​National Assembly Speaker Baleka Mbete has congratulated University of Johannesburg’s (UJ) Professor Basie von Solms, who has been invited by the World Economic Forum (WEF) to join their Global Future Council on Cybersecurity.

The National Assembly has acknowledged the leading role Prof von Solms has played in emphasising the importance of South African cyber-security initiatives in a global context.

Prof von Solms is the Director of the Centre for Cyber Security at UJ, and the Research Professor in the Academy for Computer Science and Software Engineering.

The WEF’s Global Future Council on Cybersecurity is the newest of the WEF’s Global Future Councils covering 38 topic areas committed to reshaping global systems for the benefit of humanity and the planet and acting as a brain trust for the World Economic Forum and world at large.

The Global Future Council on Cybersecurity is an invitation-only community consisting of 19 leading international Cybersecurity experts.

According to the WEF, the Global Future Council on Cybersecurity will draw a comprehensive picture of the implications and impacts of cyber risk amid the Fourth Industrial Revolution, describe how cybersecurity can serve as a key element of executive decision-making, and provide expert input to the World Economic Forum’s Centre for Cybersecurity.

Prof von Solms specialises in research and consultancy in the area of Information and Cyber Security, Critical Information Infrastructure Protection, Cyber Crime and other related cyber aspects. He had written and presented more than 130 papers regarding this field – most of which have been presented at international research conferences and/or published in international subject journals.