Zmarialai Wafa

Country:	Afghanistan
Email:	zmarialai.wafa [at] mcit.gov.af
LinkedIn:	Zmarialai Wafa

Zmarialai Wafa is ICT specialist who has been in the field of ICT for more than 20 years. He worked as Information Systems Instructor for five years and as ICT Officer and Training Coordinator with UNESCO between 2002 and 2003. After 2005, he worked as a free-lance ICT Contractor to various international and government organizations in Kabul. He worked at the Ministry of Communications and IT (MCIT) from 2009 to 2016 and has drafted various information security policies and procedures for the government.

Mr Wafa has pioneered cybercrime investigation in Afghanistan and as cybercrime lead investigator, he has solved cybercrime cases worth 28 Million US dollars. He is the author of National Cyber Security Strategy of Afghanistan and the Network Architect of new Internet Regime for Afghanistan.

He has led and drafted the cybercrime law of Afghanistan and chairs the Cybercrime Committee in the country. He has led and drafted the e-Transaction and e-Signature law for Afghanistan; drafted the National Information and Cyber Security Policy for the Government and led and drafted the Information Classification Policy for the government.

From 2013 to 2015, besides being the Director for Information Systems Security at MCIT, he also served as CISO to the President’s Office. From 2015 to June 2016, he is worked as Information Systems/Cyber Security Advisor and Head of PKI Management Authority to the Ministry of Communications and IT of Islamic Republic of Afghanistan.

Zmarialai Wafa is the founder of Afghanistan Root Certification Authority (ARCA); he was the first officer for Public Key Infrastructure of Afghanistan including e-NID from 2010 till 2016. He designed layered security with a significant authentication mechanism and ensured the security of data in transit, data at rest, data in process and Data inside smart card chip of National ID card. He deployed digital signature validation for the Integrity of Data at rest during report generation in Resident Management System.

At MCIT he managed the .AF ccTLD, National Internet Registry, National IXP, AFCERT, PKI and Root CA for the e-NID Card project. He has also been actively involved in various international organizations (ICANN, ISOC, APNIC, APT, ITU and IMPACT to name some). Currently, he is the Program Manager for Afghanistan Personnel and Pay System (APPS) at NETLINKS LTD and board director at Internet Society Afghanistan.