Karen O'Donoghue

Karen O’Donoghue is a recognized expert in network time-synchronization technologies and cybersecurity, with extensive technical and leadership experience across both government and industry. She has been a long-standing contributor to inter­national standards development through the IETF and IEEE, with a primary focus on securing and strengthening network time protocols.

Within the IETF, Karen chairs the Network Time Protocol (NTP) and JavaScript Object Signing and Encryption (JOSE) Working Groups. She also serves as co-coordinator of the Education and Outreach Directorate (EODIR) and co-chair of the IETF Working Group Chairs Forum, supporting collaboration and knowledge sharing across the standards community. In the IEEE, she chairs the IEEE 1588 Security Subcommittee, where she leads the development of security mechanisms for the Precision Time Protocol (PTP).

Karen brings more than three decades of technical and research experience, including senior roles as a civilian with the U.S. Navy and with the Internet Society. Her work has spanned network engineering, research analysis, and network time synchronization technologies. She now works with Meinberg, focusing exclusively on advancing secure time synchronization protocols.