IAPP Asia Privacy Forum 2023

Simon Chesterman is the David Marshall professor and vice provost of educational innovation at the National University of Singapore, where he is also the founding dean of the National University of Singapore College. He serves as the senior director of artificial intelligence governance at AI Singapore and as editor of the Asian Journal of International Law. Previously, he was the dean of NUS Law from 2012 to 2022 and co-president of the Law Schools Global League from 2021 to 2023.

Educated in Melbourne, Beijing, Amsterdam and Oxford, Chesterman’s teaching experience includes periods at the University of Melbourne, the University of Oxford, the University of Southampton, Columbia University and Sciences Po. From 2006 to 2011, he was the global professor and director of the New York University School of Law Singapore program. Prior to joining NYU, he was a senior associate at the International Peace Academy and director of UN relations at the International Crisis Group in New York. He has also worked for the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs in Yugoslavia and interned at the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda.

Professor Chesterman is the author or editor of more than twenty books, including “We, the Robots?: Regulating Artificial Intelligence and the Limits of the Law”; “One Nation Under Surveillance”; “You, the People” and “Just War or Just Peace?”. He is an established authority on international law, and his work has opened up new areas of research on conceptions of public authority. This includes the rules and institutions of global governance; state-building and post-conflict reconstruction; the changing role of intelligence agencies; and the emerging role of artificial intelligence and big data. Chesterman also writes on legal education and higher education more generally, and he is the author of five novels including the “Raising Arcadia” trilogy and “Artifice.”

Lew Chuen Hong is the commissioner of Singapore’s Personal Data Protection Commission and the chief executive of the country’s Infocomm Media Development Authority. He represents Singapore for data protection and data innovation on the global stage and leads the development of Singapore’s personal data regulatory regime. Hong works to foster an environment of trust among businesses and consumers, contributing to a vibrant Singapore economy.

Beyond regulating data protection and promoting data innovation, he also undertakes educational and outreach activities to encourage businesses and institutions to adopt good data protection practices, while guiding individuals in how to protect their personal data from misuse.

Lew joins the commission after a distinguished 25-year career with the Republic of Singapore Navy. He was the Chief of Navy from 2017 to 2020 and oversaw Singapore’s maritime security operations during the Trump-Kim and ASEAN summits. He was conferred the Singapore Armed Forces Overseas Service Medal for his role supporting the reconstruction of Iraq.

In 2008, Lew assisted the Ministry of Trade and Industry in championing pro-enterprise policies to help local companies scale. He also drove the strategic review of the Research, Innovation and Enterprise 2015 plan, which sets out Singapore’s strategy and investments to grow the country’s knowledge-driven economy.

Lew graduated with a bachelor’s and master’s degrees in biology from Stanford University. He also holds a master’s in management as a Sloan Fellow of the Stanford Graduate School of Business. Lew had previously served on the boards of Duke-NUS Graduate Medical School, Maritime and Port Authority of Singapore and ST Engineering. He was also chair of the School of Applied Science Advisory Committee Board at Republic Polytechnic.

John Henry D. Naga, a lawyer with a passion for public service, is the privacy commissioner of the National Privacy Commission of the Philippines.

Before joining the national government, Naga served two terms as a provincial board member in the Province of Masbate. He also practiced under one of the top law firms in the Philippines and handled high-profile cases in labor, telecommunications and corporate law.

As the assistant secretary of the Department of Information and Communication Technology starting in 2016, Naga pushed forward several bills as the legislative liaison and became the representative of the department in various international commissions on information and communication technology. Acting Secretary Eliseo Rio later assigned Naga as his chief-of-staff.

Naga was appointed by President Rodrigo Duterte in June 2018 as the department’s undersecretary for management and operations, responsible for the overall internal management of the department. He led various technical working groups and was instrumental in securing the landing party agreement with Facebook that gave the Philippines two-terabyte internet capacity.

In February 2019, Naga began to head the development and innovations cluster of the department that leads the implementation of the National Broadband Plan, the National Government Portal, the Philippine Identification System and other projects.

He became a deputy commissioner of the National Privacy Commission in December 2019. While still in that role, he became the officer in charge in the commission’s Finance and Administrative Office and, later, the officer in charge in the commission’s Data Security and Compliance Office.

Naga is an alumnus of the San Beda University’s College of Law. He is married to a fellow lawyer, Katrina Naval-Naga, and they have two children. Naga considers being a husband and father as the most important roles in his life aside from public service.

In his role as privacy commissioner, Naga focuses on the efficient and effective enforcement of the law while protecting the data subjects’ rights and interests. He also works to ensure personal information controllers have the mechanisms that allow the exercise of such rights through simple and convenient procedures. He believes that compliance is not just for one commission. It is also for the people and for the country. Naga believes that protecting one another through compliance is the first step in achieving national stability and security.