Veni Markovski

Country:	Bulgaria
Email:	veni[at]veni.com
Website:	http://www.veni.com
LinkedIn:	Veni Markovski
Currently ICANN Staff Formerly a member of the ICANN Board

Veni Markovski is one of Bulgaria's pioneers in Internet and information technology. He is currently ICANN's Vice President of Engagement with the United Nations. Before that, he oversaw engagement with Russia, The Commonwealth of Independent States, and Eastern Europe. He was a Director on ICANN's Board from 2006 to 2007. He is also the Owner and CEO of Global Solutions and Consulting and has been advising the Bulgarian National Cybersecurity Coordinator since 2009.

In November 2012, he was promoted from Manager of Regional Relations for Russia, the Commonwealth of Independent States, and Eastern Europe to his current position, which reports to Sally Costerton and is part of CEO Fadi Chehadé's goal to expand ICANN outreach and involvement to the developing world and improve the international makeup of the organization.

Markovski was born 1968 in Skopie, Macedonia. He started his work with the Internet in 1990 as a System Operator for the first Sofia, Bulgaria-based bulletin-board system, part of FidoNet. By 1993 he had founded the second Internet Service Provider in the history of Bulgaria, which later became BOL.BG. In 1995, he founded the non-profit Internet Society of Bulgaria, and is currently chairman of its board.

He currently lives in Washington, D.C., USA.

Advisory and Leadership Roles

Markovski has served on the boards of ICANN, The Internet Society, CPSR, Sofia New Symphony Orchestra, and others. In 2003 he ran for mayor of Sofia, Bulgaria. In 2006-2009 he supported the work of the Bulgarian State Agency for Information Technologies and Communications by advising its chairman on international ICT-related issues.

He has also advised several Bulgarian Parliaments, and the Council of Ministers, and has been chairing the Bulgarian President's IT Advisory Committee since 2002. His governmental work includes contributions to a variety of ICT-related legislation, such as the Telecommunications Act, the Penal Code (computer crimes chapter), the Electronic Document and Digital Signature Law, the Copyright Law, and others.

Mr. Markovski has been a member of the Bulgarian delegation to the U.N. World Summit on Information Society, and a member of the advisory group to the Internet Governance Forum. He was also the Project Manager of UNDP projects for support of e-government initiatives in Southeastern Europe, and his efforts there were positively reviewed by The New York Times, The International Herald Tribune, heise.de, and others. Veni Markovski has also served as the project contact point for the Bulgarian ENUM trial, which was launched on April 13, 2006.

He has been published in dozens of Bulgarian and foreign newspapers and magazines since 1984 and is a frequent presenter at IT and cybersecurity-related conferences around the world, among them CFP (San Francisco, CA, USA), MAAWG (Washington, DC, USA), WSIS (Geneva, Switzerland and Tunis, Tunisia), Wizards of OS (Berlin, Germany), iWeek (Johannesburg, South Africa), FBI/Fordham (New York), RANS (Moscow, Russia), Nato Forum on Security (Istanbul, Turkey), Cybersecurity forums (Sofia, Bulgaria; Belgrade, Serbia; Moscow, Russia; New York, USA), and many others.

Career History

• From September 1990 to August 1993 Veni Markovski was the System Operator at MicroComm.
• He was the CEO/President of BOL.BG from December 1993 to April 2002.
• He was a Member of the Board of Directors of ICANN from 2003 to 2006.
• He served as a Member of Board of Trustees of The Internet Society.
• He was a participant in TED in February 2009.
• Since December 1995, he has served as the President and Chairman of the Board of The Internet Society, Bulgaria.
• He has been acting as the Chairman Bulgarian President's IT Advisory Committee since March 2002.
• He has been working as the Senior Advisor to the Chairman of the Bulgarian Government - State Agency for IT and Communications since January 2006.
• In November 2006 he joined Global Solutions and Consulting as the CEO/owner.
• He has been serving as the Regional Representative of ICANN in Russia, Eastern Europe, and CIS since January 2007.
• He joined the Office of the National Cybersecurity Coordinator as the Senior Advisor in April 2009 and has been serving as the Advisor of the Bulgarian National Cybersecurity Coordinator since.

Stratfor & Wikileaks

Mr. Markovski was linked to Stratfor, a global intelligence entity called the "shadow CIA", in February 2012, by Wikileaks. He is named in some of the 5 million emails that were acquired by the hacker consortium, Anonymous, and given to Wikileaks. One contact he made within the group questioned who this "shady Bulgarian was", and another responded, "hooked into the Bulgarian OC, but nothing too shady bout that since he is Bulgarian”. He was also described as a “Bulgarian billionaire telecommunications oligarch” and “kinda a strange guy, but very powerful in business circles.”

It seems that the overall documented relationship was largely benign and that he did not seem to be integrated into the organization. Furthermore, prominent publications have noted that Stratfor is largely a joke and does not wield the strategic power that it claims.

Education

• St. Kliment Ohridski Sofia University, Msc. Law, 1989-1997

World Summit on the Information Society