Programme and Speakers - High-Level Debate on Competition, Innovation and Data Protection

Armin Hartmuth, Director, Representation of the Free State of Bavaria to the European Union

Joachim Herrmann, Bavarian State Minister of the Interior, for Sport and Integration (video message)

Ulrich Baumgartner, Regional Leader, DACH, IAPP; Partner, Baumgartner Baumann

Ulrich Baumgartner is a lawyer with more than two decades of practical experience in data and IT law. He is consistently ranked as one of the most renowned experts in data law in Germany. After establishing the respected German data protection practice of Osborne Clarke, he was a partner and head of the German data protection practice at Allen & Overy. 

In 2021, he co-founded the boutique data and technology law firm BAUMGARTNER BAUMANN. Ulrich has inter alia co-authored the leading German commentaries on GDPR and the German e-privacy law and is a regular speaker. He also serves as country leader for the Germany, Austria and Switzerland for the International Association of Privacy Professionals (IAPP).

Alberto Di Felice, Policy and Legal Counsel, DIGITALEUROPE

Alberto Di Felice is Policy and Legal Counsel at DIGITALEUROPE, the leading trade association representing digitally transforming industries in Europe.

With comprehensive expertise in data protection and digital regulation, he oversees the quality of the association’s policy deliverables and thought leadership, forecasts and analyses new legislation, and ensures compliance as DIGITALEUROPE’s data protection and antitrust officer.

Alberto previously led DIGITALEUROPE’s work in privacy, AI, data policy, cybersecurity, consumer policy and telecoms regulation. He also spent seven years at Qualcomm, addressing key issues in EU technology policy. As a Certified Information Privacy Professional (CIPP/E), Alberto holds advanced degrees in law, European studies, and diplomacy.

Moritz Hennemann, Professor and Co-Director of the Institute of Media and Information Law at the University of Freiburg Law Faculty

Moritz Hennemann has been a Professor and Co-Director of the Institute of Media and Information Law at the University of Freiburg Law Faculty since 2023.

His research focuses on digital societies and their legal framework – especially concerning Data Law, Data Protection Law, Anti-Trust Law, and Media Law. He has widely published in these fields – inter alia on the GDPR, the Data Act and the Data Governance Act –  and on global developments in data regulation.

He conducted his law studies in Heidelberg (2009), Oxford (M.Jur., 2011), and Freiburg (Dr. jur., 2011), he was a Postdoc at Freiburg (Habilitation, 2019) as well as a visiting researcher at Oxford (2023) and Harvard (2018). Between 2020 and 2023, he was a Professor at the University of Passau Law Faculty.

Klaus Müller, President of the Bundesnetzagentur

Klaus Müller took office as President of the Bundesnetzagentur in Bonn in March 2022. Before that, he was the executive director of the Federation of German Consumer Organisations (Verbraucherzentrale Bundesverband e.V.) in Berlin.

He held the same position at the North Rhine-Westphalia consumer organisation (Verbraucherzentrale Nordrhein-Westfalen e. V.) in Düsseldorf from 2006 to 2014. Klaus Müller was a member of the regional parliament of Schleswig-Holstein in Kiel for one year, where he also served as minister of the environment, nature conservation and agriculture from 2003 to 2005 and minister of the environment, nature and forestry from 2000 to 2003. He was a member of the German Bundestag in Bonn/Berlin for two years from 1998, having begun his professional career at the Schleswig-Holstein investment bank (IB.SH) in Kiel the same year following a degree in economics.

Klaus Müller is a member of the Heinrich Böll Foundation and a German Marshall Fund fellow.    

Thomas Petri, Bavarian State Commissioner for Data Protection

Thomas Petri studied law and worked from 1996 to 2000 as a lawyer in a commercial law firm. He then worked as a research associate with a research focus on constitutional law, police law and legal philosophy at the Johann Wolfgang Goethe University in Frankfurt.

After completing his doctorate, he moved to the Independent State Center for Data Protection in Schleswig-Holstein in the summer of 2000, where he was head of the department responsible for the supervision of the private sector. Four years later he was seconded as a research assistant to the First Senate of the Federal Constitutional Court. On July 1, 2006, he became Deputy Berlin Commissioner for Data Protection and Freedom of Information and Head of the Legal Department.

