CO-FOUNDER

Prior to founding illuminate tech in January 2024, George worked in Ofcom’s online safety policy team. His role encompassed ensuring policy development was tech-literate, supporting transparency reporting on regulated services, and building collaborative relationships with other regulators, particularly on age assurance.

A strong communicator with a passion for storytelling, George believes that tech companies can benefit from doing the right thing by making responsible design a key aspect of their brand. He founded illuminate tech alongside Asad to make this vision a reality.

George’s career in online safety began working in a safety-tech start-up environment, before moving to work on a European Commission funded project made up of a consortium of businesses, universities, and non-profits. With a knack for developing partnerships, he is a fascinated by the challenge of building more effective relationships between the public sector, private sector, academia and civil society.

CO-FOUNDER

Prior to joining illuminate tech, Asad led Ofcom’s Digital Identity team during the passage and implementation of the Online Safety Act. He oversaw Ofcom’s technical research into age assurance and digital identity technologies, including developing Ofcom’s approach to evaluating effectiveness.

Asad completed his PhD in Digital Identity, before lecturing in computer science at King’s College London. He left academia to help organisations transform their digital identity and access management systems.

Asad is a leading expert on the responsible design, testing, and implementation of age assurance and digital identity technologies, with extensive experience supporting non-specialist audiences to make informed decisions when adopting new tools.

Asad’s experience providing technical expertise to academic, private sector, and public sector institutions leaves him uniquely placed to work collaboratively on complex projects at the intersection of technology and regulation.