;
- Prepare for disease outbreaks, identify patient symptoms, follow established treatment protocols and perform remote diagnostics; and
- Help analyse trends, and make projections about disease outbreaks, health service usage and patient knowledge, attitudes and practices.
“All of these things are exactly the things we’ve been doing for the last 15 months or so, that we’ve been emphasising because of the Coronavirus, and that we’ve been doing mostly with the simple devices that we have in our pockets,” Professor Hinchey said.
He pointed to the success of Ireland’s contact tracing app, which was downloaded by 25% of the population within 24 hours of its release and was so successful because they kept using it. Hinchey said the Irish app has since been made available by its developer, NearForm, on an open access basis to other countries around the world.
KCC 2021 is just one of many #ifip60 events being held around the world this year which seek to showcase the work and contributions of IFIP, its Member Societies, Technical Committees and Working Groups, IP3, YIT and other committees to the “world-at-large”.
The IFIP 60th Events Coordination Committee (“#ifip60 Committee”) was created and appointed in February to co-ordinate the growing list of #ifip60 events and activities. The committee, chaired by IFIP Vice President Anthony Wong, comprises Leon Strous (IFIP Past President), Philippe Palanque, (TA Chair), Vicki Hanson, (ACM CEO, ACM Past President), Erich Neuhold, (MSA Chair), Jacques Sakarovitch, (French representative), and Michael Grant (BCS Past President), and Alastair Irons (BCS representative) standing in for BCS President John Higgins, and supported by the IFIP Secretariat, Eduard Dundler.
In May, IFIP announced a call for proposals for 10 virtual events to debate and discuss issues at the intersection of technology and the information society, aligning with the concept and selection criteria: https://nextcloud.gi.de/s/TxoAeXB7et9FjRY. The virtual “IFIP 60th Anniversary Future of Information Processing Series” which form part of the #ifip60 celebrations of events around the world, will be free and open to the public. The events will take place between August and December 2021.
At its recent meeting in June, the #ifip60 Committee reviewed the expressions of interest and short-listed the 10 virtual events. The upcoming “IFIP Future of Information Processing Series” includes:
| No | Future of Information Processing Series | Event Date |
| 1 | The Silent Revolution: Software as the Technological Fabric of Society
In this session, thought leaders from academia and industry will discuss the role and impact of principled design, methodology and implementation of high-level programming languages in this silent revolution. They will reflect not only on the increasingly severe demands on software safety, security and productivity in today’s systems, but also on advancing languages and their algorithmic calculi, formal verification, automated analysis and synthesis as under-the-hood facilitators of tomorrow’s artificially intelligent, data-driven, robotic, interconnected-device-based, decentralized and parallel systems. |
30.08.21 |
| 2 | Digital Twin for Cyber-Physical Production Systems
The web talk will focus on digital twin, security and safety aspects of Cyber-physical Systems (CPS) in different application areas, like for example production systems. |
13.09.21 |
| 3 | Strategic Collaboration of Certification and Education on Data Science
IFIP IP3 plans to share relevant activities related to certification and education on data science in this session. The audience will be able to understand the entire picture of various efforts in this domain. IFIP IP3 and the speakers will be able to seek possibilities of mutual collaboration such as college-level education and certification for data scientists. |
27.09.21 |
| 4 | IFIP Code of Ethics and Professional Conduct: A Document for its Time
This session will explore Ethics and ICTs in the age of digital transformation. It will bring together some of the creators and publishers of the IFIP Code of Ethics and Professional Conduct to talk about the importance of the Code for today’s rapidly transforming digital landscape |
04.10.21 |
| 5 | Decision Making for a Sustainable Global Society
The objective of this session is to consider individual, organisational, governmental, and societal decision making and how the decisions made by each of these stakeholders’ effect global sustainability. With the 17 sustainable development goals (SDGs) at the heart of the conversation, our aim is to reflect on decision making, decision support and decision support systems (DSS) over the last 60 years and consider new opportunities to innovate and disrupt in order to enable and achieve a more resilient, sustainable society. |
11.10.21 |
| 6 | Autonomous Vehicle Safety and Security: An Information Processing Imperative