He became the Bavarian State Commissioner for Data Protection On July 1, 2009. In addition, he has been an honorary professor at the Munich University of Applied Sciences since March 30, 2016.

On 25 June 2021, the Bundesrat elected him as deputy member of the European Data Protection Board representing the federal states of Germany.

Katarzyna Prusak-Górniak, Head of Digital Affairs Section at the Polish Permanent Representation

Katarzyna Prusak-Górniak is legal adviser, graduate of the Jagiellonian University and the National School of Public Administration, Head of Digital Unit at the Permanent Representation of the Republic of Poland to the EU in Brussels, responsible for cybersecurity, personal data protection, eID, e-government and cloud computing. 

Former Director of the Legal Department in the Ministry of Digital Affairs. Vice Chair of the Governing Board of the European Cybersecurity Competence Centre (ECCC).

Irene Loizidou Nicolaidou, Deputy Chair of the European Data Protection Board

Irene Loizidou Nicolaidou has studied Law at the National and Kapodistrian University of Athens and graduated in 1999. She served as a lawyer until 2015, when she became Cyprus' Commissioner for Personal Data Protection. 

She was also elected to the Engomi Municipal Council for three terms and held leadership roles in the Council of Europe. 

As of December 2020, she also acts as Information Commissioner. Since May 25, 2023 Irene is the Deputy Chair of the European Data Protection Board.

Louisa Specht-Riemenschneider, German Federal Commissioner for Data Protection and Freedom of Information

Prof. Dr. Louisa Specht-Riemenschneider has been the Federal Commissioner for Data Protection and Freedom of Information since September 2024. She previously was chair for Civil Law, Data Economy Law, Data Protection, Digitization and Artificial Intelligence at the Rheinische Friedrich-Wilhelms-Universität Bonn.

She studied law in Bremen, completed her doctorate and habilitation in Freiburg and subsequently held professorships in Cologne and Passau. As director, she headed the Institute for Commercial and Business Law of the Faculty of Law and Political Science and the Center for Medical Data Usability and Translation (ZMDT). She also oversaw the establishment of the Data Institute under the leadership of the Federal Ministry for Economic Affairs and Climate Protection (BMWK) and the Federal Ministry of the Interior and Home Affairs (BMI).

Axel Voss, Member of the European Parliament, EPP

Born in 1963. North Rhine Westphalia. Study of Law at the Universities of Trier, Munich and Freiburg. 1994-2000 Legal Advice Officer, Citizens Advice Bureau of the European Commission, Representation in the Federal Republic of Germany. 2000-2009 Lecturer in European Studies at RheinAhrCampus Remagen (University of Applied Sciences). Since 2004 Chairman of the CDU Bonn regional party organisation.

Since 2005 Vice-Chairman of the CDU in the district Mittelrhein. Since 1994 Lawyer. From 2004 to 2009 chairman of the district of CDU in Bonn. From 2005 to October 2011 vice chairman of the district Mittelrhein. Since October 2011 Chairman of the district Mittelrhein. Since December 2010 chairman of the district of the Europa Union Bonn/Rhein-Sieg. MEP since 2009.

Wojciech Wiewiórowski, European Data Protection Supervisor, EDPS

Wojciech Wiewiórowski has been the European Data Protection Supervisor (EDPS) since December 6th 2019.

He is also an adjunct professor in the Faculty of Law and Administration of the University of Gdańsk. He was, among others, an adviser in the field of e-government and information society for the Minister of Interior and Administration, and the Director of the Informatisation Department at the Ministry of Interior and Administration in Poland. He also represented Poland in the committee on Interoperability Solutions for European Public Administrations (the ISA Committee) assisting the European Commission.

Wojciech Wiewiórowski was also the Inspector General for the Protection of Personal Data (Polish Data Protection Commissioner) between 2010-2014 and the Vice Chair of the Working Party Article 29 in 2014. In December 2014, he was appointed Assistant European Data Protection Supervisor. After the death of the Supervisor - Giovanni Buttarelli in August 2019 - he replaced Mr. Buttarelli as acting EDPS.

His areas of scientific activity include first of all Polish and European IT law, processing and security of information, legal information retrieval systems, informatisation of public administration, and application of new IT tools (semantic web, legal ontologies, cloud, blockchain) in legal information processing.