Dr Albert Antwi-Boasiako
About me
For more than a decade, Dr Albert Antwi-Boasiako has been pioneering cybersecurity development activities on the African continent in both the private and public sectors. He established the e-Crime Bureau in Ghana in 2011 as the first cybersecurity and digital forensics lab in West Africa with a dedicated digital forensics lab; an initiative which supported law enforcement and national agencies to successfully investigate and prosecute cybercrimes. His work through the e-Crime Bureau resulted in his engagement across the African continent with considerable activities in Kenya, Uganda, South Africa, Morrocco, Nigeria and Ghana.
His extensive work in the private sector led to his engagements for a number of international organisations including the UNODC, United Nations Conference on Trade & Development (UNCTAD), the European Union, Commonwealth Cybercrime Initiative (CCI) of the Commonwealth Secretariat, Global Commission on Internet Governance (GCIG)/Royal Institute of International Affairs (Chatham House) and the Inter-Governmental Action Group against Money Laundering in West Africa (GIABA), among others. Dr. Antwi-Boasiako also served as an Expert on the Council of Europe’s Global Action on Cybercrime Extended (GLACY+) Project, even before he was appointed to serve in the public office in Ghana, later serving as the National Coordinator of GLACY+ Project
From July 2017 to September 2021, the Author was appointed as the National Cybersecurity Advisor and the Head of the then National Cyber Security Centre (NCSC) which was established in 2018. In this role, he led the institutionalisation of Ghana’s cybersecurity development which progressed from 32.6% in 2017 to 99.27% in 2024, according to the ITU’s GCI, which currently ranks Ghana as a tier-1 category, a role model country for cybersecurity development globally. In October 2021, Dr Antwi-Boasiako was appointed as the first Director-General of the Cyber Security Authority, a lead agency responsible for Ghana’s cybersecurity regulations and development. In his government role, he led the passage of Ghana’s landmark Cybersecurity Act, 2020 (Act 1038) and the revision and adoption of a new National Cybersecurity Policy & Strategy which was adopted by the government of Ghana in 2024.
Dr Antwi-Boasiako led Ghana’s technical leadership for the ratification of the Convention on Cybercrimes (Budapest Convention) and the African Union Convention against Cyber Security and Personal Data Protection (Malabo Convention). He has also led the Cyber Security Authority to implement a number of pioneering cybersecurity initiatives including the implementation of the Critical Information Infrastructure protection programme, licensing and accreditation of cybersecurity service providers, cybersecurity establishments and cybersecurity professionals, as well as the institutionalisation of awareness creation activities for children, the public, businesses and government. The above pioneering interventions underpin Ghana’s significant cybersecurity development over the past seven years, with Ghana recognising a leader in cybersecurity in the region by a number of independent studies and also by cybersecurity development partners.
The Author completed his PhD studies at the University of Pretoria in South Africa, introducing the Harmonised Model for Digital Evidence Admissibility Assessment (HM-DEAA) as a ground-breaking contribution to digital forensics standardisation. Dr. Antwi-Boasiako graduated from the University of Trento in Italy for his undergraduate programme and the University of Portsmouth in the United Kingdom for his postgraduate programme, receiving cum laude and distinction respectively.
Through his work, Dr Antwi-Boasiako has featured as a speaker in more than 100 international and domestic conferences, workshops and forums. He has also delivered training and capacity building programmes in a number of countries in Africa, Asia, Europe, Latin America and the Pacific, among others. He has engaged with a number of international organisations and development partners on cybersecurity development activities. These organisations and development partners include the World Bank, the World Economic Forum, International Telecommunications Union, Global Forum for Cyber Expertise (GFCE), United Nations, UNICEF, Security Governance Initiative (SGI), and Freedom Online Coalition, among others. Dr. Antwi-Boasiako has previously served on the Independent Advisory Committee (IAC) of the Global Internet Forum to Counter Terrorism (GIFCT) and served as a Bureau Member of the Cybercrime Convention Committee (T-CY) of the Council of Europe. He is also a member of the World Economic Forum’s Global Coalition for Digital Safety.
The Author has served as the Government of Ghana’s representative on ECOWAS’ Regional Technical Committee (RTC) on Cybersecurity and Chairs the African Network of Cybersecurity Authorities (ANCA), an elected position to drive continental cybersecurity development and cooperation at the operational level. The Author currently chairs the Joint Cybersecurity Committee (JCC), an interagency cybersecurity coordinating committee in Ghana. In June 2021, he was recognised as the world’s 20th most Influential Security Executive in the Cybersecurity Category by IFSEC Global. He has also received a number of industry awards both in Ghana and abroad including Top 20 Tech Leaders Awards 2022 by the Ghana Information Technology & Telecom Awards and Most Outstanding Personality Award by the Internet Society, Ghana Chapter.
Dr Antwi-Boasiako continues to lecture at a number of academic institutions and research centres, including the Kofi Annan International Peacekeeping Training Centre (KAIPTC) and the Kwame Nkrumah University of Science and Technology (KNUST), both in Ghana. Dr Antwi-Boasiako has several publications covering information technology, cybersecurity, cybercrimes, data protection and digital forensics to his credit.
The Author has also founded the Education for Development (E4D) Foundation, a non-profit and nongovernmental organisation established to support the education of the underprivileged in Ghana. The establishment of the E4D Foundation is premised on what Plato, an ancient Greek philosopher rightly indicated in The Republic - “the direction in which education starts a man will determine his future in life”. The Foundation has been established purposely to support this journey of the underprivileged to change their narratives.