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Boards & Engagements

Louisiana Governor’s Commission on Cybersecurity

Louisiana Governor’s Commission on Cybersecurity (Cyber Commission) was created to address the growing cyber threat to networks, personal privacy, and critical infrastructure. The Cyber Commission is a statewide partnership comprised of key stakeholders, subject matter experts, and cybersecurity professionals from Louisiana's public sector, private industry, academia, and law enforcement. It serves as an advisory body to the State of Louisiana Senior Administration Officials in matters related to cybersecurity. UL Lafayette strongly participates in several committees of the Commission. 

The following faculty and staff are active members of the Commission:

  • Dr. Ramesh Kolluru, Vice President for Research, Innovation, and Economic Development at UL Lafayette, is a member of the Cyber Commission. He chairs the Information Sharing and Integration Committee and co-chairs the Cyber Risk, Assets, and Capabilities Assessment Committee. 
  • Dr. Lakhotia is a member of the Committee on Workforce Development, Education, and Public Outreach of the Cyber Commission.
  • Dr. Edwards is a Cyber Risk, Assets, and Capabilities Assessment Committee member.

Louisiana Supply Chain Transportation Council

The State Legislature established the Louisiana Supply Chain Transportation Council (SCTC) after the 2016 floods with the charter “to study and make recommendations regarding increasing resilience in various modes of transportation through increased communication, collaboration, development of geographic information technologies, and innovations in transportation.”The Council's primary goal is to assess and mitigate cybersecurity risks to critical public and private sector supply chains and transportation networks.

The following faculty and staff are active members of the Council:

  • Dr. Ramesh Kolluru is the Chair of the Council’s Technology and Innovation Committee, overseeing the above activity.

Ostrom Workshop on Cybersecurity and Internet Governance at Indiana University

The Ostrom Workshop focuses on studying governance related to various research areas. Its Cybersecurity and Internet Governance encourages a polycentric approach to both Internet governance and cybersecurity risk management with scholars coming from diverse backgrounds including, but not limited to: Secure Computing, Law, Business, Criminology, Economics, Ethics, Public Policy, Media, Education, Psychological and Brain Sciences, Political Science, and International Relations. Only through such a multi-disciplinary, multi-sector, multi-stakeholder partnership might meaningful progress be made toward engendering sustainable models of Internet governance and equitable cyber peace.

  • Dr. Edwards is a member of the Ostrom Workshop. He focuses on the economics of privacy, expectations of privacy, probable cause to obtain data from devices, public reaction to corporate cooperation with law enforcement, trade-offs between privacy and convenience, and consumer valuation of privacy.

Industry Startup and Incubator

Dr. Lakhotia is actively transitioning cybersecurity research into practice. He founded a startup, Cythereal, Inc., to transition the fruits of his research into practice. The company has attracted $1M in seed capital from Valmiki 504 Capital of New Orleans (a subsidiary of Valmiki Capital of New York). Dr. Lakhotia is also a founder and Managing Director of an incubator, TopXight LA, a subsidiary of TopXight Labs, NY. TopXight LA specializes in bringing early-stage cybersecurity technology to market. Dr. Lakhotia is also a member of Opportunity Machine (OM), an incubator of the Lafayette Economic Development Authority (LEDA).