It is a true pleasure to be here today. I am delighted to be in a room full of people who are working to create a new and smarter world.

It may not seem like the obvious fit – having someone from the Department of State here to talk about the Internet of Things or Smart City technology – but these are among the growing suite of issues that are drivers for 21^st century foreign policy.

Science and technology are in fact critical for much of U.S. diplomacy – whether it be promoting innovation and economic growth, developing sound trade policies, protecting the global environment or mitigating the proliferation of weapons of mass destruction.

Recognizing this growing reality, and building on the recommendations from the U.S. National Academy of Sciences, the State Department created my position – Science and Technology adviser to the Secretary of State. Now in my 3^rd month into my 2-3 year tenure, and the 5^th Adviser, I find myself focusing on three broad issues.

1^st – Helping to ensure the State Department leadership is aware of emerging technologies and trends that could change the very nature of engagement around the world.

2^nd – Coordinating science fellowship programs at State to ensure that we have the best science and engineering talent and capacity at the agency that better connects us to the vast resources of the U.S. science enterprise while helping us understand and confront the technical issues affecting the pressing challenges. (Mention the 100+ scientists and engineers)

3^rd – And finally, strengthening the science and technology relationship with key countries and regions for our foreign policy. This is what we call science diplomacy, and we are already witnessing what is possible with this tool in the daily exchanges between our scientists in the United States and Cuban researchers. We now work together on everything from coral reef ecosystem sustainability to neuroscience research projects, to the internet.

Ultimately, I ensure that the State Department, in coordination with academia, technical government agencies and private sector institutions, fully leverages burgeoning technological areas to meet our foreign policy goals.

One of the fields with the fastest disruption – positive and negative – touching our daily lives is Information Communication Technology. ICTs play a major role in the global economy, and in our ability to communicate and coordinate broadly across national boundaries. It has been projected that by 2020 there could be 50 billion devices connected, and the Internet of Things could generate $1.7 trillion in spending within the same time period.

Recently, my office visited the e-Estonia Showroom in Tallinn, Estonia to understand the mechanisms of digitalizing a society. This amazing ICT platform offers a wide range of public services such as online voting, income tax return filing in just five minutes, and business registration in approximately 20 minutes, to name a few.

These e-solutions have created an increased level of government transparency and accessibility, convenient way to exchange data, a more informed population, and prosperous environment for business and entrepreneurship.

Inside the United States Government we are also using IoT to monitor air quality. Secretary Kerry and EPA Administrator Gina McCarthy signed a statement earlier this year launching a new air quality partnership between the U.S. Department of State and the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) to monitor air pollution.

AirNow is an online platform that helps Americans understand how clean or polluted their outdoor air is. The Department of State plans to place air quality monitors at select American diplomatic posts where continuous fine particle pollution data is currently of limited availability, and to publicly share this data through EPA’s AirNow website.

So as you can plainly see, the State Department is already a leader in Smart City technologies...

In September, the United Nations ratified a set of Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) that provide a broad set of milestones and targets for the world to work towards over the coming years. Encompassing smart agriculture, sustainable cities, and conservation on land and in our oceans, many of these SDGs will rely heavily on Internet of Things and Smart Cities

Likewise, challenges such as climate change, a sustainable ocean and wildlife trafficking, that the Secretary of State has asked all of us at my agency to take on – will be well-served by advances in IoT. Thus, the work you are doing holds great promise for finding solutions at home and abroad.

My office works closely with Cyber Physical Systems office here at NIST to help spread the word and increase participation in the Global City Teams Challenge to help meet some of these goals. We know that a single entity will not develop the Internet of Things or Smart City technologies – the area is just too vast. Through international collaboration we will create a more connected world.

We work closely with our Environment, Science, Technology, and Health Embassy Hubs. In particular, our hub in Copenhagen [Denmark] has been reaching out to their local Smart City and IoT stakeholders to encourage participation in the Global City Teams Challenge. This is one way international collaborations will generate the next major breakthrough.

But the success of the Smart Cities will depend in part on the continued health and vitality of the global Internet. We must remember that the Internet of Things is about much more than just the Internet we access today – it is about the Internet interacting with the physical world to a degree far beyond where we are now.

As with some of the Internet’s previous technology inflection points, the emergence of IoT has caused some to call for increased governmental involvement in standardization and regulation. We believe it would be detrimental to this dynamic ecosystem to shackle it with regulation, particularly a one-size-fits-all regulation.

Last May, Secretary Kerry laid out the core tenets of the United States’ beliefs when it comes to the Internet.

We believe that the Internet should be open and accessible to everyone.

We believe it should be interoperable, so it can connect seamlessly across international borders. We believe people have the same rights of free expression online as they possess offline. We believe countries should work together to deter and respond effectively to online threats.

And we believe digital policy should seek to fulfill technology’s potential as a vehicle for global stability and sustained economic development; as an innovative way to enhance the transparency of governments and hold governments accountable; and also as a means for social empowerment through free expression in a highly democratic space.

I do not need to encourage anyone here today to work on the Internet of Things. You all already understand the potential it yields for economic growth for your businesses, and the benefits it may yield for individuals and societies across the globe.

I will encourage you, however, to take up and build upon the best practices in this space, and to thoughtfully consider how to deal with issues of privacy, security, and the vast amounts of data that will be collected and shared by Smart Cities. Let’s continue to work together to create a more connected and sustainable world.

Thank you.