With over 1.3 million people dying on the roads each year, autonomous vehicles have the potential to massively reduce this carnage by leveraging advancements in computing power, algorithms and sensing technologies. But there are significant hurdles to be overcome. This panel of global experts will discuss information processing advancements that are imperative to the realization of highly dependable and secure road vehicles, as well as debating related societal and ethical issues. |
18.10.21 |
| 7 | Trends on Computing Systems
The panel will focus on computing systems trends to cope with the increasing need of low power and performance in the IoT world. It will discuss some new computing systems (like quantum and neural processors) that forecast a revolution in computing architectures and systems. Future computing systems should be dedicated to applications and should obtain solutions using much less power. The human brain computes using a small fraction of power compared to actual computing systems. Thus, the key question is “can we make computing architectures as efficient as our brain to go beyond Moore’s Law?” |
25.10.21 |
| 8 | Future Trends in Databases: from Data Science through Artificial Intelligence to Quantum Computing
This session will focus on novel (future) topics in database research. The envisaged topics include: (1) data engineering technologies supporting data science, (2) issues of data quality in modern application domains, (3) performance optimization with the support of artificial intelligence and (4) quantum computing for databases. |
22.11.21 |
| 9 | Cybersecurity Skills
This panel session from IFIP TC 11 will explore cyber security skills, drawing in people/perspectives from industry, academia, and the profession. Moderated by the TC-11 chair, panel would explore themes including the skills shortage, skills requirements and how to bridge the gap. |
29.11.21 |
| 10 | IFIP TC3 Zanzibar Declaration: The Outcomes
This event seeks to publicise the conclusions and findings of the IFIP TC3 Zanzibar Declaration process, which has relevance to all educators in all countries. The session will discuss the main outcomes of a series of webinars and a follow-up Conference organised to address educational and social challenges to achieve ‘Sustainable Education in a Digital Age of Rapidly Emerging Technologies’. All these events have been developed under the umbrella of the IFIP TC3 Zanzibar Declaration. They started in March 2021 and will last until November 2021 |
06.12.21 |
IFIP is grateful to the proposal organisers for their expressions of interest and for their participation.
The German Informatics Society (GI) has been appointed to coordinate and to assist IFIP with #ifip60. Working with the #ifip60 Committee, the international team at GI has prepared an #ifip60 engagement and communications campaign. To celebrate, we are highlighting the activities of participating Member Societies and IFIP committees- launching #ifip60, a social media campaign promoting events and activities of IFIP and its Member Societies.
IFIP will equip participating IFIP stakeholders with a communications toolkit to assist with branding and marketing, including the #ifip60 logo, graphics for social media, communications and style guides.
To reach and connect with the largest world audience possible, IFIP has started working collaboratively with #ifip60 participating member societies and the IFIP communities. On 17 June, about 20 participants representing various IFIP member societies and committees took part in the inaugural #ifip60 Communicators Workshop organised for “communicators” to share and utilise #ifip60 resources, to create effective press materials and social media posts, and to grow our online presence. As a result of the successful workshop, a LinkedIn Group has been created to collaborate and share information in relation to #ifip60.
Participation in #ifip60 continues to grow and at time of writing, 14 Member Societies and Committees have contributed and committed to participate in #ifip60 under the IFIP (Jubilee) Events category with a further 15 events in planning:
| Day | Month | Organized by | Location | Description | Website |
| 13 | April | IFIP IP3 | Virtual | During the WSIS Forum 2021 (organized by UN bodies) Cybersecurity track: Building Cyber Resilience with a Professional workforce | https://itu.zoom.us/rec/share/COeZgdpK3_KJKUouzjRUA47CEJXNiOwxRv4iNL29xEImNkwAzQkgfUu0IbHjL6Sj.XgiUWwGh1t-hCkno |
| 23 | June | IFIP TC- 11 | Virtual / Oslo | 36th International Conference on ICT Systems Security and Privacy Protection, IFIP SEC 2021
Panel session IFIP 60 years Bill Caelli, Yuko Murayama, Basie von Solms, Leon Strous, Louise Yngström, Chair: Steven Furnell Panel session IFIP and National Computer Societies |
www.ifipsec.org/2021/program.html
|
| 24 | June | BCS
(UK) |
Virtual | BCS Insights 2021
Defining good, doing good. Annual conference welcomes tech leaders and professionals, futurologists, influencers and innovators to discuss the way we use technology today and explore how we create a bright digital future for everyone in society. |
www.bcs.org/events-home/bcs-insights/ |
| 23 – 25 | June | KIISE
(South Korea) |
Hybrid
Jeju Island |
Annual conference, Korea Computer Congress (KCC) 2021, at Jeju Island. IFIP is the co-host of KCC 2021.
