Ayden Férdeline
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| Organization: | Mozilla | ||
| Affiliation: | GNSO, NextGen@ICANN | ||
| Stakeholder Group(s): | ,|xyz|xyz| }} | ||
| Region: | Europe | ||
| Country: | Germany | ||
| Email: | ayden [at] ferdeline.com | ||
| Website: | |||
| LinkedIn: |  Ayden Férdeline
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| Twitter: |  @ferdeline
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Ayden Férdeline is a fellow with the Mozilla Foundation. At ICANN, he represents the Non-Commercial Stakeholders Group (NCSG) on the GNSO Council.
After participating in the NextGen@ICANN program in October 2015 at ICANN 54 in Dublin, he joined the NCSG. He was appointed to the Policy Committee of the NCSG in January 2017 by the Executive Committee of the Non-Commercial Users Constituency (NCUC), and was subsequently elected to the GNSO Council as Councilor from ICANN 60 in Abu Dhabi.
He participated in ICANN 56 in Helsinki, ICANN 57 in Hyderabad, ICANN 58 in Copenhagen, and ICANN 59 in Johannesburg as part of the Community Onboarding Program. He traveled to Reykjavik for the fourth NCPH Intersessional as a representative of the NCUC. He participated in ICANN 60 in Abu Dhabi, ICANN 61 in San Juan, and ICANN 62 in Panama City as a Councillor on the GNSO Council. He participated in the fifth NCPH Intersessional, and the GNSO Council Strategic Planning Session, in Los Angeles on behalf of the NCSG.
He represented the NCUC as a workshop moderator at the Internet Freedom Festival in Valencia in 2018, and at the United Nations World Summit on the Information Society in Geneva in 2016 with the support of CROPP. He also represented the NCUC at the United Nations Internet Governance Forum in Geneva in 2017 with the support of ICANN's global IGF engagement programme.
He was an Internet Society Ambassador to the United Nations Internet Governance Forum in Guadalajara in 2016, and a fellow of the European Dialogue on Internet Governance in Brussels (2016), in Tallinn (2017), and in Tbilisi (2018).
Outside of ICANN, he is a member of the Youth Coalition on Internet Governance, and the Internet Governance Forum Support Association.
He holds a Master of Science degree from the London School of Economics.
Controversy[edit | edit source]
Since 2019, Férdeline has been on a personal crusade to discredit a child protection organization, Prostasia Foundation, putting forward the view that the Foundation's approach, which prioritizes the prevention of child sexual abuse, is harmful. In July 2019, PayPal terminated Prostasia Foundation's account on the basis of false allegations made by Férdeline; an action which has been criticized by human rights group Article 19.[1] In May 2020, he made a complaint to the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) alleging that Prostasia Foundation is using its income or assets "to support illegal or terrorist activities." In the same month he also called for informants who could help him to disrupt three grant applications that the Foundation had made.[2]
Since Férdeline has no background in this subject area and has provided no evidence to substantiate his claims, some have speculated that the campaign is a personal vendetta against fellow Internet governance expert Jeremy Malcolm. Malcolm himself however denies having any previous bad blood with Férdeline, and has suggested that there may be a political motivation behind the campaign.[3]