Ivan Uy is the next DICT head!

President-elect Ferdinand Marcos Jr. delegates IT expert Ivan John Uy to head the Department of Information and Communications Technology.

Ivan Uy as the new head of DICT (Photo from ABS-CBN)

Marcos picks PNoy's ex-Cabinet member Ivan Uy

Incoming Press Secretary Trixie Cruz-Angeles said in a press conference that Uy is an expert in technology law and well-experienced in information technology. She added,

He oversaw the formulation of the Philippine digital strategy from 2011 to 2016. He is an international commercial arbitrator in areas involving IT-related disputes.

In 2010, Uy served as the chair of the Commission on Information and Communication and Technology (CICT) under the administration of former President Benigno Aquino III. 

Marcos' DICT chief pick also entered the Supreme Court as a legal researcher before moving up to the head of the High Court's management information system office. He served in that position during the term of then-chief justice Hilario Davide Jr.

According to the CIO Forum, an organization of CIOs in the government, Ivan Uy is an expert on computer forensics, cybercrime, electronic evidence, e-commerce, and digital ethics. For his academic background, he finished his legal management degree from the Ateneo de Manila University. 

After that, he completed his law degree from the University of the Philippines and studied at the University of Minnesota under the prestigious Hubert H. Humphrey fellowship.

In recent years, Uy has offered his expertise on election-related matters. Six years ago, the IT expert was a consultant for the Binay-led United Nationalist Alliance, one of the camps that brought up the hash code controversy during the 2016 elections. 

Moreover, Uy became a source code reviewer for the Senate panel of the Joint Congressional Oversight Committee (JCOC) on the automated election system for the 2019 and 2022 elections. 

The Department of Information and Communications Technology was last headed by former Sen. Gringo Honasan, who stepped down from the post after announcing his plan to return to the Senate.

Source: ABS-CBN