Swiss Digital Initiative (SDI) with new management team
After three successful years of development, Executive Director Niniane Paeffgen is leaving the Swiss Digital Initiative Foundation at her own request as of November 2022. Her successor is Fathi Derder, a former member of the Swiss National Council and journalist who has been working for an innovative Switzerland for years. With the cross-stakeholder Geneva Digital Initiative, Derder was particularly involved in strengthening international Geneva in the areas of digitization and digital trust.
The Swiss Digital Initiative (SDI) is an independent, non-profit foundation based in Geneva, founded in 2020 by digitalswitzerland and under the patronage of Federal Councilor Ueli Maurer. The initiative was created in 2019 as a result of the first "Swiss Global Digital Summit" on ethics and fairness in the digital age. The SDI pursues concrete projects with the aim of securing ethical standards and promoting responsible conduct in the digital world. It brings together science, politics, civil society and business to find solutions that strengthen trust in digital technologies and the actors of digital transformation.
Digital Trust Label" lighthouse project
The Swiss Digital Initiative has so far been managed by Niniane Paeffgen. After three years since its founding, a period of development and leadership, the current managing director will leave the foundation as of November 2022. She will take some time off to devote herself to new tasks afterwards. The highlight of her tenure was the launch of the world's first digital responsibility label, the "Digital Trust Label". The aim of this lighthouse project is to create awareness for the handling of digital data, privacy and artificial intelligence and to carry this out from Geneva into the world. With the project "Ethics of Artificial Intelligence" and "Corporate Digital Responsibility in Practice", other concrete projects have been developed and implemented with renowned partners such as HEAD Genève and IMD Lausanne. Doris Leuthard, President of the Swiss Digital Initiative and former Federal Councillor: "We sincerely thank Niniane for her tireless commitment and work for the Foundation, but also for the positioning of Switzerland and Geneva in the fields of digital ethics and trust. Thanks to her commitment, the Foundation is well positioned for the future."
Swiss Digital Initiative enters a new phase
Fathi Derder will drive the international positioning of the SDI and the label, according to the foundation. With the operationalization and the awarding of the label to the first twenty digital trust pioneers, the SDI is entering a new phase, it continues. A strong focus is now on the further development and international scaling of the Digital Trust Label. A committee of experts was recently recruited in an open application process. Under its leadership, the label is to become an internationally recognized standard for trustworthy digital applications.
Fathi Derder brings expertise from the intersection of politics, business and society. As a journalist, former member of the National Council, managing director and co-founder of the Swiss Food & Nutrition Valley, he possesses "the political sensitivity, the necessary experience and motivation to write the next chapter of the Swiss Digital
initiative," the foundation says. SDI President Doris Leuthard: "We are proud that with Fathi Derder we were able to win such a high-caliber, as well as competent and committed personality. This confirms the high status that the SDI has achieved after only a few years."
Source: https://www.swiss-digital-initiative.org/
