Don Stikvoort is managing director and co-founder of the Dutch company “S-CURE”, offering senior consultancy and management services in the areas of Internet and intranet security, specialising in “security incident management (CERT)”. He has worked in the security area for over 20 years. He holds an MSc (hons) degree in Physics, but began as an Infantry platoon commander in the Dutch Army. in 1988, he joined SURFnet, the Dutch national research and educational network where he helped to create the European Internet, RIPE, the European cooperation of CERTs (TF-CSIRT) and the NL domain registry from 1989 onwards. He was chairman of CERT-NL (now SURFcert) from 1992-1998.
In 1998 he co-founded STELVIO, a Dutch company specialising in Internet related consultancy. Within STELVIO he helped build Kennisnet, the Dutch schools’ network connecting over 10,000 schools. He helped to setup several CERTs, such as GOVCERT.NL, CERT-AMC (Amsterdam academic hospital), CERT-RU (Nijmegen University CERT) and Philips. In 2002/2003 Don was co-ordinator of eCSIRT.net, a successful EU funded CERT research project. He left STELVIO in 2004 to continue with S-CURE.
Don was and is an active participant in communities like FIRST, TF-CSIRT and the IETF. Together with Dr. Klaus-Peter Kossakowski he initiated the closer cooperation of European CERTs in 1993 and has contributed since that time to the efforts leading to a more structured European incident coordination. From 1996-8 he was actively involved in helping FIRST to evolve its organisation. In 1998 he finished the first version of the “Handbook for Computer Security Incident Response Teams (CSIRTs)” together with Kossakowski and Moira J. West-Brown of CERT/CC. Don was chairman of the Program Committee for the 1999 FIRST conference in Brisbane, Australia. He set up the international FIRST Secretariat in 1999 and was responsible for it until mid 2007. He is among the first two Europeans accredited by CERT/CC as “Certified Incident Handler” in 2004.
Don is currently a consultant in various security related projects. He helped to set up the European Trusted Introducer service – that offers an independent accreditation and certification process for European CERTs.
From 2002-2009 he acquired accreditations as certified trainer in NLP, timeline therapy and hypnotherapy. This work also directly benefits Don’s security in many ways.