Kay Chopard | Executive Director
Kantara Initiative, Inc

Ms. Kay Chopard is the Executive Director of the Kantara Initiative, a nonprofit organization that provides its members with opportunities to work on the development of digital identity standards and emerging technology issues. At Kantara, Ms. Chopard oversees a certification program for NIST 800-63-3 Digital Identity standards and will lead the update of the certification program when version 4 of 800-63 is released. She also directs a UK certification program for the Digital Identity and Attributes Trust Framework (DIATF), where Kantara Initiative Ltd has offices in the UK and is accredited as a certification body. She is a volunteer Ambassador for the U.S. in the global Women in Identity nonprofit association. With over 40 years of international experience in executive leadership in government, nonprofit, and business organizations, she excels at building networks and collaborations for winning partnerships. She is admitted to the practice of law in the state of Iowa and to the U.S. Supreme Court Bar. She has led several organizations, including:

• Executive Director of the National District Attorneys Association (NDAA) (2014-2017), serving as the first woman head of the world’s oldest and largest prosecutor organization.  She led the organization in creating a Women Prosecutors Section and a Metro DAs section, transforming the organization's business model to diversify revenue and significantly enhance its business operations. She also led the organization in the prosecutor role and legal policy in the use of digital evidence, especially video and body-worn camera programs.
• Executive Director of the Identity Ecosystem Steering Group (IDESG) (2012-2014 and again in 2017-2018), a nonprofit organization developed as a public-private partnership to implement the National Strategy for Trusted Identities in Cyberspace (NSTIC) in partnership with the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST), U.S. Department of Commerce.
• Deputy Executive Director of the National Criminal Justice Association (NCJA) (1999-2012), where she led training and technical assistance in strategic planning for state criminal justice agencies; coordinated state, tribal, and federal courts on domestic violence initiatives with the National Center for State Courts; transformed business operations through strategic planning and modernization; and built the training and technical assistance portfolio for the State Administrative Agency (SAA) members.  
• Acting Division Chief and lead program manager at the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) for ten years (1989-1999), where she created sustainable national training programs for both prosecutors and judges; established the National Traffic Law Center at NDAA; created the Judicial Fellowship program in partnership with the ABA Judicial Division; and managed a staff of twelve with a multi-million-dollar federal agency budget.

She lectures internationally and has authored several articles and white papers on digital identity, including certification programs, diversity and equity, the use of technology in the courts, primarily focusing on digital evidence, and legal policy related to privacy and security.