Jayantha Fernando counts over 15 years exposure to a broad range of ICT legal issues, in several jurisdictions, covering ICT policy and legal reforms, negotiating and drafting Information System contracts and addressing Cyber Security & Internet Governance Issues.  

He holds a specialized Masters Degree (LLM) in IT & Communications Law from the University of London. He commenced his legal career as the Judicial Intern to the Snr Judge of the Supreme Court, and then practiced in the appellate courts before venturing into the field of ICT law. Since 1997 he played the lead strategic role in drafting several ICT related legislation in Sri Lanka. He was instrumental in drafting the Electronic Transactions Act No. 19 of 2006, the Computer Crimes Act No. 24 of 2007 and advised the formulation of the Payment Devices Frauds Act No. 30 of 2006, the Payment and Settlement Systems Act No. 28 of 2005 and the e-Government Policy framework (2009).

He is currently the Program Director & Legal Advisor at the ICT Agency of Sri Lanka (ICTA – www.icta.lk ). As a member of ICTA’s Leadership Team he shares responsibility for the operational management of ICTA and was a strategist behind the “e-Sri Lanka Development Project”, the flagship ICT initiative of the World Bank. He was instrumental in doing the legal blueprint to establish ICTA, which has now become a model institution driving ICT policy reform and implementing e-Development strategies. He also helped the establishment of Sri Lanka CERT. Jayantha also co-chaires the National Certification Authority Task force and led a number lead initiatives to strengthen the Information security framework in the Country.

In his spare time also lectures on a variety of ICT Law subjects at the Sri Lanka Law College, University of Colombo (Faculty of Law & UCSC), University of Moratuwa, (Dept of Computer Science and Engineering) and Defence Command and Staff College.

In the International arena he was involved in the following:-

-       Legal Advise on ICT legal aspects to several International Law Firms and Multinational Companies and Consulting assignments with USAID and SIDA on ICT Policy & Legal issues and negotiating large IT contracts for World Bank projects

-       Participated in the drafting of the UN Electronic Communications Convention at the UNCITRAL Working Group on e-Commerce.  

-       Became the first Sri Lankan to be elected as Vice Chair of the ICANN’s Government Advisory Committee (GAC) - (2007-2011), and also served in the ICANN Nominating Committee, including as its Associate Chair (2005-07). He currently serves in the 21 member global Internet Registry Services Technical Evaluation Panel.

Jayantha Fernando is both a British Chevening Scholar (2002) and an Eisenhower fellow (2012- SARP)