The theme of the KCC 2021 is “Unimagined Futures: Healing and Recovery with K-SW”. |
https://www.kiise.or.kr/conference/kcc/2021/ |
| 18 – 23 | July | SBC
(Brazil) |
Virtual | The IFIP’s 60th Anniversary session during CSBC 2021 is scheduled for July the 20th, 2021,12:00-13:15 (local time: GMT-3) Title: a global framework for the socially responsible development and application of information and communication technologies.
The main theme of CSBC 2021 is “Innovation and Digital Transformation: Facing the Complexity and Uncertainties of the Contemporary World” |
https://csbc.ufsc.br/ |
| 31 | Aug | Computer Society of Sri Lanka (CSSL) | Virtual | CSSL Policy Dialogue on Digital Safety and Hygiene is an initiative under CSSL CONTRIBUTE pillar of 2021 strategic plan.
This event is organised as a member event to mark and celebrate #ifip60 and Invitees from IFIP will resource persons of the panel. |
|
| 27 – 1 | Sept. / Oct. | German Informatics Society (GI) | 51st annual conference Informatik 2021
As a first event from Germany within the IFIP jubilee year we aligned our annual conference and integrated the logo: Mike Hinchey and Gabriele Kotsis will hold welcome addresses and the crucial parts will be held in English and therefore be interesting for the IFIP community (and beyond). |
https://informatik2021.gi.de/en/ | |
| 28 | Sept. | IFIP | Virtual | IFIP Virtual jubilee event – on the day declared by the UN as the (annual) International Day for Universal Access to Information (IDUAI) | |
| 29 | Sept. | Western Sydney University and ACS TC12
(Australia) |
Frontier Technologies for Sustainable Development: Opportunities and Challenges | ||
| 12 | Oct | Computer Society of Sri Lanka (CSSL) | CSSL CEO Conclave is a new addition to CSSL’s flagship event at the 39th National Information Technology Conference (NITC). It is a CEO breakfast meeting.
This event is organised as a member event to mark and celebrate #ifip60 and Panellists will include invitees from IFIP |
||
| 18 – 19 | Oct. | Swedish Computer Society
(Sweden) |
Stockholm | ITARC 2021
|
dfs.se
|
| 25-27 | Oct. | IPSJ
(Japan) |
6th IFIP Conference on Information Technology in Disaster Risk Reduction
ITDRR-2021 provides an international forum for researchers and practitioners to present their latest R&D findings and innovations. The conference is especially focused on the various IT aspects and challenges of copying with disaster risk reduction. |
https://www.itdrr-2021.com/ | |
| 2 | Nov. | IFIP IP3 and IT Professionalism Europe (ITPE) | Never waste a good crisis: building a trustworthy digital infrastructure: www.ipthree.org and www.itprofessionalism.org | ||
| 4 – 5 | Nov. | IFIP Domain Committee IoT | Amsterdam / hybrid | 4th IFIP International Internet of Things (IOT) Conference
|
http://ifip-iotconference.org/ |
IFIP (Jubilee) Events are events of any duration or format which are (co-)organized by IFIP, IFIP Member Societies, IFIP Technical Committees, Working Groups and other Committees including IP3, YIT and Domain Committees. These events, to be included in #ifip60 and promoted by IFIP, should be co-branded with IFIP, meaning at minimum the #ifip60 logo should appear on the event website and any materials shared on social media.
The initial #ifip60 events have occurred – a panel discussion on “Building Cyber Resilience with a Professional Workforce”, staged by IFIP IP3 as part of the WSIS 2021 Forum was followed in June by the IFIP SEC 2021 Conference, the BCS Insights 2021 and the KCC 2021, “Unimagined Futures: Healing and Recovery with K-SW”.
We acknowledge and thank the #ifip60 Committee and the GI International Team for their dedicated commitments, for their drive in getting the #ifip60 campaign moving in such a tight timeframe.
We invite and encourage all IFIP stakeholders to participate, engage, host and organize IFIP jubilee events in 2021. To contribute and participate in #ifip60, please contact Anthony Wong, Chair of #ifip60 Committee at anthony.wong@acs.org.au or Kristina Hatas, Junior Manager International Relations at GI kristina.hatas@gi.de.
Stay tuned for more information as additional details become available.
