Bernd Kowalski
Head of Department, Federal Office for Information Security
Head of Department, Federal Office for Information Security
Bernd Kowalski was born on March 22nd 1954 in Siegen, Germany. He visited university at the Rheinisch Westfälische Technische Hochschule (RWTH) in Aachen. In 1982 he joined the Deutsche Bundespost / Deutsche Telekom and worked first in the area of data communication networks and applications in Darmstadt. Since 1985 he was involved in various information security projects and several standardisation groups like, for example, the ITU work on X.509 Authentication Framework (1985-1988). In 1990 he became product manager and head of the Productcenter Telesec of Deutsche Telekom that provided secure communications products and services, e.g. Certificate and Smartcard Services for public Digital Signature and corporate security solutions for business customers. In 2002 he changed to the German Federal Office for Information Security (BSI) in Bonn and took over a division that is responsible for Certification, Conformity Testing and the development of Protection Profiles and Technical Recommendations for infrastructure projects of the Federal Government, e.g. German ID-Card, eHealth and Smart Metering / Smart Grids.